Management

I can tell when I'm too 'busy'... when I feel like I don't have the time or subject-matter to blog every day. I'm not putting myself it situations where something can happen.

However, today I want to record my thoughts on how it seems like so much of success or failure (by whatever definitions you wish to use) comes down to management. No matter how skilled, talented, etc, you are, if you can't manage that in a meaningful way, trust erodes and when trust erodes, character takes a hit and you lose respect. I'm seeing this in so many facets of my life from discussions with church staff, Thrivent colleagues, reading, talking with a church planter, experience with my MBA program, etc.

Perhaps it depends on how you define "management" and perhaps it just depends on each person's need for management. I place a high value on things being "run well" which means that I'm going to do things like write blogs about how important that is.... I concede that there may be people that don't have the same value on this attribute and therefore don't see it as key to anything. But, with that background, I can't think of anything that has been successful that has not involved quality management - that could be starting a new church, running a ministry, having a good devotional/prayer life, putting on a Christmas drama, having a strong family or marriage, personal budgeting, leading others, etc. I look at the Biblical examples of management including Jesus with his 3, 12, 70 plan and his Jerusalem/Judea/Samaria/Utter Ends plan. I think of Jethro helping Moses organize for effectiveness. I look at the detailed plans God provided and required management needed to build the ark (Noah), rebuild the walls (Nehemiah), or build the ark of the covenant (Levites). I look at the Apostle Paul and his plan to send out people to start churches, his voyages, his letters, his leadership development of others, etc and the management that took.

I believe that we are to live life as spirit-led believers, but I also believe that God is a God of order and not chaos. Management, however you define it, is important in carrying out the work that God has purposed each of us to do. A church-planter friend of mine calls it "chaordic" -- ordered chaos. Perhaps that is a better term...