Leading with Gospel Freedom

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Welcome to Grace at the Fray, a podcast that explores the many dimensions of God’s grace that we find at the frayed edges of life. Come explore how God’s grace works to renew your life and send you on mission in His Kingdom.

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0:00:20.8 Jim Lovelady: Hello, beloved. Welcome to Grace at the Fray. I’ve been thinking about the pilgrimage metaphor for life a lot lately. And if you’re a Christian, you know that your journey in this life is with Jesus. It’s following Jesus and discovering a greater closeness to Jesus and the sweetness of fellowship that comes with following Him. And sometimes as you’re following Him, you begin to have people following you. Maybe you’re a parent raising kids, or you’re a business owner or anything that has people under your responsibility. The Apostle Paul has that seemingly audacious statement, “Follow me as I follow Christ.” But think about it. Jesus will never lead us astray. So as long as we are following someone who’s following Jesus, we can be confident that we’re going in the right direction. That makes sense, but it’s still difficult to follow the leader, right? And it’s difficult to lead those who are following you. And that’s what today’s episode is all about. My guests today are a couple of pastors in the long succession of folks following the leader as the leader follows Christ. It’s pastors Tony Giles and Clint Dowda. Tony’s in charge of two facets of Serge’s Renewal team specifically directed toward equipping the local church for mission. The first is a personalized coaching program called Church Leader Development, and the second is a cohort-style curriculum called Leadership Lab. You’ll hear him talk more about both of these, and you’ll hear Clint, who followed Tony through all of these programs, tell some of his story. And I think that you’ll see in this conversation that if you’re going to lead like Jesus, you’re going to need extraordinary grace because Jesus’ leadership style is very counterintuitive to what we’ve come to expect outside the church, of course, but also within the church. So John 13 is my go-to passage for this. It’s the famous passage of Jesus washing His disciples’ feet. I want to read this story to you so that it’s fresh on your mind as we jump into this conversation. And I want to start at verse three, and then I’m going to skip a little bit and go down to verse 12. It goes like this: “Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God, got up from supper, took off His outer robe and tied a towel around Himself. Then He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that He had tied around Himself.” Then there’s this part of Peter freaking out about how this is absolutely the most humiliating thing that his master could be doing, and he wants no part of it because leaders don’t do that thing, right? So then I’m going to jump down to 12. “After He had washed His disciples’ feet, He had put on His robe and He had reclined again. And He said to them, ‘Do you know what I have done to you? You call me teacher and Lord, and you’re right, for that’s what I am. So if I, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. For I’ve set for you an example that you should also do as I have done to you.'” So leadership material often focuses on what leaders need to do, while gospel-shaped leadership asks how we love the people following us as we follow Jesus. Jesus’ love liberates us, makes us curious, present, encouraging, and concerned with God’s purposes for the other person. Kingdom-building goals become distorted if accomplishing them matters more than loving the people that we’re with. So the question is always, where do we get the ability to love the way Jesus loves? Follow along as Tony, Clint, and I explore what it means to lead like Jesus.

 

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0:04:29.1 Jim Lovelady: Well, Tony, Clint, welcome. Tony, you head up Serge’s curriculum called Leadership Lab. And so when I was like, “Hey, let’s do a podcast,” you’re like, “Yeah, but let’s bring Clint.” So here’s what I want to do first. Tony, introduce yourself and then introduce your friend Clint, and each of you just say a little bit of background of who you are and how did you get here?

 

0:04:50.9 Tony Giles: Yeah, absolutely. I’m in Brentwood, Tennessee, Middle Tennessee. Currently, I’m serving as an interim pastor at a church in East Nashville. I’m also serving part-time at a church in Franklin, Tennessee, and we live providentially halfway between the two churches. And my goal is to not drive north and south on the same day if I can help it. I’ve been with Serge now, I guess it was about eight years when Bob came through town once and said, “Hey, would you ever help us… Be able to help us develop a ministry that we think is important?” Because we get calls to Serge that begin with the words, “Hey, is there anybody at Serge who knows what it’s like to work in a church that could help us here with blank?” And the blanks were all over the place. And he said, “We’ve wanted to do this for a while. We’ve just never felt the time was right or we were ready to pull the trigger.” And that began a journey that I’ve been on ever since. It’s Church Leader Development, and then Leadership Lab is a subset or parallel to that, and we can get into the distinctives. But one of the cohorts that I’ve been leading recently includes Clint Dowda, who’s been pastor of a church in the suburbs of Richmond, Grace Community Church, for several years now. And when he learned, he’s been in the Serge world and he’ll tell you about that, but when he learned about Leadership Lab, we had a call kind of like this one. He landed in a cohort that he’s been a part of here now. We’re now looking back on what he’s learned and put in place through this material.

 

0:06:27.5 Jim Lovelady: Nice. Yeah, Clint, man, what’s your story?

 

0:06:31.9 Clint Dowda: Well, I’ve been connected with Serge for a long time, back with World Harvest, been mentored by Jack Miller’s mentees, and that’s kind of shaped a lot of my understanding of the gospel and ministry. So when I saw that cohort and that Tony was doing it, I was attracted to be connected. And also we just celebrated our 20th year as a church, and we’ve kind of moved along and become a little bit bigger of a church, and I realized a lot of my deficits were about next-level leadership or just leading in a changing church, and maybe leading after 20 years of kind of doing things a lot of the same way. So when I saw that, I was like, “I need that.” And so I asked a ruling elder in our church and he and I both went through it. Still need it, and it’s been really helpful in a pretty big transition year in the last year for us. It was helpful to think through specific things and also just general gospel-led approaches to leadership.

 

0:07:25.6 Jim Lovelady: I know so many pastors, I know so many leaders who feel, I mean, there’s a loneliness to it, and feel like, “Oh man, if only I could get some good advice.” If I had a nickel for every person that ever told me, “I feel like I just need like a life coach just always with me to guide me, to give me some wisdom.” A lot of times pastors just don’t feel that way. And if I had a nickel for every pastor that said, “I never really was discipled, but here I find myself having to disciple people,” that kind of thing. So what was it in particular where you were like, “Okay”.

