Our Multiply Podcast hosts conversations aimed to stir, equip and provoke. Through interviewing thinkers, practitioners and pioneers, we aim to inspire and equip Kingdom people to launch Kingdom communities.
This episode features a conversation between Ted Kim, Nigel Hemming & Paul Lowe. Ted Kim recently took over the leadership of Evanston Vineyard in Illinois (Chicago) and Nigel Hemming leads Winchester Vineyard, which was also a succession.
In this episode they talk about what healthy succession looks like; how to transition your church from one Senior Pastor to another well. Ted also touches on four key elements to growing a culturally diverse church: proximity, education, representation and demonstrated commitment to the work of justice in your community.
QUOTES
Successions
- It would be folly to try and fit someone else’s shoes! I keep the shoes to remind me of the legacy of what has been before, but I don’t wear them.
- Faithfulness is not copying or imitating, faithfulness is rhyming with what’s gone before. Rhyming leaves room for the Lord of the new thing, to do that new thing.
- When you take on a church it’s not a different home or even a different story, it’s just one that’s unfolding.
- Whatever plan you have for the transition, you must be open because it’ll likely change.
- A lot of senior pastors are afraid that their church will die when they pass it on and think it must continue to look the same. I challenge you to think about rhyming instead – that’s liberating for both you and the person coming in.
Diversity
- Your proximity to multicultural areas will impact the home that you build in your church.
- If your leadership doesn’t look like the church you want to lead, then it’s going to be hard to build that.
- The things that are important in growing a culturally diverse church are proximity, education, representation and demonstrated commitment to the work of justice in your community.
Find out more about successions here.
