Pastor's Perspective on Church Administration Part 1

this week i had the privilege of interviewing pete greasy to gain a pastor's perspective on church administration pete's been working in pastoral ministry for the last 35 years and it was great to hear from him what he thinks about church administration now i've split this down into three different videos so please take the time to check them all out it's also available on podcasts as well so look to the website thechurchoffice.co.uk and you'll find a whole range of other resources as well thank you for watching today it's gavin and i'm your host today and i'm joined by a good friend of mine pete grisley and we've worked together at the christchurch in newport for the last 17 years 70 years 70 years yeah it feels like 70 years doesn't it i took you on when you were 12. yeah i'm not looking that good am i i'm not looking at them so it's good to be here we've worked together and i love working with pete and you know pete was the one who employed me and prior to me p i suppose um there was a previous church administrator and it's obviously been something that you've obviously had in past you've you've valued it highly you've employed people in this this kind of role over the number of years that the church has been around so yeah what's your thinking on that church administration i think horton is it obviously yeah vital gav 17 years so yeah well no it is vital and and i think my my whole understanding of it's changed over the years so i've been impassing my pastoral ministry full-time for 35 years plus now and i think initially i used secretaries but then quickly realized that they were great in one thing but not in another and became very aware very early on of my limitations and my own weaknesses and i think that's the case for so many men who are in pastoral ministry they they they have a particular gift set particularly if they may be a kind of lead pastor or whatever it may be that they they love their books they should do they love their theology they should do they love their preaching they show you they love caring for the folk they should do they love taking the gospel out these are all things that that are part of the package of an elder uh and a pastor uh yet what they tend to lack is the ability to get things done the ability to know where to go how to do it and so things fall between the cracks so i think early on i realized things were falling between the cracks so who can fill in the cracks and then over my years i've realized i don't need someone who can just fill in the cracks i need someone who is far beyond that who is able to see ahead understand where we're going work it through as part of a team and make things happen yeah all right i'll edit this soon okay it's mark williams ringing see accountant ring of all things okay leave it on leave it in this is this is what you need this is why you need an administrator the accountant doesn't ring me i'm glad to say he rings me no it's good um so most churches if we talk about you know pastors in your role you're talking about key things that they've got gift packages that they've got and and structuring and seeing ahead and putting in plans in place is not some of the strong things i remember joking with one pastor that he almost needs to put a sign outside his door you know pastor in administration you know do not disturb um because you know now's not a good time he's doing admin and admin is a bit of a challenge and so you've kind of got the pa route that people go down and and that has some success but not not all and you're talking about a role that goes beyond that that's part of the leadership team yeah and that's taking on responsibility and that's able to kind of be a manager i suppose in many ways of what you're what you needed yeah no question so we have a secretarial team here and they're wonderful they do a great job but their primary role will be to implement our decisions so can you call this person can you write this email can you sort this out can you whatever it may be um and that that's necessary and helpful but what's more important far more important is somebody who's a part of that team or a few people that are part of that team who are not just implementing decisions but part of the decision-making process and approach it from a perspective of this is how we can get this done and this is the way i think we should go as well so they're not just the implementers alone they're also bringing a voice into not only how we can do things but the best way and things that we need to change yeah absolutely right yeah i've always appreciated and felt very valued you know on the team retreats that we go away utterly valued if you go ongoing if he goes i'm gone but i think you're right and and you've set such a good model here of you know i'm not just about implementation but i'm involved in the process so so there's a thinking when we're when you're trying to take the boat or the church in a particular direction there's a thinking that goes on there's no there's a process that goes on and if the person who's implementing can be involved in that process they they're the ones who give the flavor of what we're doing and what we're trying to do no questions so so if you think about us let's use that metaphor of a boat or if you think about us as a ship yeah because i've actually done my day skipper yeah so i know about these things um so if you think of it as a ship yeah you may have a man or a team of men whose hand is on the rudder ultimately determining the direction uh yet the people the hands on the rudder aren't the people that know which sails to put up necessarily to get us there um and so you know someone needs to say hoist the mansell uh you know pull in the force or put out the jib these are the things that that someone and some people need to be able to take us forward and then also say to the people with the hands on the rudder you can't go in that direction the wind is against us you know you may want to go there but we're going to have to do a big loop here so i mean it's a good metaphor because you have all hands on deck working together and i love i i love to do that if it were just left to those who are pastorally gifted a church will not go forward yeah it can it will flounder in the water yeah whatever you do to the rudder yeah yeah and it's true isn't it because i've met some