When I arrived at my first church fresh out of graduate school, I was oblivious to the fact that I had walked out of the warm, protected womb of seminary academia into a virtual battlefield of unrest and power plays. The church had a reputation of staff tensions, divisions, and in-fighting.

The previous twenty years had seen the appearance and disappearance of three strong-willed pastoral leaders. The original, founding pastor had retired, the second pastor had been asked to leave, and the third pastor, caught in the crossfire of controversy surrounding the first two, made the wise choice to move to another church. I have no doubt that each of them was a fine, committed man of God called to serve in that large congregation. However, I also know God does not call together church workers only to see them divide the body of Christ.

When I arrived, this large congregation had been without pastoral leadership for three months. The details of the battles among the multiple staff are being omitted, for they differ drastically depending on whom you talk to. The important fact is that multiple staff tensions are not uncommon. It seems as though God chooses pastoral leaders in the church who are independent types: self-confident, dynamic, and usually quite set in their ways. These traits are strengths, not weaknesses. However, when these types of leaders have to work together, a potentially explosive situation exists.

Multiple staff problems are so widespread that most pastors are leery about adding staff. The end result is that as their congregations grow, they continue to try covering all the bases themselves. The effect, of course, is twofold: the quality of ministry deteriorates, and the pastor becomes increasingly frustrated. This frustration leads to anxiety, and when coupled with an overworked schedule, the whole thing becomes a mess. When desperation sets in, some conscientious pastors take the leap of faith (sort of like jumping out of an airplane at 30,000 feet without a parachute) and decide to add professional staff.

One friend of mine took the leap of faith. He is an excellent pastor, and had spent several years building the spiritual depth of his congregation. He introduced an evangelism program and trained lay people for outreach. The result was a growing church. Soon he couldn’t handle the workload, and he knew a multiple staff was the best alternative. But he’d always ministered to small churches; he had no experience with a multiple staff. He knew of several multiple staff churches, but he also knew there were many problems. To put it bluntly, he was scared.

Thus, with incredible patience and caution, he spent an entire year interviewing candidates for the position of his associate. The choice was made; the man joined the staff; and two years later both men are miserable. They rarely speak to one another, and both are seeking positions elsewhere. The bottom line, of course, is the fact that the congregation suffers from the whole situation.

The more one hears about multiple staff situations, the more hesitant one gets about working closely with anybody. You begin to recognize the real meaning behind the humorous takeoff of John 3:16: “For God so loved the world that he didn’t send a committee.”

Yet, on a more serious note, perhaps it is precisely in the beautiful reality of the incarnation that multiple staffs can be built on real hope. That hope is not pious theory, but a sound strategy that works. The strategy is grounded in the incarnate reality of Christ. God loved the world so much that he sent his only Son. His Son loves the world so much that he established his body of believers to be his presence in the world. Jesus Christ loves the body so much that he gives the body his Holy Spirit. With the Holy Spirit comes God’s strategy for people to work together. It can work, and a growing number of multiple staffs are seeing that it does work.

In three years, the staff of my church grew from one young, naive, overworked graduate to fourteen professional church workers. Of this large staff, five of us had to work together closely and efficiently, in a way that edified the body and brought glory and honor to the Lord of the church. I was the head pastor; Neil, the assistant pastor; Joann, a deaconess; Frank, a minister of evangelism; and Tony, a minister of education. We differed in age, in race, and in sex. We differed in educational levels: from one with two doctorates, to one with only two years of college. Our families varied: some were married with several children, some with no children, and one was single. We had different hobbies, likes and dislikes in music, food, and many other areas. The challenge was clear: As different as we were, we shared one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and we were called to serve one church-a church in a changing community, a church with a lot of problems, a church with a history of multiple staff disasters. The question that faced us faces every multiple staff: What are the criteria that can work for managing a multiple staff?

Criteria That Don’t Work

Some criteria are more popular than others, but all are used. When a church begins to expand or replace staff, or when a church begins to experience some tensions, what criteria are available for good, sound management?

1. People just like me. The pastor’s been looking for a long time to find a “suitable” candidate for the job of assistant pastor. He’s pleased that the lay people will look to him for the final decision, and he’s glad to be able to influence the whole process. After all, he reasons, “I have to work with the new man.”

The pastor hears about John Smith who has a small church in another state and wants to move into a larger congregation. The real clincher is that the pastor sees Smith as being just like himself: he stresses a strong counseling ministry, he’s good at counseling, and people come to him to seek his help. Furthermore, many of those people end up joining the church. Since both of them are known for their counseling, they’d make a great team, right? Wrong!

When the two counselors are on the same staff, they do have a lot in common: they have the same interests, read the same books, and enjoy attending the same seminars. However, when a couple comes for counseling about their family problems, do they see the original pastor, or Smith? Are they given the choice? What about the jealousy that may be inevitable when one pastor is asked to counsel more than the other pastor?