 

0:07:59.6 Clint Dowda: I didn’t always, but coming here to Richmond was a surprise to me. I remember doing… Our church planting assessment center 24 years ago, and my wife and I went and they give you the debrief and I walked and I said, “Oh, look, they gave us the two guys that are closest to us to let us down because we’re not going to get approved.” And that was my sort of bent of just general, I don’t know that I have the personality or leadership skills to do the church plant. And that didn’t happen. They were encouraging us to do it and we did go. But I’ve always sort of thought, oh, I’m more of a strategist than I am of a visionary leader. But I was mentored well, I was discipled well. And a lot of that is indirect and direct fruit of Serge World Harvest. So I do feel equipped. I mean, Hunter Dockery, anybody knows him, he just sort of threw me out and said, “Start doing this,” and kind of learned under fire. So that went well and just kind of following lessons I had learned. But as we’ve been going well for 20 years, kind of things I avoided, I realized, oh, I avoided those because I don’t know how to do those. And no one’s asking me to do those. But they would be really good for this next season of ministry if we did. Even going, we re-envisioned our mission statement and ministry objectives. And those are things I think if I was honest, I’d be like, I don’t know how to do that. Therefore, we’re just going to keep on going forward and God’s blessing us. Why do I need to step back? But some encouragement within the church and then realizing, oh, it’d be helpful to get some outside voices that I trust the foundation and framework of grace to lead from. And then doing it with one of my ruling elders. Not any crazy inside turmoil in the church, just sort of the kind of… A lot of people have been here 20 years and we’ve planted churches, we’ve sent people out, and it’s easy to get stagnated. And so I wanted the last five, 10, 15 years of ministry that I’m in to be refreshed a little bit, even though it was leaning into weakness. But Paul said something about grace being there when you lean into weakness. So we decided to do that.

 

0:09:58.0 Jim Lovelady: I love how you said, “I was kind of avoiding this thing. I kind of knew it was happening, kind of knew it was a thing.” But at some point you’re like, “Okay, for us to take the next step, I really have to face these things.” And man, that’s the thing about being a leader, is that you have to be the first to kind of face some of these things. If you’re leading your congregation and you know that there’s a thing that you haven’t addressed or a thing that you are weak in, man, you gotta jump. You gotta jump in. Tony, speak into that.

 

0:10:30.9 Tony Giles: Yeah. Well, you both used a key word, and that was outside. And that was a voice from outside or somebody that can breathe some fresh air or perspective. Because we don’t know what we can’t see. By definition, we don’t know our blind spots for one. But we’re coming at issues and it’s a relentless, perpetual mountain of things that find their way to the leader’s office desk, to-do list. And while you’re trying to wrestle one, there are three more that have piled up. And that’s just a reality for leadership that will occur, that will develop unless you have some measures in place or some ways of filtering, some ways of delegating, of recalibrating. Because most leaders feel like, “I need to be able to figure this out and solve it. And if I’m a real leader, I won’t need help.” And how much is wrong with that? Just all that’s shot through with fallacies that we don’t have to solve everything. And we certainly can’t figure it all out without help. And we need others in it. The other feature of it is that you both referred to how alone that can be. Most leaders eventually will be overwhelmed with those relentless, compiled challenges, fighting off exhaustion and often alone and trying to lead on the fly. And that’s a recipe for crash and burn.

 

0:12:07.5 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. I heard a… I guess he’s an author/artist named Charlie Mackesy. He’s got a book called The Boy, the Horse, the Mole, and the Fox or something like that. Maybe that’s…

 

0:12:20.9 Clint Dowda: It’s somewhere in this bookshelf back here.

 

0:12:22.1 Jim Lovelady: Is it? I love it. I prayed through that book during COVID. He says the most courageous thing I ever said was “help.” And leaders don’t feel like they have the ability to ask for help because it’s a sign of weakness. I mean, you say that and I resonate with that because, and my wife can attest to this, that I am just so, so independent. And she’ll be like, “Hey, do you need help with that?” And I’m like, “No,” offended that you would even ask that I need help. So it’s a courageous thing for me to ask for help. So, Clint, you knew yourself well enough to go, “Oh, I need help in this area.” So there is some self-knowledge that you had enough for you to say, “I’m a strategist. I’m not as much a visionary. So I want to lean into that aspect of me and become what I need to become for the sake of the church.” So you called up Tony? How did that go?

 

0:13:27.1 Clint Dowda: You notice these cohort things have become really popular right across all these ministries. So I’ve done a couple with the Gospel Coalition on more issues, more things going on in society to learn from people. I do have a gift of being able to figure out the right people to ask and learn from them and then can take and apply. And so when I guess it just popped up and I was like, “Oh, that’s what… That would probably be helpful in this season of ministry.” It’s like I tell my congregation, I told them, I think last week, I pay my good friend and counselor lots of money to ask me questions. And it’s really helpful for people to… So it was a good investment of time and resources for me and Reed, my ruling elder, to lean on Tony and the cohort, the material, but also the dynamic nature of the conversations that happen to take those lessons and process them into where we are and where we need to go.

 

0:14:17.9 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. Nice. Tony, talk about the curriculum.