pastors who've got like they've come up with 100 ideas they've got so many ideas of ways they want to reach out for the gospel and it just never seems to happen it never you know those ideas never seem to kind of birth or take any fruit or and if it gets very frustrating for a church doesn't it if you don't have somebody on the ground who's able to kind of push those ideas forward and and draw people in and i think one of the key skills i think that i've tried to i suppose develop is is people skills yeah and that's crucial isn't it in this role yeah because if you are hoisting the sales and pulling them in you are the one working with the majority of the crew yeah and that's what you do and that's what others do in this situation now it doesn't mean that we're not working with the crew but we're more trying to care for the crew trying to teach the crew trying to motivate the crew outwards that's our job but we need someone who can work with everybody particularly most of them are volunteers um because that's the nature of church life so you must have someone who knows where to go knows how to get there but also has the ability to win people's hearts so that they don't feel that they're under pressure or being used but that they feel that they're on board enjoying where they're going so that is a gift you have and that's a gift where i think sometimes when we think about an administrator we think about some guy sitting behind a desk with this computer that is not the main job this is more uh if you or if you to go to a board room you may have a chairman and a board of directors but you need a managing director you need someone who can work with the team to in order to get us forward so i think it's it's far more vital than most men in pastoral ministry realize yeah i think you're right and the different leaders that we get to interact with and different churches that we we meet often the model here in wales and probably further afield is that you get a single pastor who'll be serving a church um and they often next person they have to hire is someone of who's similar to them in a kind of part-time or kind of pastoral assistant yeah and from my experience you know depending on how gifted that second person is you know the assistant is in administration is how effective that church can be going forward yeah sure and sure well if again this is this is if you were to ask me now if it would if we had to just have two people yeah for us if the team had to be diminished it would be probably not me one of the other guys and you or at least a a leading pastor and an administrator or a manager because i think that's what happens i think i think when you i planted churches and and started when i was 25 and so when when i looked there the first thing i looked at at that time was i i just need someone who can reach out to the youth i need someone who can sort out the music i can need someone who can do some evangelism uh and we'll have a secretary a day a week or two days a week to try and sort out all the stuff that i don't like sitting at my desk writing um i i i just that is for me not the priority if if if you're a single guy on your own and you're looking for who should i take on next for me there's no question you should take on not not a secretary not just someone who can sit behind a desk you should take on someone it's a deaconing role so if you're an elder before you want a a team of elders and so you can always have lay elders in that but if you're taking on someone else in a full-time or a part-time role i'd be saying i'd be looking for someone who had a gift of making things happen managing that was able to connect with people that was as clear on the gospel and loved it as much as you that love the church in the way you love the church and essentially as a just a completely different package gift package to you and i think those are the churches that are able to thrive and move forward and then respect that person and and recognize that they may not have the gift of teaching you know if you're talking about a deacon role the only major difference is is the elder should be teaching and the deacons don't do the teaching they don't need the gift of teaching but they do need to be able to communicate they do need to be able to win hearts they do need to be able to motivate and so those are the things you're looking for and there's a lot of those people out there i think just untapped and unrealized yeah that's absolutely right because there can be a kind of an idea that the ministry looks like this you know you're a teaching you know caring uh elder and that's all that you do and that kind of function what you're talking about earlier but actually the ministry needs to be viewed broader doesn't it that there's actually a leadership role here and kind of a managing of a church that can be recognized and and and implemented yeah there's no question again let's go back to that metaphor of the ship i mean imagine imagine a couple of guys that you just you take another guy on and all he wants to do is what you do so you've got your hand on the rudder on the tiller and and you're encouraging him and showing you how to do the same and and you just keep moving this thing and you're wondering why you're not going forward because all you're doing is going around in circles well let's try moving it here and maybe if you do that we can move it here or we can move it here um and the people on on the ship are going where are we going what's going on and you know yeah are we changing a direction again but not really moving forward so i think we must look into the into the ship we must look at who's can determine and direct how we can drive forward in those ways and i think that's the management administration role yeah because that's uh yeah i think's right absolutely right and it's interesting that you're talking about you know if you could do it again you wouldn't necessarily employ a children's ministry or youth worker and those are kind of the strategies that smaller churches take initially don't they so we've got the the lead pastor right how do we make sure this church goes forward for the future how do we secure the future right we need to think about children we need to think about young people and we need to kind of put all our effort in and they and fairplay churches put a lot of effort into those areas um but they do seem to slow