Managing to Worship

Our regular readers know that a recurring theme in our ministry is lifestyle worship. The reason for this is that God designed us for worship. And since God designed us for worship, we'll only be fulfilled in life when worship becomes a way of life.

Today, we'll take lifestyle worship into the arena of management. Management may be defined as the skillful or resourceful use of personnel, materials, time, etc. While we often think of managing as something that business people do, it's much broader than that. A mother manages her home, caring for her children, planning and preparing meals, and balancing the checkbook at the end of each month. A college student manages his time, his expenses, and he coordinates the completion of various class assignments. We each manage in one setting or another at one time or another.

Let's begin with a true story about a person who became a manager in a ministry he loved. We'll call him "Dan," and we'll change a few minor details to protect his identity.

Dan was a person "with a future." Bright, handsome, articulate, ambitious, eager to serve God, he had everything it took to achieve his goals.

Even as a college underclassman, he knew he wanted be a cross-cultural missionary. He knew what organization he wanted to join, hereinafter called The Mission. He knew he wanted to become president of The Mission. With this single-minded focus, he devoted himself to jumping through the hoops that would get him where he wanted to go.

First, he graduated from college. Then he was accepted into The Mission. For almost a decade, he served in Asia, moving from newcomer to veteran to director of his region.

The Mission noticed him and asked Dan to move to their headquarters and serve in the general administration of The Mission. Dan was given one area of responsibility, then another and another. Each required managerial skills and each was progressively nearer "the corner office" where the president worked.

However, over a period of time leaders within The Mission discovered a disturbing pattern emerging. Dan cut a wide swathe, but in his wake were the corpses of other people who had somehow gotten in his way. Under his ambition was a pride that tolerated no opposition. Getting on Dan's bad side was a big mistake. Those he couldn't manipulate found themselves transferred to some other region of the world.

It's not that he was totally self-serving. Some in The Mission were devoted to him because of his help at one crucial time or another. Others, however, carried their self-esteem away in a sling after he was done with them.

There were other problems: At times, Dan put the wrong people into key slots. Sometimes he ignored interpersonal conflicts instead of helping to resolve them. Counsel on these and other concerns from the leaders went unheeded by Dan.

Sensing finally that things were not going according to plan, Dan began to withdraw from others. Eventually he retreated to a memo-writing and number-crunching management mode, leaving his office only for required meetings of one kind or another.

His next responsibility moved him farther from the corner office he wanted so much. One year later, after a widely circulated parting shot at leadership for "not supporting him," Dan left The Mission, moved far away and took employment in a completely unrelated area of work.

What happened? Didn't he "have what it takes to become a president?" Was he burned out? Was this another case of the Peter Principle? As you might expect, no such situation is single-faceted. I'd like to suggest, however, that one major contributing factor was his lack of worship in management.

That's not a very common diagnosis, is it? Worship-filled management: What is it? Worship-filled management aligns our management activities with basic assumptions that emerge from Scripture. It recognizes that management styles need to vary according to each situation, but that underneath any particular management style is a set of principles and motives. Worship-filled management focuses on aligning actions with those God-centered principles and motives.

Listening friend, do you genuinely want God to be glorified in the way you manage your home and your work? If so, do you wonder how to do that?

Let's step back for a moment to look at a typical organization at work. This will help us appreciate the importance of managers. Most organizations are comprised broadly of three personnel categories: leadership, management and staff.

Leaders conceptualize and communicate the vision of the organization. They are responsible to look ahead, design a way to match mission with need, set the course, muster support and ignite the staff. Staff (whether they get paid or volunteer their time) get the day-by-day work done. They're gifted in myriads of ways to accomplish the organizational mission.

Between leadership and staff is a big chasm. It is the canyon between vision and reality. If the organization is simply well led but not well managed, the charisma of the leadership may attract good people to get on board the ship. Once aboard, though, they need someone else to help them find out such important information as what to do, where to do it, how to interface, how they will be measured, and where the supplies are. High turnover results as unfulfilled people realize that working there is not working out.

Managers are the ones who step into that gap. They have the crucial, dual responsibilies of developing and maintaining the organizational systems that we all need, while also developing and maintaining the people within that organization. That's a lot of responsibility!

Suppose you're a manager in that organization. As a lifestyle worshiper, can you see this responsibility as an act of worship, that is, can you see being a manager as a way to give glory to God? Can you be a good steward of the organization and the working lives of those reporting to you - and also be a steward of your own life? You and I will become the best managers we can be when we habitually see both the privileges and responsibilities of our position - whether at home or at work - through God's eyes and then fulfill that role in the way most pleasing to Him.

Come back tomorrow as we consider the most difficult of those challenges: the challenge of managing ourselves.

Let's enter the rest of this day remembering these words from Romans 12:9, 11 - 9Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil. Cling to what is good . . . 11not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord.

© 2007 John Garmo. If you would be interested in using this article, please contact us at Info@MissionToChildren.org.