Welcome back to learning to lead. We've been talking about leadership and that whole  definition, I'll give it to you again, because you have to know it by the time you're done with  this class. Leadership is the process of a leader encountering culture, the way we do things  here, in order to divine define of preferable future and then provide the impetus for the  planning, and the programming that is needed to be done to make the future a reality. That's  what we're about. We're in the area called leadership. But we've been talking about how you  find out you're a leader and what those leadership gifts look like, and how you knowing  yourself, will help you be a leader. We've been talking about that for the past several  sessions. And it's my privilege to introduce to you today probably my longest term friend in  history, Frank Weavers as been a friend for over 50 years, we kind of grew up together since  middle school. And we ended up going through seminary together. And it's been a time of  connecting with each other over the years just to get to know each other to help each other.  And I've come to know him as a tremendous leader. He is a husband. He's a father, he's a  grandfather. But he's also been an incredibly effective leader. And so it's my privilege, as I'm  trying to bring some practical practicing leaders into your experience out there to introduce  Frank to you. So Frank, maybe you can tell us first of all, just how how you have grown as a  leader. I mean, growing up, what kind of experiences do you have that would say, guy, I'm  going to be a leader someday?  

Frank - Well, I was born, when my dad was a dairy farmer in Wisconsin. So he had an eighth  grade education. But he felt a call to ministry. And so when I was nine months old, so I don't  have a lot of farm blood in me. When I was nine months old, he moved off to go to college,  Calvin College, and then on to seminary. So when I was young, I just sort of grew up in a home in which my dad was going to school, my dad was preparing to be a pastor. So you know that  that was sort of my route. So I could have been a farm kid. And I ended up being the son of a  pastor. And at an early age, I began to think that God was calling me to be a pastor. It's kind  of an interesting story. Some people have really dramatic stories of how they were called to  be a leader in church ministry. But for me, it was the fact that my parents, my mother,  especially bought me a little matching suit. When my dad went out to preach, I had a little  suit when I was probably five years old. And people would say, Oh, you look just like your dad. And my mother would say, and what do you want to be when you grow up? And I would say,  on cue, well, I'm going to be a pastor someday. And everyone would say, Oh, that's wonderful. I actually have a picture Bruce of me standing when I'm about five years old, I must have  been on a chair, I'm standing behind the pulpit with my hands raised in benediction. So at an  early age, I began to pray. God help me someday become a pastor, but don't make me be a  missionary. I actually pray that for years as a kid,  

Bruce - Why not a missionary?  

Frank - I thought, you know, at the time, my concept of what a missionary was, you went to  Africa, you know, when they came back, they would show pictures of huge snakes. I wasn't a  snake fan. And I thought, you know, this would be a terrible life to be dragged off by God to  some other country. So I just wanted to sorta, I guess, be like dad. Later in life, my mother  would introduce me, she was always proud. I was a pastor, and she'd say, you know, he  became a pastor, and we never even pushed it. And I thought, what thing did you grow up in  mother, but that was my call. I was called into ministry early on, sort of through the  manipulations of a mother and God uses all kinds of ways. But then when I was in high school  in fact Bruce, you and I had a similar experience. We signed up for a summer ministry  program. And my dad had been serving large churches, in His ministry, churches that were  sort of internal. He was a great pastor, but he sort of all the focus was internal in the church.  He worked hard, all those things. But church was sort of boring to me it was, we never  penetrated our neighborhood at all. It was just sort of like a little fortress Church. The world's  a bad place. We're safe here it is Christian. So you and I both went on our summer ministry  program to Ogden, Utah. And there I met a very different kind of Pastor leader than my dad. 

And that was as fiery redheaded preacher called Gary Hart. And I stayed in a home where the  family that I stayed with for weeks and weeks and weeks they were new Christians.  

They were messy. The church was filled with all these variety of people were there a day or 2  and he drops us on the corner and he says, "talk to people about Jesus." He took us down to  the toughest parts of town where there were a lot of alcoholics, people actually passed out in  the street and he said, Tell them about Jesus. And I came home from that changed, where I  said, I want to be a pastor. But I want to be a pastor like that. A church that's focused  outward. So that was the original sort of time in my life, I think when my calling was  confirmed. And I started thinking about the options of what kind of leader can a person be  when they're a pastor?  