Add to this the possibility that neither pastor likes youth work. They both say it’s not their strength, and avoid involvement with the youth. Yet, someone has to take care of the youth program. The original minister has seniority, so he tells Smith to take care of ministry to youth. After all, “It has to be done.” To the jealousy and tension Smith already feels, add resentment. The stage is set for an explosion on the one hand, and/or ulcers on the other.

2. Popularity. “Joe Johnson is a powerhouse. He has strengths for ministry that have really made him popular in his church. Let’s get him for our staff.” Johnson is a big-name preacher who is well known in the whole denomination. He’d be a great asset to any church. He’s looking for a change and is interested in our geographic region.

The congregation thinks Johnson would be a great associate for their pastor, George Grant. Grant has served faithfully for several years, and he could definitely use the help.

The problem is that Grant is threatened by Johnson: his popularity makes Grant uneasy, and he begins to get worried about his own leadership before Johnson is even officially invited. Worse, for Grant to admit this to his people would be a confession of insecurity.

Johnson accepts, and Grant salves his own fears by remembering that he too is popular with his people and is known as a “powerhouse.” Yet, as they try to develop a “team” ministry, Grant and Johnson realize that every good team has only one captain. A football team works well with a quarterback, guards, and tackles, not just several quarterbacks.

The two pastors recognize you can’t fit four feet into the two shoes under the head pastor’s desk. They feel the pressure build; the circulation of Christian love stops; they both become numb to each other and insensitive to their ministry. And the body of Christ, if it moves forward at all, does so in spite of the pastors, not because of them.

3. Academics. I once heard someone speak at a congregational meeting where the discussion was focused on adding a professional staff person: “I think we should get Sam Jones from Greenbranch because he has a good educational background. He has a B.S., M.A., D.D., A.M. and P.M.” We all knew he was well qualified for the E¤.S., but we wondered how he would earn an A.M. and a P.M.

Recent emphasis on a highly trained clergy has been a welcome and needed trend in the church. Well-educated, professional pastors have been equipped to meet some of the most pressing needs of today’s complicated society. Furthermore, advanced degrees have helped pastors add credibility to their ministry in a world that places high priority on education.

Academic degrees can help a congregation to know the interests and areas of training that are part of a pastor’s background. Yet, as someone has noted, seminaries and other educational institutions don’t make leaders for God’s people; they only train the leaders whom God has chosen.

4. Effectiveness. Pastor Adams’ associate just accepted a position in another church. The congregation has chosen a committee to seek candidates to fill the vacancy. One of the committee members has recommended Bill Baker. This member has an uncle in Baker’s church who happens to know he’s looking for another church. He also has related how very effective Baker has been. The committee is interested and recommends his name to the congregation because of his good track record.

The problem is that effectiveness varies in different locations. Baker’s former congregation was made up of younger people in a suburban setting. His new position as Adams’ associate places him in a rural setting with mostly older people. Thus, in this case, Baker is not effective at all.

Another problem is the word “effective” itself. To be an “effective pastor” in some people’s eyes means “people like him.” To others it means “the church grew.” To still others it means “we made the budget every year he was here.” Some feel pastors are effective when they “don’t make waves.” It also is true that a boat that doesn’t make any waves is not moving!

5. Bureaucratic Design. This model is used frequently in those denominations which have a “system” for placing church workers in congregations. Often a district supervisor or regional bishop has several congregations for which he has responsibility, and among his duties is sometimes the task of filling vacancies.

The bureaucratic system at least makes the task of adding staff objective. Church workers are recommended to congregations on the basis of criteria selected by the bishop or supervisor rather than on the good advice of somebody’s uncle.

Yet, the criteria used are often some of the same faulty criteria mentioned above. Consequently, there is little evidence that the Holy Spirit uses the “system” to any greater effect than drawing names out of a hat.

There is a “system,” however, that has worked for me. It is biblically based, New Testamentoriented, Holy Spirit – designed, God- pleasing, causes growth for the kingdom, and is hardly ever used by many congregations. It’s the system of managing a staff according to spiritual gifts.

Using Spiritual Gifts

Somewhere in my background there was a fear of the topic of spiritual gifts. Perhaps it was a fear of the unknown. Perhaps it was a reaction against those who had “charismania.” Like any pastor, I’d had my share of well-meaning Christians who had discovered their spiritual gifts; people who wanted to share their new discovery with all the discretion and diplomacy of Attila the Hun. My reaction was cool, to say the least. These people were sincere, but often not fully informed on the biblical teaching (due in part, no doubt, to uninformed clergy like myself). Consequently, they let their enthusiasm get carried away. I frequently felt beat over the head when they finished with me. They made me feel like a second-class Christian because I didn’t have their particular gifts. They often committed “charismatic suicide” by over-emphasizing gifts to the extent that there were divisions in the body of Christ. Clearly they suffered from the not uncommon Corinthian syndrome, supposedly well-versed on I Corinthians 12 about gifts, and not so well-grounded in I Corinthians 13 on the necessary fruit-love.

