A good friend of mine gave a great assessment of The Avengers movie… he said he loved the movie, but they took too long to pull the team together. Wow… AWESOME observation. In fact, that was my one fault of the movie… once they assembled the team, the movie took off.
Many of us do the same thing in ministry… we take WAY too long to assemble a strong team. We know we can’t pull off by ourselves what God has called us to do, so why do we wait? For us, it really could be any of a number of things: we don’t know how to do it, we don’t want to do it, we’re afraid to do it, or we simply don’t think it’s important to do it. But the bottom line is that we move FURTHER and FASTER in a team environment. I’ve had more and more guys ask me in recent weeks/months about some of the things we did well at Mosaic, and some of the things that we could’ve done better. Building teams was definitely an area I could have done a whole lot better…
We were made for teams. This is why the apostle Paul talks about the importance of BODY LIFE in 1 Corinthians 12… none of us can fulfill every role needed in the body, so God has created us to be interdependent – needing one another individually in order to make the whole work together properly. When we see a person with one arm, we know there’s a problem. When we come across a person who has no sight, we automatically know she cannot function at peak performance. When one or more parts of your body are inoperable, you are severely limited. Yes, you can make up for the difference, but how much better it would be to just have the use of that part!
What’s true of our bodies and the body of Christ… is also especially true of ministry teams. When a leader or leaders fail to build a strong team, you can count on several things happening:
– People don’t know what’s going on. When a leader(s) doesn’t pull his team together, he inevitably goes it alone… he becomes a solo leader – he is basically the only one who knows what’s going on from day to day.
– Morale wanes. When people don’t know what’s going on, they eventually become demotivated… and not only does morale wane, but ministry tends to drop off, as well.
– Distrust sets in. This might be the most severe. Leaders who don’t build into their team come across as distrusting. After all, why would they not keep people in the loop? This only builds a cycle of distrust: “Top man doesn’t trust me… I’m not gonna trust him.” This is DAMAGING… and it displeases the Lord.
No team… no dream. Keep your people in the loop… build community with your leaders… dream with them, so that they feel ownership for the ministry.
If we don’t model teamwork… we will never make our dream work.
The Plum Line 