Relational Discipleship

Fatherly advice is always good. It is one thing that everyone in the world can agree is one of the best things in life. Unfortunately some will get fatherly advice from someone other than their real father, but the fatherly advice that we get in life is some of the best advice that can be given.

I had the opportunity to see and hang out with my dad last night and this morning, it was definitely a time that I will cherish whenever I get the opportunity too see him. Dad is a church planting guy, one of the veterans in the the church planting world. He has helped numerous churches start and sustain as well as be a coach for a lot of new church planters.

One thing that my dad is good at is giving free advice, mainly in this case, to me. He loves to embed wisdom in my life and I could not be any more grateful.

This morning we had a great conversation and I would love to share what I learned:

I am a relational guy. I always have been and I always will be. My wife describes it as ” you can drop into a party that you know no one and come out of the party with 10 new friends and their life history.” I don’t know if I would go that far, but I do love to connect and meet new people.

When it comes to ministry, I feel like there is a huge disconnect in my brain to how to disciple and teach discipleship to others. In this case it is leaders. I love leading and I love leading other people, not because I want to be in control all the time but because it allows me the opportunity to see what other people can do and hopefully help them work at their gift. Whatever that gift may be, leading a ministry someone like me a place to be behind others and encourage them to continue working hard at succeeding in their gift.

However, for some reason, I feel like I have a hard time figuring out how to do that all the time. There are things in ministry that I am good at and there are some things that I am not good at. For instance, systems. I am not a good systems guy. I like systems and I see the benefit in them, but I am not good at executing them all the time. In my conversation with my dad I realized that it is not because I am a bad leader or because I suck at it, it is because systems are not in my DNA. My DNA as a leader is to sit down at a starbucks and learn about that person, feed into their lives and then serve along with them. My dad classifies as a big relational leader. I want to know people and meet people.

Which can make my job a little difficult sometimes. Mainly because systems are all around me. Different systems and systems that make me get head aches. This doesnt mean that I can discredit them or not attempt them. It means that I have to adapt the systems to my style of leadership.

In this case, we were talking about developing leaders. Mainly student leaders in this time of my life, but in any case developing leaders. My dad helped me realize that with my relational complex, I need to have someone with me all the time. Not every minute of the day, but when I am doing something that is discipling others, I need to bring someone along with me to teach them how to do the things that will develop other leaders. When I am with student leaders, I cant sit in a room and open the bible and teach them leadership, not because I hate it or because I can’t but because I would much rather have them do leadership or service projects that will allow them to learn about leadership in their own lives.

The simple description Dad reminded me of was:

I do, you watch then we talk. 

I do some, you do some then we talk. 

You do most, I help then we talk. 

You do, I watch then we talk. 

You start over with someone new and then talk. 

It is a constant growth in leadership that requires simple systems that will allow a pipeline of leadership to grow. It is a simple concept that doesn’t always go smoothly. It is one that is necessary to develop and equip leaders around you to do the things that need to be done to grow and sustain any growth that may come along.

So, that is my confession: I am not a systems oriented guy. I am a relational guy that has to work much harder at systems because I am not very good at them. I need to focus more on the relational side of discipleship and leadership development in order for me to train and equip other leaders.

What is your confession? 

What kind of leader are you? 

What advice can you give to others?