Bruce - So I know that our training was very much to be the chaplain, taking care of people  when they're sick preaching on Sunday, maybe teaching a class here or to to high school kids  or whatever. And when did you figure out that you were called to be a leader within the  church?  

Frank - I think that was a sort of gradual process. I mean, I guess everybody knows, that's  going to become a pastor that there's going to be some leadership involved in this. But the  model I had of my dad was that leadership was sort of focused inward. You preach good  sermons, you show up when people are in need. But our the leadership had nothing to do with really moving out into the neighborhood, our church, the churches that I grew up in, really  had nothing to do with people that lived one block away from the church building. It was sort  of us so as I entered ministry, I I sort of fell into the pattern of my father, I think in my first  church, it was a rural church. And I was run ragged, just making sermons, visiting people in  times of need. It was a small rural church that really expected the pastor was hired to do  about everything. So I was just run ragged. I would be exhausted at the end of a Sunday. And  after four years, in this wonderful church, I just had to go. So I moved from there to a small  church, in Jacksonville, Florida, sort of a missional church that hadn't gone well, there were  about 30 people there. And I learned a lot about leadership there, especially about what not  to do, because all the models of my youth just didn't work there. This was a diverse group of  people. There wasn't a church of our denomination within about 100 miles. Some of the things I thought, you know, you should just automatically do didn't make any sense there. So I began there to at least start thinking about, maybe I should lead in a different way. Maybe I should  learn some new skills. But then, the third church I went to was really the church where I spent  most of my ministry it was my life calling I spent 25 years in Holland, Michigan at a church.  And it was really there that I bumped into several people that pushed me one was a young  woman in our church who was involved in business, she was an incredible leader. And she  kept telling me, Frank, you are not just a preacher, you are a leader, you have to take us  somewhere. And so she just shoved all kinds of leadership books my way. And then also at  that time, I began attending every year, the Willow Creek conference with Bill Hybels. And he  was a great inspiration for me, teaching me that pastors are leaders. So through just a slow  process increasing, I became aware of the fact that the church should be going somewhere.  The church is not just a maintenance kind of position, the church is is going somewhere,  there's always a new place, that God wants to bring a church. So I began to increasingly see  my role as not only a teacher, but critically as a leader. So I began to read everything I could  on leadership, I began to be mentored by some great leaders. And you know, over time, I  think I picked up some skills. But I did become aware of the fact that like it or not, I was called to lead this, this growing church.  

Bruce - So you're getting involved with a leadership process and you interact with the culture  there and who's going to change and develop a vision? What were some of the visionary  things that came out of your leadership, particularly the last church or when you're in  Jacksonville? 

Frank - Well, I think I'll comment on my last church because it was really a long process in  which the church really was transformed over those years. I learned first of all, how important  structure is and so I think I led the church through a change in leadership structure. I really  kind of inherited the system from the denomination in which I was a part in here's this elder  board and a deacon board and then there's some pastors are a pastor. And I quickly began to  see that this church had a very dysfunctional leadership structure. It was a huge church,  council of elders and deacons and elders meetings and there were deacons meetings, there  was an executive team that met and it was just chaos. And they're sort of an anti pastor as a  leader mentality as well. One of the lead elders told me "as far as I'm concerned, you  shouldn't even be able to vote around here." So when I came there, you know, the pastor was almost the enemy when it came to making decisions leading us somewhere. So, over a  process of years, we began to evaluate the structure as the church was growing, we came to  the conclusion that wasn't bad people in positions, that was a bad structure, not bad people,  but bad structure. And we've, I led them through a process in which we brought in other  leaders from churches that had grown. And they talked about how they had to rethink. We  just, I didn't push, but I gave them lots of information over process of about a year, we  completely restructured the church, which made it possible to get decisions made quickly,  capable people were in positions with clear lines of authority. And I can't tell you how much  the Church changed. When we move toward clear definitions of leadership, the church got rid  of that big stamp pad that says no on it, no leaders go, Nope, we're not going to do that.  Nope. And we were led by staff, and governed by elders. So I think changing structure was a  critical point for me as a leader in that congregation. And I would say it is one of the two or  three things that accounted for the ability to grow as large as we did, which was about 1,400  people.  