After preparing for four years in pre-theological schools, spending four years in seminaries, and devoting three years in a doctoral program, I noticed something about spiritual gifts: The subject was absent! There were only two possible explanations set forth: gifts were given just to the apostles (and a few others), or gifts died with the close of the first century and/or the closing of the New Testament writings. Those explanations sounded fine for a while, but even as a budding theologian, I could see an inconsistency with my conservative teachers (and tradition). On the one hand they yelled heresy if you watered down Scripture in terms of the virgin birth, resurrection, ministry of Jesus, Jonah and the whale, and so forth; but on the other hand, they took the liberty to water down the spiritual gifts teaching in the New Testament. Not only did they water it down-they looked the other way!

I then realized I had over-reacted to those who had “charismania.” I had developed, along with a host of others, an avoidance syndrome. I’d contracted a serious disease called “charisphobia.” Had that condition persisted, the multiple staff at my church could have been another statistic in the graveyard of ecclesiastical disasters.

My introduction to spiritual gifts came by way of the “church growth movement.” Our church is located in a transitional neighborhood. For thirty years it had been a plateaued or declining congregation. Something had to be done, and the church growth movement spoke to the needs of the church.

As a vital part of church growth principles, I learned about spiritual gifts discovery. I soon realized that the biblical evidence shows that the use of spiritual gifts is God’s design for the church. The big challenge was how to implement spiritual gifts discovery into the church. Since we were in the middle of developing a staff, that seemed a logical place to begin.

We started by discovering what the gifts of each of the staff members were. First, we looked at the biblical passages on gifts; then we answered a questionnaire which helped us to discover some of our gifts; and we listed the gifts of each staff member.

For many of us, that was one of the most liberating days of our lives. How relieved I was to discover that I did not have gifts that would make me a good counselor. I knew I was adequate, but I knew I wasn’t strong in that area. The staff laughed with me, because they knew it too! Yet, the staff rejoiced with me when I discovered I had strong gifts in teaching and administration. It was no ego trip; there was no boasting. God gave me those gifts-they were his graces, his gifts to me.

We were pleased to see that Neil, my assistant pastor, had some gifts that helped in counseling, and our minister of education, Tony, also was strongly gifted in that area. We knew the counseling load was heavy in our church, and we were grateful that the Lord had given us people to meet those needs.

Dave was one of our teachers at the time. He was in his late thirties and had never been married. Although he was a likable person and we enjoyed his company, he often would feel uncomfortable, sometimes almost apologizing that he had never been married. He’d say, “I guess I’ve just never met the right person.” When Dave discovered his spiritual gifts, he found he had the gift of celibacy-a gift that allows certain members of the body of Christ more independence to serve the Lord with their other gifts. For Dave, his discovery helped him to see that what some people considered a liability, God considered an asset, and he had gifted Dave for a special ministry.

We also discovered why Joann, our deaconess, was so much better at hospital and shut-in calls than were either of us pastors. She had strong gifts of mercy and helps. Neil and I would not stop making calls on our people, but we had no hesitancy in allowing Joann to take the lead.

Frank discovered he had the gift of an evangelist. He didn’t feel he had the gift of administration. That was really helpful to know. Since I was his supervisor on the staff, and since I had the gift of administration, I just couldn’t see why he didn’t administrate with the finesse that came natural to me. That’s where I was wrong: it didn’t come natural to me-it was supernatural. God’s gift of administration was given to me, not to Frank. Immediately, I realized I could no longer expect him to be an administrator. In evangelism, however, he shined. His best place was not in an office or attending meetings-it was in the streets, visiting unchurched people, presenting the gospel to people who had never heard it.

As our staff began to see the beauty in God’s design, we recognized that it was the differences in gifts that was our real strength. Soon we memorized each other’s gifts, and it wasn’t long before we began to delegate and transfer functions to one another on the staff on the basis of God’s design: spiritual gifts.

Spiritual gifts became the modus operandi in our executive staff. Gifts took precedence over any kind of superficial rank: age, sex, race, and even educational background. As head pastor, I sat in the head office. I had enough educational degrees to paper the walls. Yet, every time it was necessary to make an important decision about the future direction of the church, I called upon Frank, the person with the least formal education on the professional staff. Why? Because we’d discovered that besides the gift of evangelist, Frank had the gift of discernment. He would listen, and then ask a couple of questions for clarification of the issue. Then he’d read some Scripture and we’d pray. We saw many times how God could use my education and Frank’s discernment in a positive way for the good of the kingdom.