 

0:14:23.3 Tony Giles: Yeah. This curriculum was field-tested on the field all over the world by Serge in a form called Leadership Foundations. So when there’s somebody on a mission team showing leadership potential, the team leader comes to this person, the man or woman, and says, “Hey, you’re showing some leadership potential. We’d like you to take some of your work hours with us and devote that to a cohort experience, some reading that we want you to do, reflecting on some questions that we will give you. We’re going to give you a coach and a project.” And as a way, it’s kind of a laboratory of developing and testing leadership skills and capacities. So we took that 10-month, four-hour-a-week model and shaped it into eight modules that take… Our recommendation is two hours a week. This is designed for people outside of Serge who are busy leaders, whether they’re pastors or ministry leaders. Frankly, we’ve had a number of other missionaries that don’t get this kind of gospel-focused leadership training that have come to Serge to say, “Can we jump in?” And we’ve had a number of those over these years. But it’s broken up into two parts. The first is foundational and then the second half gets into practicalities, some of the very specific things. So it begins with: what do we mean by leading missionally? That’s a buzzword these days, but an important word that we’re holding on to and trying to fill with good biblical meaning. What does it mean to lead missionally? What is the posture of a leader? We talk about what leaders do. We don’t often talk about the posture with which they do it, and we spend quite a bit of time on that. We talk about leadership styles and we use some material that’s been developed by Myers-Briggs, called Myers-Briggs and Leadership. So it takes your Myers-Briggs profile and drops leadership on top of that to say, what does that personality, what do those gifts and strengths and weaknesses look like for you as a leader? What are the challenges? How do you stretch outside of your DNA in order to lead well? Love requires you to stretch outside your DNA. And so what does that look like? And then in the second half, when we get to the particulars, it includes things like casting vision, having hard conversations, risk-taking, faith, things of that sort. So it’s eight modules with a very hefty appendix because we took all of the Leadership Foundations material and have embedded everything in it. So when someone goes through Leadership Lab, they read some things, they answer some questions. We come together for two hours once a month to discuss that and how it applies. It’s a dialogical kind of environment where we’re just learning from one another. And so there’s a facilitator, me, and usually one other person facilitating that dialogue. And it’s actually… This is important too because I don’t know a single leader that doesn’t know the value of taking a couple of hours a week to think about what you’re doing or trying to do. And that’s really what this is. It’s a way to help a leader think about what they’re currently doing. It’s not in addition to what they’re already too busy with, but what do I need to be thinking about? How does the gospel impact and shape and influence the things that I am trying to do?

 

0:17:53.2 Jim Lovelady: Clint, what was your project that you did?

 

0:17:56.3 Clint Dowda: Yeah. In the beginning, honestly, some of it was unity and trust among leadership, particularly, it wasn’t severed, but there were some walls, cracks in the wall, so to speak, even among our session. And it was interesting over the year how God used those lessons, gave me some ability even to listen better to people and not assume you have the right perspective, but also circumstantially, the things that God brought into life for our church. We are… I think I told Tony from the beginning of the year to the end of the year how some real restoration and deepening among that group had happened alongside that year.

 

0:18:34.0 Jim Lovelady: Okay. Okay. I’m really curious because I have a friend who’s a pastor who had a consultant come in, and the consultant had some really hard, candid things to say about the relationships and the trust and the lack of trust and how there were some relationships that need to be worked on. And my understanding is that at the end of the consulting period, the consultant was like, “So you need to get this figured out.” And I’m kind of like, “Well, how are you going to get that figured out?” So and then here you’re talking about some of those things and how you gave the end of the story is like, well, some really deep reconciliation happened. Deep reconciliation is like a miracle. I would almost expect for the Red Sea to be parted and to walk through quicker than I would expect people in conflict in the church to experience deep reconciliation. So when you’re saying that, I’m like, “Alright, prove it to me, Clint.”

 

0:19:43.2 Clint Dowda: Yes. Well, I both get what you say and have seen some of it. But yeah, I think it was… It’s interesting because we have a lot of longevity in the church as far as people, but an influx of new people. And I think in this case, it was some people who work together, know each other well, but not… Well, that’s the point. They didn’t really know each other well. They didn’t know the core of how that person operates. But I think we would have… I think I would have assumed three years earlier, “Oh, this group is unified and has teamwork.” And under the strain of making decisions, it became obvious, “Oh, you don’t… That person doesn’t trust that person,” or they don’t… And even their preconceptions of who that person was and how they would have interpreted things or why they might have done something was maybe not 180 degrees off, but 150 degrees off. And I think them seeing each other was the beginning. And then it really was us moving more together towards some mission and feeling, “Oh, we are on the same page.”

 

0:20:45.0 Jim Lovelady: Right. When you’re working on a team, it’s really easy to become so focused on whatever the mission is that you can forget the people around you. And then sometimes it becomes such a problem that actually we can no longer do this mission because there’s such… We have so many irreconcilable differences. One of the mantras of Serge is gospel renewal fuels mission, and being on mission drives you back to needing gospel renewal. And so it sounds like that was the dynamic at play. So talk to me about how did being on mission together drive you guys back to being desperate for Jesus?

 

0:21:24.7 Clint Dowda: Yeah, I think we had done some of that work of mission and then down to strategic objectives that were going to guide us. And I think in that midst is where the relational… And I thought, “Oh, this is great.” But what I didn’t see beneath all that and that we’d experienced when there was some strain was, “Oh, we’ve come up with these things, but these things don’t really matter if we’re not on the same page as a team.” And so I think getting there, I don’t know, we’d gone through the motions a little bit on getting to the mission. Nothing’s changed about the mission, nothing’s changed about the objectives, but I think the teamwork in between, the harder things, and just the suspicion that can grow from a comment or an email or what’s behind driving that person. And I remember one time in another situation just saying, “Wow, you thought that about that person? That’s just not at all how I’ve ever experienced them, but I know them better.” And so they had to have their own experience together to realize, “Oh, that’s actually what’s driving you.” And in some cases, there were some things that needed to be repented of, but in some cases, just misconceptions of… Or and fear. Like a lot of it all is back to relationship. But then some people not feeling… Even within a coordinated leadership group, feeling on the outside a little bit relationally can do that. That was the surprising thing I learned. “Oh, that person does not feel as connected in. I would have assumed they were.” So the mission… Then I guess getting back to the mission, it has helped us in other leadership things, not this insider group, but this leadership group, to go, “Oh, this is what we’re about,” and we’ve walked through this and we… I guess we own it more is what I’m trying to say a little bit. But I think the relational piece, had we not had that, I don’t think we’d own it as much, and maybe the other way around in terms of mission.