Bruce - Well I know too, that one of the key things you did was keep vision in front of people,  at least in later years, powerfully. And maybe you can just share some of that some of the  vision that you had, and how, how did you roll it out to people? How do you keep reminding  people? How did you keep people focused on vision, we're gonna be talking about that later.  As far as in the course we're gonna be talking about what it means to write a vision  statement, how you develop vision, but just share a little bit about your experience.  

Frank - Well, I'll begin by saying that I believe that, in general, churches want to be led  somewhere. Church should be an adventure, right? This gathering of people who are  passionate disciples of Jesus, this should be this should be an adventure, right? This should be more than about lawn mowers, which one we're going to buy, what kind of computer we're  going to get? What about putting on an addition all those kinds of things that can be very  divisive. So I think that in general, churches, and members of churches are eager to be led in  a way in which they say God is taking us somewhere. And I think in nature, churches that I've  experienced, tended to be a cyclical. So you know, every year they would kind of go around  and round. So it's this time of year. So we do this, and then it's, you know, Advent, and we do  that. And then it's the summer and we do this, and you just every year tried to do it a little  better than you did it the year before. But there's just a sense of churches sort of spinning  round and round and round. And I became convinced that churches should at least have a  part of their experience being linear, we are going somewhere. And so what I began to do is,  each year, we would kick off our fall season with a focus banquet. And we invested lots of  resources in planning this focus banquet. And we invited all adults in the congregation  together. And so we would say this is where we believe God is leading us now to do that. with  a clear conscience, you have to be waiting on God, you have to be talking with others, you  have to have a pulse of what's happening your finger on the pulse of what's happening. So  months ahead of time, we begin praying and planning and the congregation would gather 4- 500 people with a sense of excitement. Where's God taking us in the next year? So not just go round and round? But where are we going? And we had all kinds of powerful experiences. By  doing that, you know, this year, we feel that God is calling us to be more fully a house of  prayer throughout the year. That's what we would focus on over and over again. What does it 

mean what changes need to happen to become more fully a church of prayer? We had one  year in which we introduced the concept of hitting the streets. We are way too ingrown. We  had built a new facility, a lot of focus was internally as a church, we need to move out of this  building and hit the streets. So you know, we sold that kind of vision. And then throughout the year, we give all kinds of opportunities and training. How do we get out of the building and  into the community that God's placed us in and perhaps, perhaps the most powerful focus of  events in which we we were taken in a new place was what we call the year of Jubilee. I had  gotten away by myself. We had just paid off the debt on our new facility, and we're getting  ready to build phase two. And you know, I felt a little guilty all the money that we'd spent as a church. I knew one thing we would do at the focus banquet, we would burn the mortgage. But I didn't know what else we would do. So I got away for three or four days. And I stumbled  upon that Old Testament concept of Jubilee, you know, this radical, every 50 years, God's  people were to do something radical land is redistributed. Land is given rest slaves are set  free. There was a radical generosity. So I thought, what would that look like to declare a year  of Jubilee at the church, I served Calvary Church in which we would put a pause on the  building program's second phase. And instead of a capital stewardship campaign, where we'd  raise money for our building, we would say make a one year plan. And in that year, we will  put up structures all over the world where people can afford it, but they need a place. So  370,000 was committed to that we built seven buildings around the world, I also encouraged  every family to have at least one person that would go somewhere in the world where they  would see a world in need a world in poverty. And what happened in that one year of Jubilee,  God sabotaged us. When the year was done, we said, why have a year of Jubilee when we can be a church of Jubilee. So we tore up the glossy brochures of the phase two, we decided in  comparison to so much of the world, we had great facilities. And we began to really radically  commit large amounts of our resources. When I left, almost 800 people have gone somewhere in the world and a place of need, we've given away millions of dollars, we had a budget of 1.6  million we gave 6, 7, $800,000 a year away, that was a huge thing that came out of saying,  we are not just going to go round and round in a cyclical fashion. But we're going to be open  to where is God challenging us and taking us. And I think that night of the focus banquet  became the most anticipated evening in the life of the church, because Christians love to  have a sense that God is taking them to a new place. So that to me was so important. That's  a heart of leadership. Where does God want to take this group of people? How do we  challenge and call them to it? And then in the process? How do we keep reminding them over  and over why we're doing it? And why it makes a difference? Good stuff. There was fun.  

