Leaders and pastors live with a tension that everyone experiences in life, but is different on an organizational level.

It is the tension of the in-between. Pastors lead and live in the now of the church, but also with what could be: their vision for the future and where things are going, or where they’d like them to be.

As a leader, you walk into a room and see what is, but also what it could be. This is positive and exciting but it can also be deflating at different times. 

A leader often knows what is coming, the changes that are going to be made, the momentum that can be had because of those steps, but often has to wait. It might be waiting on a new hire, waiting for things to settle down at a church or for the summer season to end so you can get started.

As a leader, right now you are stuck with this tension. And it won’t go away. It will simply shift to something new. Six months from now you will be waiting on something different to happen.

If you aren’t careful as a pastor, this tension can rob you of the joy of leading. It can also make you miss what is happening in your church right now. 

Here are 5 ways to survive this tension & thrive in it:

1. Enjoy where you are. This is hard for leaders because we are wired to keep moving. But, you are in a certain season, embrace it. Your church is a certain size, enjoy it. There are things a small church can do that a larger church can’t and vice versa. This is the battle of contentment for leaders and if we lose it, it will rob us of our joy. 

2. Make sure things are in place for what is next. Many pastors, by nature, are not strong planners. They often fly by their seat, spend a lot of time focused on people and find themselves behind the curve on something. This is why it is so important to make time to work on your church, not just in it. If you are growing, do you have enough groups for people? Are you prepared to add classes for kids? What about parking spaces?

3. Start looking past what is next. At some point, you need to start preparing for what comes after what is next. Meaning, you just grew your church plant to 100 people and are on your way to 200, you need to begin thinking about what your church will be like at 400. Why? There’s a good chance you will do something at 200 to keep you from growing to 400. The same is true as people are coming back to church and you are regathering people after covid. Are you doing anything right now that can slow down momentum? Too often we simply do things and we don’t pull back to ask if they will help us or hinder us from what is next. 

4. Listen to the fears that people have. As you are making plans and getting key leaders on board for what is next, you will run into someone who is not excited about what is next and may even hold you back. This person is not the enemy, although you will think they are. They may be crucial to slowing you down (which might be good), they might be God’s way of helping you grow as a leader, or you might be God’s way of helping them grow through their fears. Each person and situation is different, but don’t disregard someone who is not as excited as you are about what is next. You should always be more excited than everyone else, you’re the leader. For me, I’ve had to learn to pay attention to the hesitancy or questions of others as they have helped me when I overlooked something or was moving too quickly. 

5. Plan for what is next. All growth means change. If your church gets larger, changes are coming. You will need to hand things off to people. Leaders who worked well in a church of 100 won’t be the leaders you need at 400 and beyond. Your schedule will be busier, which will make sermon prep, meeting with people and strategizing harder because you will need to plan better. Everything is different at each stage of your church. Many leaders blindly walk into the next season, get busier and burn out because they haven’t planned for what is next. So make sure that you are regularly pulling back to look at your top priorities as a leader and your schedule to ask, “Is this sustainable? Am I doing the right things? What do I need to pass off to others? Who do I need to develop?”