Our staff experienced a beautiful multiple ministry together. We saw how God can use the various gifts We also noted in Scripture that Paul was absolutely right: when the gifts are used, there is no jealousy. Who can be jealous about someone’s gift, especially when you have your own? We also recognized God’s presence in our daily ministry. We had a mood of cooperation, a spirit of health, and an awareness of God’s power.

The spiritual gifts discovery promoted a sense of humility among our staff. We began to experience what it meant to be great in God’s kingdom by being a servant: to one another, to God, to his people. Furthermore, our ministry resulted in church growth. We began to see the results of both internal and external growth. Even in our difficult situation

of community change, we saw the body of Christ being edified. We experienced people being reached with the saving gospel. Our professional church workers, functioning on a traditional battleground, had experienced the joy of seeing multiple staff swords being beaten into plowshares.

Were all our problems solved? No way! The reality of sin and human error still existed. We still had disagreements. But we rejoiced in the discovery that one can disagree without being disagreeable. Was the church suddenly without problems? I wish! Yet we had discovered God’s strategy by which we could work on those problems together as a team.

Developing a Multiple Staff

The staff that ministered together there is now in various parts of the country. God has called us to serve him in ministries at other congregations, colleges, and seminaries. However, we didn’t leave because of staff tensions. In fact, if there is one thing we all miss the most, it’s probably working with a staff on the basis of spiritual gifts. Each of us in our new location is ministering according to spiritual gifts. We’re discovering this can work elsewhere with different people and in different places.

Here are some practical steps we used for managing a multiple staff on the basis of spiritual gifts:

1. As a staff project, study the biblical material that deals with spiritual gifts: Romans 12; I Corinthians 12; Ephesians 4; and I Peter 4: l0. List the gifts that Scripture contains. Study the use of these gifts in the New Testament and develop a definition for each of them. As supplementary reading, study one of the many books on spiritual gifts available through Christian publishers.

2. Study the dynamics of spiritual gifts. Concentrate not so much on the specific gifts as on the process that God has designed for a healthy church and staff. Notice the value of the diversity of gifts. Study the complementary nature of gifts working together in the body.

3. Have a series of staff Bible studies on the nature of the church as a living organism. Zero in on the various images of the New Testament, especially the bride/Bridegroom, the Shepherd/ sheep, the building of living stones with Christ at the corner, the royal priesthood, and the body of Christ.

4. Study spiritual gifts again, this time helping one another discover his or her gifts. Begin to associate people on the staff not only in terms of personality, academics, age, sex, and race, but also by their specific gifts

5. Make gifts a part of everyone’s resume.

6. List the greatest areas of need in the congregation. Make a list of gifts for every need, and every ministry to meet that need. Does the staff have the gifts needed? Is there overlapping in one area and absence of gifts in another area? Should staff be added to fill some gaps? Should lay persons who have complementary gifts be trained for more active ministries?

7. Regularly evaluate the ministry of the previous week. Did your staff function most effectively, according to gifts? Ask each staff member to write an evaluation listing those ministries they performed during the week. Which tasks utilized their gifts well? Which tasks should have been delegated to those with other gifts?

8. Rate the gift consciousness of the staff week by week. Ask staff members to rate themselves on a scale from one to ten. See if a consensus can be discovered. Note from week to week if there is significant improvement. Is your staff managing ministry by emphasizing strengths (gifts), or is it still getting mired in the muck of ineffectiveness contrary to God’s spiritual gift design?

9. After two or three months take a general inventory on the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5). Is there an improvement in the tone of the staff in terms of love, joy, peace, patience? Is there a mutual edifying process in which the staff members see themselves as growing “. . . in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every joint with which it is supplied, when each part is working properly, makes bodily growth and upbuilds itself in love” (Ephesians 4:15-16)? Is there an expression of teamwork which is characterized by Paul in Romans 12:3-4 when he says, “. . . I bid every one among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, . . . For as in one body we have many members, and all the members do not have the same function, . . . “?

10. Begin to use the same process with the lay leadership of the congregation; then use the process again with the general membership.

The end result of these steps can be a healthy, functioning, effective ministry that, under the blessing of God, leads to qualitative and quantitative growth of the body of Christ. As a congregation begins to develop God’s design for management, staff positions can be filled according to God’s criteria: spiritual gifts. Leadership positions will be filled by people who are qualified not just because they are “warm bodies” willing to sit on a board or committee, but because they are gifted for that position in the body of Christ. People won’t be so apt to be jealous. There won’t be so much temptation to boast. There will be less likelihood of division because people will see themselves not in a competitive position, but in a complementary design.

Multiple staffs will never be completely free of problems as long as there exists the reality of sin. Yet, the in-fighting, tensions, and battles don’t have to be part of the scene when people discover their gifts and use them for one another, as good managers of God’s varied grace.

Copyright © 1981 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.