down over a couple of years and so you know if you're listening and you're in that kind of role then it's worth reconsidering again who do we bring in as a second role yeah and just to think about that a little bit more yeah we i mean there's a lot of people i don't like to use the word lay because we're all in it together um but there's a lot of people who are not supportive financially by the church who can bring in so many different gifts um in so many different ways and they do and most churches utilize that um you may have a large children's group and think i've got to have someone who can take this on but you can probably find those things amongst the church with people willing to serve within music you can probably find those gifts within the church you don't need some super professional musician to take it full we're not trying to put on a great show here we're trying to care for people and enable them to enjoy the lord jesus together and so there are many things that we think if we do this it'll it'll look good and go great but it doesn't necessarily work now there may be a stage where churches get to a size where by the grace of god we're in a size where we are able to employ people in different roles in specific ways they're just not the major priority in my opinion you need someone who can even determine with you who is needed next yeah how that works next because as a senior pastor i don't always know now i hope that what i can do is try and look ahead to some degree try and discern who would be good to be useful but a lot of the time it's not coming from me you know it's you approaching me saying i think we need to put this into place yeah i think if we do need to take somebody on it should be in this role and i'm deeply grateful for that because you're seeing things in ways that i'm not i'm recognizing on the ground what needs to happen in ways that i'm not which gives me room to read mr spurgeon and to you know we should be given to prayer and the word we should be given to care and for folk we should be given to telling people about jesus so you release me to be able to do what i can do best yeah um and that's vitally important absolutely yeah and that's been my heart i think right from since day one i think um is that how can i take a responsibility that you don't have to think about it anymore you know i can take something off you and that you've done a great job i don't think about anything anymore yeah it's great i do but not for long yeah but you're thinking about the word you're thinking you know everything that god's called you to do you've now got the space and not the distraction of some of the things that that were probably there before yeah and and that i think that does make a difference a big difference particularly in a smaller church in a single pasta there can be a lot thrown at you in a lot of distractions but to be able to go right you take care of all that operation stuff that frees you up to think and so to serve so this i you know i've spent so much time with so many different pastors so many of them particularly if they're on their own or just a couple of them in in a in a full-time or part-time role just feel like failures and go to bed at night thinking of all that has to be done or all their meetings are only and ever caught up with trying to figure and sort stuff out that push things under the carpet and then just think i am just no good at this i'm coming out of this and so you do get a lot of guys quitting it's not that they haven't been called it's not that they're not effective it's just they're just not positioned correctly so that's why i would be and i think this what you're doing with this website and all that's taking place is so vital if it does nothing else it causes causes men in that role to go okay what do i need most importantly yeah and how can we move forward and what does it mean to put that into place yeah yeah definitely and it doesn't have to it isn't just a big church with a bigger budget that can afford to employ someone this is identifying gifting isn't it and all the different gifting you talk about that could be there present in your church just untapped you know like i've spent time looking through the church database thinking right what kind of jobs have we got what kind of people have we got in the church what are they really good at and strengths and then to tap into that and there's a degree of gifting isn't it to be able to identify someone's gifting and go right this person will be ideal in this role yeah and deploy them into that role and that is kind of an essential part of the role i think and you can find people like that in a part-time role yes you can in a voluntary role they're out there aren't they they are out there but again um they can be found but i think most pastors myself included wouldn't be the best person to be finding them yeah so i can see the frustration of what needs to be done yeah and go oh well we need someone to possibly do this or not even be aware we might need someone to do this so you need someone to be able to look ahead to to perceive where the needs will be down the road where the weaknesses are and look to filling those whether it's through people just serving voluntarily or whether it's it may just be taking on someone a day or two a week who you recognize that may have a gifting to be able to do this so you don't just want to you don't just want to maintain what you have yeah you want to be able to move forward you want to be able to take this gospel out and you want to be able to serve people more effectively so it's the ability to see ahead to recognize what's needed in personnel yeah so it's both an administration and a personnel role mixed together well that concludes our video and the interview that i did with pete again please check out the website at www.churchoffice.co.uk

Channel: The Church Office

Views: 801

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: pastor, pastors, pastors training, church admin, church administration, christian, the church office, church office, church work, church, leadership, support, administration, organisation, church administrator, church elder, deacon, church life, church ministry, ministry, ship, steering a boat, Gavin smith, UCAN, pastoral team, churches

Id: yIzqeZAB-_A

Length: 19min 47sec (1187 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 15 2020