A Theology of Church Leadership: Book Review/Plug

Richards, Lawrence O. A Theology Of Church Leadership. The Zondervan Corporation, Grand Rapids, MI, 1980. Ppg 399.

Throughout one’s reading collection, there are books that rattle our cage, others strengthen our positions one way or the other, others move you from one position to the other at rapid speeds, others awaken curiosity, while other cause such deep impact that you wonder why no one ever told you such beautiful truths before. Well this work did a few of those things for me. I had already begun to question much of what Christians call leadership especially in the local church. That is because my view of the Church had already moved from organization to organism. I had already begun to view the church for a radically different paradigm than I had during the early and formative years of my Christianity and “Church Leadership” gave me the gentle nudge and encouragement to help solidify such a position.

This book is broken up into four main parts with about 26 sup-points under them. The four main points are: Theological Foundation: The Church and It’s Leadership, Understanding Enterprise, Biblical Principles of Church Leadership: A Description of Allegiance and How Leaders Build Allegiance and finally The Shape of Tomorrow. The first and the third parts are the vast majority of the book and rightfully so, because there is where the meat of church leadership is found. I will write about each part, what I felt  was important in those parts and then sum it up at the end.

Theological Foundation

Mr. Richards gets off on the right foot. He says on page 37:

Scripture teaches that in its essential nature the church is a living organism. We are members of a body, not an institution. Any expression the church takes must be an expression in harmony with its nature, not a stumbling copy of man’s notions for organizing institutions.

If we miss this we miss it all. This is the cornerstone of church leadership. If we treat the church like a common organization then its purpose and plan will be missed and the practical outworking will start off fast in the wrong direction and as we have seen it is nearly impossible to convince it that it is going the wrong way because it has been travelling the road for so long.

This following quote is long but I have to type it all so none of it is missed and the context misapplied. On page 75 he says:

One of the drawbacks to working with the church as though it were an institution is that an institutional approach to Christian life gradually robs us of our awareness of the supernatural.  It is not hard to understand why. Leaders in an organization are always dealing with problems related to maintaining the institution and planning for the achievement of its goals. They must deal with budget and staffing. They must plan new buildings and maintain the old ones. They need to set goals and then set up committees and councils and other organizations to reach them. Even in their counseling and teaching they tend to focus on problems in their relationships with people.  Even with the use of good management techniques, the come to think of the saints in relation to whether they help or frustrate the leaders’ plans and hopes. The exercise of managerial skills being to dominate more and more of their attention and demand more and more of their time. Many who entered the pastorate burdened to minister have left, discouraged by all they are required to do simply to keep the organization functioning and its agencies and activities on track.

Enough said there.  On page 77 he talks about how many leaders have taken on responsibilities that “are not really theirs”. And says “no wonder they feel burdened”. He brings in a principle called release (I wrote about this and must find it) This is the practice of simply “affirming Jesus as the head of His church and giving the burdens that are His back to Him”.

On page 92 he moves into what the responsibility of leaders are. He says:

The responsibility of leaders is not to manage the church. They are not to be God’s voice of authority in the body. The responsibilities of leaders is the care and nurture of believers. The Human leaders in the church use their wisdom and maturity to “guide” the congregation and individual members into growing ways of life so that when Jesus speaks, His body will be healthy and responsive.

He then moves into the identity of leaders which is servanthood. Much has been written on this subject and many sermons preached but I have rarely seen the servanthood of Jesus practiced by leaders today.

Understanding Enterprise

Mr. Richards does a great job distinguishing organization from organism and the goals of each in part two of his work. Here plain in simple he says the goal of an organization is the organization itself, the health, survival of and even the profitability and people are second. In an organism such as the church this can never be and whenever a church begins to operate in the survival of the organization over the growth and development of the people at all cost, you best believe that church is not functioning under the direction of the head. It has adopted enterprise goals and has lost its ability to do what it is called to be. (ppgs 161-173)

Allegiance

This part of the book alone is worth its weight in platinum! There are too many quotes and I have practically highlighted the entire part. But here are two and hopefully if you are a leader or even if not you would meditate on these two quotes, please read this part of the book. On page 22o he says:

Allegiance to one another in the body of Christ is based on love, expressed as love and experienced through love. We cannot live as the church unless we are growing in our personal relationships with each other, and deepening in our devotion to each other.

A little longer quote is found on 226 in relation to leaders developing interaction:

How do we develop a climate of love and openness where impersonal institutional patters may have long been established? Some suggest that the institutional church must be abandoned and a new form adopted. Others opt for starting new congregations, where they fell there will be no need to “fight” established patterns. It’s true that it is difficult to work toward a change of patterns that are deeply ingrained. But since the church is the body of Christ, and Jesus is the Lord of the church, He is powerful and able to work within His people. We would be wrong to quickly or lightly abandon brothers and sisters because we are discouraged about the unbiblical patterns that have become established in the congregation. Instead we need, without criticism, or antagonism, for what the body now is, to work toward the reality described in Scripture as the heritage of a church that is family and that is body.

Some other subpoints that I enjoyed were Body Organization and Ownership, Consensus and Freedom. Both are huge in the way we build allegiance to one another and to Christ.

The Shape of Tomorrow

The final part is the shortest. However, he asks a question that I wanted to quote on page 399 he asks:

Why then would anyone choose the type of leadership suggested here rather than one of the “success” models taken from secular management systems or recommended by “superchurch” promoters? We can think of only one compelling reason: It is biblical. It honors Jesus as the living, capable head of His own body, and we must honor His instructions.

Conclusion

Mr. Richards does a fine job of not promoting in “step” related methodology. He simply promotes and advocates a living, thriving, discerning relationship with the Head of the Church. Why turn to plans we Jesus knows best. Also why turn to secular leadership models or borrow from pseudo-christian leadership networks that are just modified business strategies cloaked in theological jargon? We don’t need them folks! We don’t need them. Success in the church is not defined by success in the world. An organism does not employ the same methods to grow and become successful that an organization does. We need to scratch the way we have turned the church into an enterprise and ask the head what does He want, unless of course we believe we know better! I recommend this work 100 times over please it is worth every penny then more.  Not to mention it was written 30 years ago