 

0:23:06.0 Jim Lovelady: And Leadership Lab was the catalyst for all of that?

 

0:23:08.9 Clint Dowda: It happened all during this time. Some things were kind of coming to surface as we were starting and I saw this, and so that was part of the thing. “Oh, this would really be helpful to do this. We need this. I need this personally, but our church needs this.” And so it was concurrently, in God’s providence, that was happening.

 

0:23:26.6 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. So I love the dynamic and I love that there’s this thing from outside going, “Hey, ask these questions,” to stir things up a bit and begin to evaluate: Are we… Do we know each other well? Do we love one another well? Are we participating in ministries of reconciliation with one another? And is there an outflow of that from the top down, the people that are looking to us for leadership? And all of that becomes a catalyst for, “Oh yeah, we’re more reconciled. Oh, we’re actually more clear on what our mission as the church here in this community is.” So anyway, Tony, talk more about that dynamic.

 

0:24:11.1 Tony Giles: Well, I think most of our listeners today will know this part, and you hinted at it, that it’s gospel renewal in us that leads to mission. And the part that is part of the World Harvest Serge story is missionaries were sent afield and had trouble loving one another well, which led to, “Timeout. Let’s think about if the gospel is not at work in you, what are we doing here? What are we trying to do if the gospel is not the driving dynamic, animating feature of your life and enabling you to love one another, your teammates, and the world you’re trying to reach?” So those lonely, exhausted, fighting-for-survival leaders are trying to figure out, “How do I survive? How do I get things done? How do I manage this?” And what we mean by a gospel-driven leadership is leadership that is shaped and formed by the gospel operating in you. So, for example, I’m believing something at every given moment. What am I believing? Am I believing that my job is on the line if I don’t get this done, if I don’t come out smelling like a rose, then the world falls apart? Or do I understand that my identity is in Christ, that the results are up to Him, that my job is to be a faithful steward, loving those that God’s called me to love and serve? So I’m not finding my identity in my work. My identity is in Christ. It’s okay to fail. It’s okay then to boast in that weakness, which many of our listeners will certainly recognize as well. We can boast in our weakness instead of hiding it, instead of pretending that it’s not there or being locked up in a performance mentality. So it’s the mindset of a leader that is shaped by the gospel, that this is God’s work. He’s using broken, foolish, weak people like us. And as we look to Him, as we listen to Him, as we let Him order our steps and our hearts and go about this in a way that’s bringing honor to Him, we’ll live with those results. It means that a major part of my role as a leader is to serve you, not to make sure you make me look good. My role is to serve you. And I’m ready to acknowledge that. And a gospel-driven leadership is a leader who models humility and repentance. And we use the language that Serge has been using for decades now, and that is the leader is the chief repenter. And the gospel is what enables me to do that and empowers me. When Paul says the gospel is the power of God for salvation, it points to the fact that the gospel is an operating, powerful dynamic in my life that shapes the way I live, the way I love, and the way I lead.

 

0:27:02.7 Jim Lovelady: You bring up this thing that feels like it could fall apart at any time, right? This gospel-centered leader who boasts in his weakness. When leaders reveal their weakness, their followers have a really hard time with that. And I have plenty of data in just in the church, not even in broader leadership, plenty of data of a pastor opening up about a struggle here and there and then the church going, “Nope, we can’t handle that. You’re done.” And so, all right, it’s your turn to prove it to me, Tony. It’s like, okay, the gospel frees a leader to boast in his weakness and to be vulnerable and to be repentant and to be the chief repenter. But how do you cultivate a world, or maybe how do you build it to where when you do that, they don’t crucify you? Because they thought you were Jesus and now it’s revealed that you’re not, and they can’t handle that. That kind of thing. Talk to me about that.

 

0:28:08.9 Tony Giles: Yeah. Yeah, I remember hearing the story about the pastor who would talk about his own sins every week in a sermon, and you’ve got the congregation doing this: “Yeah, I can’t hear anymore. I don’t want to hear any more of that.” I think the nuance there is how do we live and lead in such a way that Jesus is the hero? That Jesus is the hero. It’s not me and it’s not us, but we have one head of the church. We have one who’s giving us our marching orders. And what we’re modeling is a desperate dependence upon Him. And I can talk about… A leader can talk about his or her weaknesses without going into the gory details that leave you with just the gory details of failure and weakness. But if I can model an ongoing dependence upon Jesus, that He is our hero, and I want you, church, I want you, ministry leaders, I want you, team, I want us together to continually help us look up, to look to Him and not look at one another as, “We’re going to… We are the people this church needs. We are the people God has in place to use with our weakness to bring his glory in full display.” And that happens when I…Here’s one of the things I’ve heard as I was first beginning a long journey. And I used to be on Young Life staff right out of college. And I went on Young Life staff after I heard the regional director say to me, “Tony, we’re looking for people that are willing to stand in the spotlight but don’t need to.” And that has rung inside of me for a long, long time over these decades. What we’re talking here, I think, is about people willing to stand in the spotlight but don’t need to. And because I don’t need to, I can be honest about my shortcomings. I can receive criticism without being crushed. And the moment that I feel crushed, then I go back to, “What am I believing at any given moment?” If your criticism is crushing me, and leaders will be criticized, all kinds of complaints, disappointments. Don’t try to please everyone because you can’t, but that doesn’t stop us from trying. But as soon as the criticism comes, we don’t have to be defensive about it. We can say, “What’s the grain of truth? What is the element of truth in that criticism? Or what have I not seen that I need to see?” And I can thank you for that criticism if my life is not on the line, if my reputation is already set and fixed because I’m living my life before an audience of one, ultimately.

