Learning and Leading in Ministry: Chapter Eighteen

Control Your Own Spirit

Learn yourself.

A well-know rule of the legal profession states that a lawyer should never ask a witness a question without already knowing the answer. An overconfident attorney who presumes to know more than the facts permit may ask a careless question and risk getting an unanticipated response that can blow a case to smithereens. In ministry, it is extremely dangerous for a leader to breeze into a situation without understanding how he or she may react to a given problem. Hidden agendas, surprise attacks and irrational outbursts can come out of nowhere to stun an unwitting leader. Unknown factors always have the potential to touch a nerve and elicit inappropriate responses from people, including the leader.

Several years ago, the matriarch of a large family in the church I pastor went into emergency surgery with the assurance of success. Something went wrong on the operating table, however, and she did not survive. When I arrived at the scene, over forty of her distraught children, grandchildren, siblings and other relatives had flooded the waiting room, and the place was in an uproar. Some were screaming, some were crying, some were praying in a shrill voice, and others were shouting angrily at the health care personnel. The doctor stood silently, his eyes darting around the room and his lips bluing with a twinge of fear. He couldn’t have been happier to see me. My long association with the family gave me the ability to quell the uprising and when they quieted down, the doctor gave his report and quickly vanished. I stayed and dealt with each of the emotions and reactions until the group dispersed. Had I encountered this problem early on in my ministerial career, I may not have succeeded. But, my ministry style developed over a forty year span of experience prepared me for situations like this, in part because I knew how I would react.

Merely being a leader does not exempt you from negative emotions like anger, touchiness, bad temper, mood swings, impatience or prejudicial feelings. Raw, human passion comprises the personality of a leader as much as any other person. If anything, these traits can become amplified in leaders. This is a critical observation because ministry leaders get pulled into a cross section of volatile situations that can push all of their buttons at once. Disasters are likely to happen when leaders do not take the time to recognize their human weaknesses and examine their own reactionary tendencies. For example, if you go berserk when you catch someone in a lie, or if you lose it when someone shouts an obscenity at you, or if you become disgusted with a drug addict who has ignored your counsel for the twentieth time, then you are destroying your own ability to help. When you face the worst in human behavior, you must respond with your best in leadership.

The key to knowing yourself is found in the title to the chapter: control. Envision a steering wheel fastened to each problem you encounter. Reach out and take hold of it. When you grab it, you will have a sense of control that will make the matter manageable. Self-knowledge or knowledge of the circumstances are helpful only to the extent that you can take control over the wheel.