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Leading Ideas
Delivered every Wednesday, our free e-newsletter Leading Ideas offers articles by thoughtful, cutting-edge leaders on subjects you care about — navigating change, reaching younger people, financing your ministry, communicating effectively — to help you be the leader God is calling you to be.

The Lewis Center is committed to helping congregations and denominations thrive and grow by providing ideas, research, resources, and training for vital and fruitful leadership. Through Leading Ideas, we share vignettes of leaders and congregations, book reviews, leadership quotes, and helpful “right questions” built around the premise that leaders don’t need answers — they need to know the right questions.

Leading Ideas
0 Moving Beyond Geographic Boundaries

Where is your church called to serve? Many churches think of their outreach area in limited geographical terms. By this measure, the growth potential in First Sedalia United Methodist Church (UMC) might not seem promising. Sedalia, Missouri, a town of 21,000, has been the same size for nearly 50 years. It is stable but not growing. Established by a circuit…

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Leading Ideas
0 What You Told Us About Your Summer Worship

Last month, the Lewis Center administered a survey about whether and in what ways churches change worship practices during the summer. While this was not a scientific survey, the responses do give some clues for church leaders. Some initial observations from the first 132 churches responding are: Forty-five percent report making changes, with 55 percent not doing so. Among those…

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Leading Ideas
0 Know Your Purpose

When Rabbi Noah, Rabbi Mordecai’s son, assumed the succession after his father’s death, his disciples noticed that there were a number of ways in which he conducted himself differently than his father, and asked him about this. “I do just as my father did,” Rabbi Noah replied. “He did not imitate, and I do not imitate.” (Kurtz and Ketcham, The…

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Leading Ideas
0 Helping a Congregation Connect to Mission

My congregation has been in an ongoing mission partnership with the Child Rescue Center and Mercy Hospital in Sierra Leone, Africa, since 2000. However, there is always a need to find fresh, new ways to help the congregation feel connected with this project. During a recent mission trip, we did two things that made this mission connection come alive for…

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Leading Ideas
0 Moving Beyond Personal Preferences into Missional Thinking

Being missional does not mean doing things the way we like them. It means to take the gospel into the context where we have been called … and, to some degree, to let the church take the best shape that it can in order to reach a specific culture. However, the problem is our preferences. You can’t be missional and…

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Leading Ideas
0 Preaching in the Small Membership Church

Lew Parks’s newest book is ostensibly a preaching primer with good, solid advice on some of the basics, such as selecting a good biblical translation and commentary, research and preparation, and effective delivery. But at a deeper level, his discussion of the preaching task provides a conceptual framework for exploring the contextual dynamics and leadership imperatives unique to smaller congregations.…

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Leading Ideas
0 Do Male and Female Pastors Lead Differently?

What do we know about the differences between men and women serving as lead pastors of large congregations? Not enough. But we do know more now from the United Methodist context because of a project undertaken by the General Board of Higher Education and Ministry. Although there may be differences between how male and female lead pastors see themselves and…

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Leading Ideas
0 Leading a Ministry with Homeless People

When Jesus walked on earth, he taught about the kingdom while he healed the sick, restored sight to the blind, and fed the hungry. Today, we are called to meet the physical as well as the spiritual needs of people — all people — in our communities. In fact, hurting and hungry people won’t believe we care if they only…

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Leading Ideas
0 Authenticity in Leadership

When I walk into a church, I can tell almost immediately if the leader is authentic, transparent, and warm. If so, the entire congregation exudes these qualities. It is almost palpable. People greet me warmly, and there is a vibrant sense of life in the air. If, though, the leader values safety over spontaneity, I sense that people don’t really…

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Leading Ideas
0 Helping Families Cope during Pastoral Transitions

We are often unaware of the grieving that goes on in our families and our congregations around times of transition. Spouses, for example, may feel resentment about not having more say in the move. Remember that transitions can be stressful times for relationships. Sharing feelings and permitting others to do so is emotionally freeing for everyone. Other common concerns for…

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Leading Ideas
0 All Things New

As I was driving back to my office after taking my husband to the airport, I was a little worried because he was flying on an airline that had had a plane crash the day before. My concern prompted me to reflect on my life as I sped along. “I love my life!” I thought to myself. As a society,…

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Leading Ideas
0 Leading the Small Membership Church

Small membership churches have a history of making do without a lot of leadership from persons outside. Many were started by laypersons gathered in homes, sometimes in response to some traveling evangelist’s preaching, but often by their own initiative. Through the years, most small membership churches have been subject to frequent turnover of clergy leadership. Is it any wonder that…