 

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0:31:11.5 Jim Lovelady: I want to pause this conversation and invite you to join us in prayer for the Serge field workers that we here at the headquarters in Philadelphia are praying for each week. We meet on Tuesday and Friday mornings to pray, and this week, we’re praying for our board of trustees and the executive leadership team. Would you pray with me? Lord, we pray that You would bless these folks. Remind them who they are, who they belong to, and the destiny to which You have called them. Give them great joy in their work in Your Kingdom and the pleasure of Your joy as they follow You. Give them wisdom and let Your grace abound in their relationships with one another, with family members and children, and with the people that they serve. Heal all sicknesses, liberate the enslaved, protect them from the powers and principalities of darkness, and restore to them the joy of Your salvation. And let Your Kingdom come and Your will be done in these places and in their lives, just as it is in Heaven. We pray in Your name. Amen. Now back to the conversation. 

 

0:32:24.5 Jim Lovelady: Yeah, I resonate with how the gospel frees me from having to defend all of those different things. And you listed off so many different challenges that a leader has to face. And if he’s not free in Christ, then those things are going to… He’s going to drown in those things. Clint, can you speak into this, too?

 

0:32:46.1 Clint Dowda: Yeah, I think I can. I’ll use two examples from church softball. Last year, I got punched during church softball, so I shared that.

 

0:32:54.2 Jim Lovelady: Wait, wait, wait, wait. Like…

 

0:32:55.7 Tony Giles: Yeah, you can’t… Don’t skip over that.

 

0:32:57.2 Clint Dowda: I wasn’t skipping over that. The punch was intended for my shortstop, not for me. That he did not deserve it. He’s a young kid, but it was a guy who’s since been kicked out of the league. But I shared that story, and I was not faultless in the playoffs game, but the guy was sort of off the chain. I can’t… Not worth all the details, except that he was known sort of as a person who’s having trouble all the time. And he went, took a beeline for my shortstop, and my shortstop was a big guy, and ran into him, and then benches were clearing. Just the ump comes out. I was just trying to calm people down, and he was trying to jump, he’s a shorter guy with a shorter guy complex, trying to jump over the pile and hit my shortstop, who was a really nice, kind kid who doesn’t do money, not a guy who should be punched. And he hit me on top of the head. So I shared that story in part at the service. I think in talking about things that are real, where people live, and how in weakness the gospel shows up. And so a couple stories came out of that. But one that’s more recent, I’m the manager of the team and I’m the pitcher. So I had sent a group text out, and it was just an innocuous bad… I was trying to make a joke that didn’t land, and it actually offended somebody, offended somebody on the team. And I reached out to them, and we have several people on our team who don’t go to church, and this is one of those guys. And I said, “Hey, listen, I wish I could take that back. I see now that it obviously wasn’t funny, and obviously it’s a risk to send out a joke to a group text of 20 people, how a joke’s going to land.” I said, “I can’t take it back, but I’m a Christian and I can apologize, and I’d love to keep texting with you.” And we ended up having lunch, and a great lunch, and he opened up about his life and his beliefs, and they’re all over the place. And we’re having lunch tomorrow again as a follow-up. And so I shared that story in a sermon, not just for people to identify, “Oh, okay, I do that kind of stuff all the time. I say things I shouldn’t say, or I do this at work, or this happened at school.” And yet as a Christian, I opened up…That was a Holy Spirit line, “Hey, I can’t take it back, but I can apologize. I’m a Christian.” And that opened up his hostility towards conversation, and so much so that last week when I said, “Hey, you want to get back together?” “Hey, I’ve been thinking of you. Yeah, I want to get back together.” And so I think in some ways, what Tony was saying, admitting weakness to show where this repentance happens and where Jesus is the hero and things work out because the gospel will work out. I do that a lot, mess up and those things. And I think people… There’s some things in those softball stories that probably wouldn’t be, would be like, “Hey, I didn’t need to hear all that,” but people need to hear this gospel makes a difference in how I’m doing evangelism. I mean, honestly, like I’m doing an evangelism series this summer and I’m realizing, “Huh, I haven’t been paying attention to people around me who don’t know Jesus.” And so I teach out of my weakness in areas I’m growing in, and I think that encourages people to be able to admit their weakness and also want to see the Spirit use them.

 

0:36:13.4 Jim Lovelady: How do you navigate the high expectations? And what does the gospel say to leaders who feel the high expectations?

 

0:36:24.2 Clint Dowda: One level, of course, there is a reasonable expectation for us as Christians and for me as a leader that come from, again, that situation. I’m going to be a person who tells a joke that didn’t think about how it’s going to land. That’s unreasonable to think I’m not going to be that person, right? Me or any Christian. I have a little soapbox about hypocrisy and, “There’s always hypocrites in the church.” I’m like, “No, not if they admit they screw up and they need Jesus.” That’s not being hypocritical. That’s failing to follow Jesus perfectly and shows that the gospel is true. So that’s where I would usually go in that, that what you do with your mistakes and where you go matters. Right? So, oh, you should not have thought that I was going to be the person who didn’t sin. But you should have the expectation as a Christian and as your pastor that when I sin, I can repent. In proper ways, set the bar low, but in the hardest ways, right? Like I say all the time, when’s the last time someone really apologized to you? Like really sincerely, without condition, apologized to you? We don’t get a lot of those. And that’s what I did to that softball guy when I realized, oh, he’s really upset and, oh, I really did kind of blow that. I was just left with confession and the gospel, and then that’s where God showed up and worked.

 

0:37:47.2 Tony Giles: I think a leader and those who are leading with him or her, those around them in a plurality of leaders in a corporate culture, a church culture, but with a corporateness to the leadership, can actually set the expectations and not leave it to individuals in the ministry or in the body to have their own high expectations that are unrealistic. But there’s a chance for the leader who has a microphone like nobody else to say, “Here’s who I am, here’s what I understand my calling and my role to be, here’s what it’s not, and we’ll walk this together.” And when you’ve got a corporate leadership being able to say, “This is our leader, these are our expectations of him,” then it really does set the bar in a livable, realistic, God-honoring place. To try to please everyone is to fail at your job. If my job becomes meeting your expectations, I’m taking my eyes off the ball that I have been given to do to meet your expectations, and I don’t want to go there. And I’ve got friends that will help me stay the course and focus on what is mine and what’s not, stay away from what’s not mine.

