Our recent loss of the insightful, church consulting pioneer, the 91 year old Lyle Schaller, caused me to pull some of his books off my shelf to review and reflect. His insights certainly shaped my leadership and Cuyahoga Valley Church over our 29 year history.
You can read about Schaller's life and legacy in an article by Leith Anderson. You can see some of his most memorable and influential quotes in a blog post by Will Mancini.
In his book Getting Things Done (published in 1986), Schaller asked, "Who will be the leaders in 2015?" He called for existing leaders to identify, enlist, educate, socialize, nurture and train persons who would be the leaders of the churches in 2015.
Then, Schaller, with his typical prescience, identified some of the qualities and competencies that would need to be present in the lives of the best and most effective initiating leaders. Way back in 1986, he was calling church leaders to raise up leaders for 2015 who would be "venturesome rebels."
In five short paragraphs, he described what kind of leaders the church of today would need. With apologies, I have tuned his paragraphs into a list so we might evaluate ourselves.
28 characteristics for effective leaders - "venturesome rebels" - for 2015 and beyond...
1. They display a high level of self-confidence.
2. They are not conformists.
3. They are willing to take risks.
4. They are hard workers.
5. They are curious.
6. They are impatient. [I'm sure that this, for Schaller, was a Spirit-inspired impatience with the status quo.]
7. They are assertive,
8. They are survivalists.
9. They are energetic.
10. They are hardy.
11. They are flexible.
12. They are self-starters.
13. They are tough.
14. They are persistent.
15. They are decisive.
16. They are persuasive.
17. They are ambitious. [Schaller was thinking of a holy ambition for the advancement of God and His kingdom and glory.]
18. They are optimistic about the future.
19. They have learned how to manage their time in a productive manner.
20. They are reflective.
21. When criticized, they do not respond in anger but look beyond that anger in an effort to analyze both the content of the criticism and the motivation of the critic.
22. They function in a long time frame.
23. They are comfortable conceptualizing abstract ideas in a five to twenty year time span.
24. They display the characteristic of "mental rehearsal" - anticipating the arguments of the opposition and reflecting on alternative courses of action.
25. They rarely allow themselves to become captive of what others claim is the most urgent immediate issues.
26. They have vision.
27. They have the ability to inspire others to want to turn that vision into reality.
28. They have a willingness to intervene.
As I thought through Schaller's list, I thanked God that He has indeed raised up some key leaders to be "venturesome rebels" for the good of and the growth of His church. I did some self-evaluation. Surely, this is a list to aspire to and to pray toward.
Questions: How do you think current church leaders are measuring up? What qualities would you add to Schaller's list?
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