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Leading Ideas
0 Palms in the Park on Palm Sunday

During the Easter Season, the First United Methodist Church in New Braunfels, Texas, launched an outreach event in the heart of our city. Our goal was to take our worship service to the people instead of asking them to come to us. With that in mind, we rented space in Landa Park, a natural area at the heart of our…

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Leading Ideas
0 Your Church’s Creation Story

In The Contrarian’s Guide to Leadership, University of Southern California president Steven Sample makes the case that all leaders should discern the creation story for their organization. A creation story is a brief overview of the organization’s history that recounts how the organization got started, what motivated its founders, notable accomplishments over the years, and why it is important today. Articulating…

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Leading Ideas
0 Congregational Integrity

We rightfully expect personal integrity in our leaders. Should we not also ask whether our congregation has integrity? The behavior of organizations is as important as that of individual leaders. What a church is as an institution may very well have more impact on people than what it says to them. This may be all the more critical as we…

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Leading Ideas
0 Clergy Health — A Mixed Portrait

Studies of clergy beginning in the 1700s consistently found that clergy lived longer than other professionals. But by the middle of the twentieth century something was changing. Clergy could no longer claim that distinction. Indeed, concern about the state of clergy health is mounting steadily — due in part to heightened health consciousness in our culture broadly, but more specifically…

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Leading Ideas
0 Giving Up to Our Potential

The oft-repeated claim that churchgoers are the most generous of Americans was always a reassurance to me as I labored in the vineyard of stewardship ministry — and a source of pride, as well. Unfortunately, however, it turns out this claim is not entirely true. There are other religious givers who are far more charitable than Christians. And even though…

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Leading Ideas
0 Establishing New Congregations Reaches New People

The experience across all denominations shows how critical establishing new congregations is to reaching new populations. The United Church of Christ (UCC) has embarked on an ambitious effort to start new congregations to increase their presence and witness among the growing populations in the United States. Despite recent high numbers of new church starts, there will need to be higher…

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Leading Ideas
0 Effective Ministry with Children

One of the most important challenges facing our society today is the moral and spiritual development of our children. The questions for the church are What are we doing about it? and How well are we doing it? A truly effective children’s ministry sets up the conditions to nurture young people into a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. What…

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Leading Ideas
0 Put Your Money Where You Want Your Heart to Be

If you want your heart to be with God, here’s a suggestion I’ve found to be very powerful in my own life. Put your money where you want your heart to be. Jesus said, “Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”  In other words, your heart follows your money, not the other way around. We think it’s…

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Leading Ideas
0 A Spiritual Recovery

Today, we are faced with a terrifying financial crisis in both domestic and global financial markets. The economy is in dire straits according to leading economists. We are experiencing record foreclosures, bankruptcies and unemployment. Our gross domestic product is in steep decline. A simple equation of prayers, presence, gifts, service and witness will help forge our way through any financial…

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Leading Ideas
0 Supporting Younger Clergy

I had the privilege of being with the national United Methodist camp and retreat leaders who gathered in California recently. One of the things I emphasized was the importance of camping experiences for young persons as a place for hearing and responding to God’s call to ordained ministry. The Lewis Center survey of under-35 United Methodist clergy showed that 11…

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Leading Ideas
0 Outliers: The Story of Success

Have you ever wondered why some people are extraordinarily successful? How do some people overcome insurmountable odds and reach an elite level in their fields? In Outliers: The Story of Success, bestselling author Malcolm Gladwell draws on sociology and economics to examine the traits of successful people. Gladwell uses the word “outliers” — a mathematical term describing a statistical abnormality…

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Leading Ideas
0 Is Denominational Loyalty Waning?

A new study documents a reality many have claimed for quite some time. People are not as loyal to their denominations as church leaders might wish. Ellison Research found that seven out of ten regular churchgoers in the United States would be at least somewhat open to switching denominations if they could no longer attend their current church because of…

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Leading Ideas
0 Helping Youth Discern God’s Call

Two months ago, a group from my church attended the Leadership Institute held at the United Methodist Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kansas. Pastor Adam Hamilton spoke of his desire to encourage young people to pursue the possibility of ordained ministry and how the church was planning a small group to accomplish this. He then asked all those attending…

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This article is reprinted by permission from Leading Ideas, a free e-newsletter from the Lewis Center for Church Leadership of Wesley Theological Seminary available at churchleadership.com.