 

0:38:59.5 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. Yeah, and again, you can’t manufacture this. You can’t be so strategic about the way that you live your life that you manufacture being a certain level of vulnerable so that you can influence your church in a certain way, so that they can have certain expectations on you so that… You just can’t… Or maybe you can for a little bit, but you just can’t hold on to that. It has to come from freedom in Christ to be, “This is who I am. I’m so free that I have nothing to fear when it comes to apologizing because I’m not surprised that I’m a sinner.” And I know that it surprises you to see a leader sin in this kind of way and fail in this kind of way, but I’m not surprised, and I’m free to actually confess and to repent and to say an apology that’s a genuine apology, which is so refreshing. I mean, we don’t live in a world where leaders are free to give an apology. Any major politician, any person in high national leadership, when they fail, it’s like the marketing team or whatever they are, the team that comes around, they go, “Okay, say this, don’t say that. Make sure that you don’t say this because the lawyers are going to pounce,” or whatever. Well, when we’re free in Christ, when there is no condemnation, when there are no existential lawyers to bring guilt and condemnation on me, I’m free to go, “Yeah, I’m sorry.”

 

0:40:29.7 Clint Dowda: Maybe we have a better PR team, right? We have Jesus.

 

0:40:32.3 Jim Lovelady: Yeah, that’s the word. PR team.

 

0:40:35.1 Clint Dowda: Like, “Hey, what, are you surprised by that? Just admit it.” It’s… You do have to be able… And people can tell the difference, right? You have to be able to go, “Oh, they really… They see what they did, and they see how that hurt me and how that was wrong, and they’re asking me to move.” That’s what I did with this guy, who ironically doesn’t believe in Jesus. So the ability to move on to the next level. I mean, I was waiting for that text going, “Alright, wonder what he’s going to do?.” And he relaxed a little bit. Relaxed a little bit. And then we went out to lunch, and so I could… And then maybe there’s opportunity. We’re having a lunch. It turned out to… I learned…he’s been on my team for four years. I learned more about him through that episode and our lunch than I had in four years. And he and me probably a little bit.

 

0:41:29.9 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. I love that kind of a theme. I don’t know you but for less than an hour, I love that a theme in your pastoral ministry is the more we can get to know one another, the more that we can love one another in Christ. I want to hear your story. I want to get to know you, and I’m going to have some empathy for you. So I just… It’s a side comment. I just appreciate that in the short time that I know you, that seems to be part of your MO. I appreciate that.

 

0:42:03.2 Tony Giles: As we were trying to put Church Leader Development together, which is another sidebar to all of this, it was, what do we have out there in terms of leadership? And I’ve got a bookcase full, all my books are in front of me, not behind me. I’ve got a bookcase full of books on leadership that I just perused, combed through. It is rare to find a book on leadership that has any reference to love. There’s all kinds of, “Here’s how you do things, here’s how you work with others,” but you look long and hard for the kind of gospel focus that we’re trying to bring to all of this. And that is love is the foundation for all of it. Love is what makes me curious. Love is what makes me want to know that person that I don’t know. What do I not know about him or her? Have I even asked? And what would it look like to be fully present with him or her? How do I encourage them? How do I build them up? How do I love them in a way that is in line with God’s purposes for him or her and maybe us for us?

 

0:43:15.3 Jim Lovelady: Yeah, maybe… I mean, not maybe, but that certainly is the goal of Christian leadership is love. And maybe it’s not the goal of secular leadership. If I worked for some corporation that the bottom line was you need to make 400 cogs and whatever it is, and if you’re not doing it, “This is business.” And we say it, “This isn’t personal. This is business.” And that’s our way of not having to address the fact that the greater call here is to love, not to produce whatever it may be or not to build whatever it may be that we’re wanting. Even if it’s participating in the building of the Kingdom of God, if we have not love, we’re a sounding gong.

 

0:44:03.6 Tony Giles: Yeah. And it’s okay to think about end results or have goals. That’s not excluded from this. It’s how do we get there? How do we get to the end? How do we get to the goal? And if I’m running over people along the way, I have failed.

 

0:44:22.2 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. So when it comes to being a leader, when the Lord calls a person to be a leader, He’s calling this person to a really difficult task. And so what would you guys say to someone who, trying to distill leadership into one kind of person, but so all I can really say is, what do you say to a person who the Lord has called to be a leader? And it’s scary and they’re scared.

 

0:44:49.7 Tony Giles: A couple thoughts come to mind. One is the fact that, and we cite Dan Allender a couple times in this material where he writes, “A leader is anyone who moves to influence others to engage a problem or an opportunity for good. If we’re being followed by someone who looks to us for wisdom, direction, perspective, or decision, then we must embrace our calling and lead. And God doesn’t call us to something that he doesn’t equip us for and promise to sustain us in.” That would be one piece, just recognizing that if God calls, then we step up. And I need to discern carefully and thoughtfully what that is. I don’t rush into it. I want to get the feedback of others. If I sense God is calling me, we talk about the internal and the external call to ministry, and I might have a job offer, but if nobody is looking around and if I don’t sense a fit, then it may not be that God’s calling me to that. And that’s a rambling way of saying this, too, that Christian leadership is a spiritual gift, and it’s a gift to be stewarded by us and developed by us. We don’t come into that role fully grown or fully capable. And eventually never capable, never competent. Our competence comes from the Lord and our dependence upon Him, not in our innate abilities or education or skill set. It’s all from Him.

