Strategy #4 "Create Momentum"

The Strategy Themes discussed below were presented by Bob Farr, Director of Congregational Excellence, Missouri Conference UMC, as part of a presentation “Renovate or Die: How to Become an Outwardly Focused Church.” The following discusses Strategy #4 of 10.

Strategy #4 Create Momentum

Or how to break through resistance and lead change!

Leaders motivate. Managers channel that motivation. In the case of “Creating Momentum” both are clearly needed. Channeled activity without motive is doing the same old thing. Motivation without direction is simply chaos. Momentum mathematically is a “vector,” ie it has a direction as a component. In other words, it is channeled energy. So the leader’s task is to achieve channeled energy that moves the congregation toward his or her vision.

So how does a pastor create momentum? What does he or she focus on? Buckingham and Coffman, First Break all the Rules (pg 57) say emphasize your strengths. Jim Collins, Good to Great, says select something you can do world class, that you are passionate about, that makes the biggest difference (he says “economic denominator”; I say that produces the most "extravagant generosity" or the most "radical" participation by your congregation.)

What can you do world class, better than anyone else? Everyone has something. Our little church does Vacation Bible School (VBS) world class. We have an average attendance of 19 that includes two children. Yet we had 18 kids in VBS last year with a teenage dancer leading awesome music, in a multipurpose barn a half mile from the church, with a neighbor mom, home schooler, as a wonderful Bible teacher. To be world class, we didn’t just depend on our own resources, we used the community. And we had fun! Three years ago it rained. One of the mothers rounded up 10 plastic water bottles and tennis balls, and we did VBS bowling down the church aisle. The first one to 153 (the number of fish caught in John 24) won. And we had fun. (Two years later, Cokebury used the same game as one of its recreation programs.) Did I say 18 kids?

The intersection of what you are passionate about, what you can do world class, and what radically maximizes participation should be the fruitful ministries that are your focus. Then Collins says the best achieve success over and over again creating an accumulation of visible results that energize their companies (congregations). Momentum builds and bursts through resistance to change!

Success is best visible in PRAY-PLAN-DO-CHECK-ACT cycles. Rick Warren says, “[Practices] must be put into a sequential process [to] be acted on every day.” Bishop Schnase says, “Exemplary and repeated practices.. are the means congregations use to fulfill their missions with excellence and fruitfulness [changing lives in Jesus Christ].”

Create momentum by doing what you are passionate about, what you do best, what brings extravagance and radical participation and do it in an exemplary and repeated manner… Changing lives in Jesus Christ!

Bob’s Farrism: “Successful churches do what unsuccessful churches refuse to do.”