From time to time we see volunteers to whom God has given such magnificent ability that the local church seems too small an arena. It’s not that any local church could not use such a man or woman. But the leadership and long-term members do not always know how to respond to this mega-talent. One of three things usually happens.
• The most common solution is to refuse access to the resources of the church and thus restrict the person’s ministry.
A young staff member was invited to a church and quickly discerned that the young marrieds desperately needed help in managing their relationships and finances. He put together an elective Sunday school class on this theme. Immediately, class attendance jumped to four or five times the size of most other adult classes in the Sunday school. More than two thirds of the class were worship attenders who hadn’t been coming to Sunday school, but the rest were migrants from other classes.
After thirteen weeks or so, the senior pastor simply ordered the staff member to dissolve the class so the Sunday school could be “regularized.” This restored the political balance to normal and made life more tolerable for the older leaders and senior minister. The chance to develop additional talent out of the young-married class was forfeited, however, along with a revitalization of the entire adult Sunday school program. Even the nursery and preschool departments stopped growing as young parents began dropping away.
Consider another case of big talent and small vision: When the chief executive officer of a: corporation attended one of our church growth seminars, he went home to his pastor and said, “I’m ready to make myself available to stimulate the world mission of the church.”
“That’s great!” the pastor responded. “We’ve been looking for someone to become missionary hos-pitality chairman, and this would be ideal for you.”
“Well, what does the job consist of?” asked the CEO. The pastor then outlined the task: opening one’s home throughout the year to house visiting missionary speakers. This would not only give the missionary a chance to be in a home setting but would also relieve the church of motel and food bills.
Unfortunately, the CEO’s very busy schedule did not permit much home entertaining for any reason. His gifts did not include hospitality, so this offer came like a pail of cold water in the face.
Here was a volunteer talent able to plan a strategy for missions and recruitment that could have resulted in lay trips to other countries, the raising of large sums of money for specific mission projects, the design of a denominational approach to missions education, and the call and training of dozens of young people into missionary careers. But since this talent was greatly undervalued, none of that happened.
• A second possible outcome is when the local pastor, realizing the magnitude of talent involved recommends the individual to regional or national levels of the denomination. This person is named to committees, task forces, boards, or other structures in which his or her unique energy and ability can be suitably applied to the church at large.
• But a third option is possible, at least in some congregations. The church can decide to deliberately shape itself in favor of capitalizing on the direction and energy this person brings. In rapidly growing churches we often find several effective individuals who came when the church was much smaller. They were encouraged by the pastors and older members to utilize their gifts within the context of that body. When great fruitfulness came from their ministry, and the church grew, the church leadership kept receiving these people without defensiveness. Their ministries were accepted as a gift of grace, and the resultant growth was applauded.