 

0:46:16.5 Clint Dowda: Yeah, that’s good. I think it may depend on the person. I’ve had people who say, “Hey, I’m called to be a leader,” with a lot of confidence in that. And I’m like, “Well, let’s go slow with that and see where that goes.” And then I’m onboarding one of our three people, a worship director, and he’s more easygoing. He’s said… For him, I’m like, “You got this. You got this,” pushing him out to do that. And that’s probably more what Hunter was doing with me, like, “Yeah, you got this.” So it depends on the person. A person like that you approach very differently than the person who says, “I got this,” and you’re like, to Tony’s point, “Yeah, you sense a call to ministry, but no one else does. So slow your roll and just start serving somewhere.” And then let’s see.

 

0:46:57.8 Jim Lovelady: I’ve been meditating on the idea of pilgrimage and the journey of faith and how when we find ourselves on the journey of faith and someone says, “Hey, either you have a following, you have people listening to you, you have people asking you to lead them,” or, “Hey, you should start practicing these spiritual gifts of leadership that it seems like you have,” when someone points that out and when you realize, maybe it’s years and years into pastoral ministry that you realize that you’re a leader, still, there’s something about when God calls us, He says, “Okay, I want you to lead in this way. And I’m doing that because this is part of how I’m saving you. This is how I’m sanctifying you. This is how I’m going to make you more like me.” And that means in order to lead these people, which maybe you do or don’t want to do, you’re going to have to put down some of these other things. You’re going to have to give this up. You’re going to have to give that up. You can’t lead these people if you’re doing this. You can’t lead this organization if you’re doing that. And there’s a certain amount of suffering that comes along with being a leader. So talk a little bit about what it means to be a leader, what suffering looks like for a leader. I know that you guys have experienced suffering as leaders. So feel free to talk about how you’ve experienced Jesus with you, fellowship in the sufferings of Christ as you lead.

 

0:48:30.9 Tony Giles: There was a long time where I felt like if I was the leader, I was the one that needed to say the words that everyone else wished they had said, to solve the problem, to chart a course. “Wow, I wish I had thought of that.” I thought I was supposed to be that person. The longer I go, the more I realize I never was that person. The suffering that comes along is when I’m trying to be that person and I’m trying to be everything for everybody that has a need. And I realized at some point not long ago that I’ve said yes too quickly to too many things, and that have come back to haunt me. Because they’ve taken me away from a fresh, renewing sense of the gospel because I’m so busy trying to please others. I lack the emotional bandwidth to do everything that I’m trying to do that is not assigned to me. So there’s that kind of suffering. There’s the suffering that comes with identifying with the people of God in a local church and the suffering that they endure. The very first funeral I did was for a six-week-old. And I don’t know that I ever have fully recovered from that. The last funeral I did was for a suicide. And in between those, there were about 50 years in between those two. And they’re hard and harsh, and there’s suffering that comes with that of bearing the burdens and entering the story of others. That’s a painful, for me, it’s a painful kind of suffering that only the gospel really deals with in their life and in mine.

 

0:50:23.1 Jim Lovelady: Yeah, amen.

 

0:50:27.5 Clint Dowda: Yeah, I resonate with that. And I think the things you said earlier about stepping into things, just in the last five or six years have been more personal suffering and then church suffering. Like, oh, this is some heat coming towards me or towards us. I have blissfully avoided that for most of my ministry career. And there were some points of going… I was starting to think, “This is why people leave the ministry. These kind of things are why people leave the ministry,” that I hadn’t experienced. And I feel rejuvenated through the process in the last couple years. And I feel better equipped, even in my own suffering in those ways, different things. I guess more motivated to enter into people’s suffering.

 

0:51:11.0 Jim Lovelady: All right, last question. What would you guys say to a leader who’s exhausted, frustrated, and just about ready to call it quits?

 

0:51:20.1 Tony Giles: I guess I’d say, “Let’s talk.” You need friends. God is near, and He’s not done with you. I’ve got a friend who recently threw in the towel of a ministry that he’d been involved with. He said, “I can’t do it anymore.” And my words to him then and since then were, “God’s not through with you. You are gifted, you’re capable, you have a capacity” I think that was the word I was trying to use, “you have the capacity to serve God and His purposes and His people. Let’s talk about that. It may be a different setting, maybe a different city, maybe a different role, but God’s not done with you.”

 

0:52:04.2 Jim Lovelady: That’s pretty good.

 

0:52:07.1 Clint Dowda: Pretty good. Yeah, I think I would go with that. That wasn’t me, Tony, was it?

 

0:52:10.5 Tony Giles: No, no, no.

  

0:52:14.7 Tony Giles: That’s a recurring story. That’s an old story.

 

0:52:18.1 Jim Lovelady: Yeah.

 

0:52:19.4 Clint Dowda: I would think that, yeah… Like, hey, I would say even a step back, go… I’d say maybe let’s… Like, I’d say maybe let’s talk about, maybe that’s what God’s calling you to do, but maybe you just… Maybe you need… You do need to talk to somebody. And thoughtfully think through who you’re going to talk to. But similar things, that makes sense to me. I appreciate those words.

 

0:52:37.6 Jim Lovelady: There are a lot of folks, a lot of gifted folks, and being a leader  is beating them up. There’s a Savior who ministers really beautifully to Elijah, who does the glorious defeating the prophets of Baal, and then he runs and he finds himself under a broom tree, exhausted, ready to die. And the Lord ministers to him. The Lord feeds him. So, yeah.

 

0:53:11.1 Tony Giles: Yeah, one of the things we try to do with Church Leader Development, which is individualized, it’s not curriculum-based, it’s working through particular issues, whatever the leader has identified. And usually the objectives that he or she might have to start with aren’t the only ones they need to be thinking about. And so a part of that individualized coaching, whether it’s Church Leader Development or the coaching that Clint referred to that accompanies Leadership Lab, includes an element of what Jack and others always called spiritual inquiry. I want to ask enough questions to figure out what’s going on in your heart, what’s gotten you to the place where you are. Let’s unravel that as best we can. And that leads… Spiritual inquiry leads to pastoral care ultimately and then missional discipleship. As we think about what does it look like wherever the Lord has you, whether it’s in the job you’re currently in, the one that you could be in, or something in between, what does missional discipleship look like for you? Because that is a part of your calling, whether it’s serving in the role you’re in or the one that you haven’t found yet. But you are His, you’re a disciple, and we’re all on mission. Let’s talk about that.

