LEADING THE FAITH COMMUNITY A BIBLICAL PRIMER (3)

What Leaders Do (1) The Five-Fold Mandate

The Prophetic Task: Challenge the Status Quo What is broke and how would God want it fixed? What is not working and needs to be changed? What is out of line with the standards of God’s Kingdom and requires adjustment? What is unethical and needs to become righteous? What is self-centered and how will it become other-centered? What is small-minded and in what manner will it grow to be Kingdom-minded? What is culturally-conditioned and needs to break out of the restrictions of human thinking? What is defined by an obsolete past and has to be brought into present realities? What is transient and needs more solid historical, theological, and confessional grounding? What is an old wine-skin practice that needs to be replaced with new wine-skin initiatives?

The Kingly Task: Inspire a Shared Vision What does the Kingdom of God look like? What would Jesus do? What is the next hill to take? How big is the love of God that sweeps us up in its passions? What are the marks of the church when it is running on all cylinders? What is the next task that Jesus gives to us? How does our neighborhood know that God lives, and lives through us? What are the dynamics of orthopraxy that emerge from our orthodoxy? What is God’s mission in this community and how will God engage us to do it? What is the dream? Who is dreaming it? How will it become a reality?

The Priestly Task: Enable Others to Act How has sin created barriers between ourselves and God, and how can these be addressed? How has sin created barriers between ourselves and one another, and how can these be addressed? How has sin broken down our society’s functioning, and what redemptive renewal will bring back life and health? How are we out of touch with God’s creational plans of goodness, and where will these come to expression again through our combined efforts before God? Where might we be “quenching the Spirit” (1 Thessalonians 5:19), and how should we release the Spirit’s power? How is prayer the vital breath of our community? In what way does worship nourish and sustain our collective identity? On whose behalf should we be interceding and why?

The Eldership Task: Encourage the Heart What is the relational temperature of our community and how can it become warmer? Who are our encouragers and how can they become our guides and mentors? What is the tone of my communications and those from our leaders and leadership teams? Do others find care and hope through our words or are they stiffly rebuffed or accused or verbally insulted? How are the lives of our younger members affirmed and nurtured to greater maturity? In what manner are the different social groupings in our fellowship acknowledged and respected? How is hospitality a growing quality of our fellowship? How do those who are not currently members or “insiders” find access to this hospitality? Is it proactive or merely reactive? How are those who provide leadership and express qualities of Christ’s care recognized and affirmed?

The Diaconal Task: Model the Way Read Acts 6 and reflect on the manner in which the first Deacons were identified, and what responsibilities were given to them: What is a Deacon? Who is a Deacon? How are our teachings and behaviors lining up? Where do our behaviors need to be altered to connect more fully with our teachings? What is the integrity factor in my life? What am I asking of others that I have not yet begun to do in my own life? Why? If a deaf person were to observe me for a week, what report would she make on who I am and what I do? C. S. Lewis wrote of Charles Williams that he could do whatever he pleased, because he truly sought to please his father; how might this become an analogy for how I live and what could be said of our community? What actions and behaviors ought we to nurture more fully as we seek to represent Christ in this community?