Bruce - Tell me about some times where you thought you had the right idea. And it turned out  to be a bust, it was a failure. And how and how do you handle failure? Because that's part of  leadership, too. You don't always make the right call every single time.  

Frank - Right. and I think that a lot of as I look back on ministry. I think one of the failures that  I did was I had a concept that if I was a really nice guy, if I led really well, if I explained really  clearly, if I brought all of us along together, we would be able to change as a church from  being a rather ingrown church to a very external missional church, affecting our neighborhood and many parts of the world, that I could do that in a way in which everybody would cheer.  And it was very painful for me to discover that it was not always possible to bring everybody  along. And there were there were times when I know I disappointed people, people thought  we were going in the wrong direction. There were people that felt with our push to be  missional and engaged, we were ignoring our own people. There was once a time when about  150 people left enmass, when a staffer left, those were bitter hard times. And I learned that  try as I could, there are times in which leadership doesn't always take everybody along. And  that was very painful for me. Those are the most painful memories I had when I and leaders  with good intentions that God is calling us in this direction. And then there were others that  were like, No, we're not going there. And it created problems that are eventually just left. That was really painful for me. 

Bruce - And I know you, like all us within the leadership anywhere head critics occasionally  would send you an email, note, letter, or for a tome. How did you handle the whole idea of  critics?  

Frank - Well, I think a couple of things I learned over the years one is that all criticism hurts,  no matter how positive it is. You know when you're getting criticism when you're giving  criticism to a staff, no matter how nicely you word criticism, all criticism was. But there is  criticism that deeply wounds unnecessarily. So I tried to keep myself open to criticism, and I'd  be too deeply wounded by it. I tried to find where's the nugget of truth because often  criticism, even if it's something, someone who's really opposed to you, often there's a kernel  of truth in this criticism, try to find that. But I came to believe every I cannot make everybody  happy. It's not my job to make everybody happy. And criticism comes with leadership,  because you may say, we're going to go right, God's calling us to go right. Our church thinks  all should go, right. And there may be people who will want to go left with everything they  have. So criticism was hard. It's the worst part of leadership for me was the kind of criticism  right people say, My friends call you Hitler. I mean that, if that doesn't wound you, there's  something wrong with it. That an elderly lady in the church had a big box in her backseat of a  car, someone said, What's that for? She said, that's a coffin for our pastor. So, and I hear I,  once again, just a really nice guy, leadership, when you say we're going this direction, and  people move in that direction together. There are times when people stay behind. And it's  very painful, it's very hard for me, because I don't like conflict. I can't understand anyone that likes it does come at times, and you can be misunderstood. Those are the painful things. I will  say that, you know, letters that weren't signed, or people that said nasty things or groups that seemed to gather to attack what was happening, happen mostly in the first 10 years. And as I learned more about leadership, and as a church became more shaped by that leadership, as  the church began to move as a body and a missional direction, people either began to  embrace it or left. And my last 10 or 15 years it was, it was just a very different situation. I  think you can out last often, critics, and some of your critics can become dear friends, I had a  person, the person who told me if I had my way, you wouldn't be able to vote around here,  when I left, hugged me and wept and said, I love you. So it's a tough business being a leader.  But you do the best you can learn from your mistakes. And do not allow criticism to paralyze  you. Because it is easier to say I guess I'll just take care of everyone and forget about  pushing, let's just do the round and round. Just keep everybody happy. That's right. We keep  everybody happy. But I think in the long run, biblical leadership brings people to wonderful  new places. So it's worth doing.  

Bruce - Hey, this has been a treat for me. We've talked about this stuff for a lot of years  together already. But being a leader, the themes that Frank has brought out today comes with a cost, we're going to consider that later in the lecture. It comes to knowing yourself well, and knowing where your strengths are, but it comes with the idea that you've got to be and  choose to be a leader. And that involves finding out where God was calling you to go and  calling you to take an organization or a church, and then leading there with God's strength,  and with the corporate help of the people. And it's gonna take a while. It doesn't all happen  immediately, unless something supernatural happens. So we're going to continue talking  about leadership and begin talking about culture and the way things are done here that we'll  have to change. Frank referred to a couple of those situations as we move on in this class.



Last modified: Tuesday, November 23, 2021, 11:32 AM