 

0:54:30.0 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. That’s really good. You should probably give me, while we’re here, a pitch for both of those, Church Leader Development and Leadership Lab. So we’ll do that at the end, like when we’re done. But for now, can you just talk about the difference between each?

 

0:54:48.4 Tony Giles: Sure. Yeah. The biggest difference is cohort learning together as individuals or as an individual, curriculum-based or issue-driven. So curriculum-based cohort is for a designated period of time. We have an orientation and then we have eight modules. So that’s nine gatherings over nine months. This cohort that, for the most part, don’t know each other before they meet each other in an orientation unless, like Clint, brings somebody with him, which we’re encouraging. So it’s cohort-based, online, two hours monthly. The individual coaching is twice a month, usually for an hour. It’s based around the objectives that the leader and I hammer out together. So if you come to me and say, “I know I need some help,” and it’s very specific, this is more specific and tailored to the individual situation rather than curriculum-based, “Here’s a broad way of thinking about what you’re doing.” But if somebody says, like someone did recently, “I need help working with my staff. We’re a mess,” so I may be sitting down with him twice a month, starting soon, to think through how is he engaging his staff. So we’re going to spend that time around that particular issue. And I’m going to be bringing gospel things to bear, probably pulling from the Leadership Lab curriculum as we go, but there may be some nuanced things that are not in the Leadership Lab curriculum that we’re talking about individually.

 

0:56:26.2 Jim Lovelady: Yeah, that’s great. I love how each is tailored and each has a certain strength to satisfy a particular need. Even as we’re talking, this has been kind of a mini-cohort kind of conversation, and we’re just kind of bringing up… There have been so many different things where I’m like, “Oh man, you could do an essay on that. You could do a whole essay on that and a whole essay on that.” There’s just so many aspects of being a leader and what it means to be a missional leader, what it means to be a leader who leads like Jesus. There’s just so many aspects of this. And so I appreciate that Leadership Lab has these cohorts. Like, “Hey, I have so many things that I need to talk about. I would love to talk with a group of folks, and I’d love for there to be insight in all of that.” So, yeah, I feel like this conversation has just gotten things started for anybody who’s listening who would join in on this conversation. Anybody who would join in to this kind of cohort thing, man, they need to just sign up for Leadership Lab. I’m kind of out of time, but I really appreciate y’all doubling in with these things.

 

0:57:34.4 Clint Dowda: Yeah, it did what you said. You said at the end of the hour, be more encouraged about Jesus. It worked, Jim. Way to go, God.

 

0:57:42.1 Jim Lovelady: It works. Way to go, God. Yeah.

  

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0:57:51.6 Jim Lovelady: How did Jesus lead people? He wrapped a towel around Himself. Taking the low place, He set a narrative around Himself that was completely unexpected, and then He called those who follow Him to do the same. How was He able to do that? And how in the world are we going to follow Him in that? Thankfully, the answer is actually more sophisticated than just go and do what He said to do. How was Jesus able to take the low place? John 13:3 gives the answer: “Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come from God and was going to God.” That’s the key. Jesus knew who He was, who He belonged to, and where He was going. And that freed Him to need nothing from the people that He led. It freed Him to love them sacrificially. If you’re going to do the same, it’s not just because Jesus commanded you to do it, though you better take His command seriously. He is the King. It’s that His command comes with Holy Spirit power. You gotta know who you are. You gotta know who you belong to, and you gotta know where you’re going. So who are you? You’re a child of God. Who do you belong to? You are not your own. You belong, body and soul, to your faithful Savior. And where are you going? Your destiny is to share in the glory of the sons and daughters of God. It’s all yours in Christ. This is the only way that you’ll be free to not need anything from the people that you lead or are responsible for. You’ll be free to just love them. And here’s the glorious and joyful reality of this. Imagine not needing anything from anyone. Imagine not needing to use people to build your reputation or to hide your shame and brokenness. Imagine being freed from the power of ridicule and slander. Imagine having all things, all things, because the Father has given you all things. Now, from that place, all there is left to do is to love the people around you. Jesus is inviting you into that freedom. His yoke is easy and His burden is light. One of my takeaways from this episode is that I discovered an invitation to prayer. Whenever I sense the call to lead as Jesus leads, whenever I find myself saying, “Follow me as I follow Christ,” John 13:3 invites me to pray. And I say, “Jesus, remind me who I am and what I have in you.” And I say, “Jesus, remind me where this is all going.” I want to make space for this kind of prayer in my life, and I want you to make space in your life for this kind of prayer. And make space in your life for Him to answer these prayers. And as He answers these prayers, He’ll begin to lead you, and you’ll discover His call to lead others. And then you’ll discover that leadership exposes you, and you’ll see the need for the gospel to remind you of your identity in Christ, that you no longer have to be the hero. You’ll be free to admit your weakness and repent, and then you’ll be increasingly free to love and serve the people God has entrusted to you. This is how the gospel empowers us to lead like Jesus. If you want to learn more, I encourage you to follow the links in the show notes to explore Church Leader Development. It’s the one-on-one coaching program. And I also want to encourage you to explore Leadership Lab. It’s the cohort style program designed to help you lead like Jesus. And I’ll have other resources for you to explore in the show notes, but when in doubt, go to serge.org and just browse our website. We have so much there to help you on your spiritual journey. And go to give.serge.org to financially support the work of Serge. You’ll discover the joy of generosity if you just go explore the people and projects that you can support as we participate in God’s Kingdom together. Give.serge.org. And as you go, remember who you are. Remember who you belong to and where you’re going. Child of God, the Lord loves you and He’s a good King, and He sends you out with His blessing. So may the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face to smile down on you. May the Lord be gracious to you, turn His bright eyes to you, and give you His peace. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, one God, life everlasting. Amen.

 

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