In my last article (http://www.smallgroupministry.com/article.asp?ID=781) we began to unwrap the Four Phases of Ease. This simple yet profound process for giving away ownership of a ministry is easy to explain but very difficult to do. Most people tackle phases one and two with relative ease. However, in my experience, many a ministry professional has stumbled when faced with crossing the gap between phases two and three -- what I refer to as the Grand Canyon.

Before we consider how to make the leap across the canyon, here’s a brief update on the process we’re going through with our own small group ministry. As we discussed this, my wife made the observation that, if I was frustrated I should share that with our campus pastor because she was pretty sure he wasn’t aware of the extent of my dissatisfaction with the process. She was, of course, right. We set-up an appointment and I had the chance to lay out my concerns about what has been happening. He shared his frustration and agreed that my concerns about the way small groups were being launched were valid. It seems that small groups have been caught in the middle of a major reevaluation of the overall ministry direction of the church. The launch, as suspected, hadn’t really been clearly thought out.

We’ve decided to get some leaders trained so that those few who signed up to be in a small group have somewhere to go. It’s not the best solution, but it will buy us a couple of months to clean up the mess that’s been made and, hopefully, prepare to re-launch something later this year that’s built on a solid foundation of purpose, vision and goals.

The learning from this is that there may be volunteer leaders out there who are frustrated and not talking to you. And they might not have the wise counsel of a patient wife to encourage them. Also, failure isn’t the end of the world. Though I believe it’s more difficult to re-launch something that’s been poorly done, it’s not impossible. We have some hard work ahead of us that wouldn’t have been necessary if church leaders hadn’t rushed to throw something together. Let’s see how the re-engineering goes.

So, you’re standing at the precipice of the Grand Canyon between phase two and phase three. As a reminder the Four Phases are:

1. I Lead

2. I Lead, You Watch

3. You Lead, I Watch

4. You Lead, I Move On

Phase two is the beginning stage of handing off ministry to others -- when you delegate responsibilities that are important but not vital to the overall health of the ministry, such as setting up the meeting room, sending out e-mails, making the coffee and setting out snacks. At the same time you’re modeling those core aspects of leading that must be caught by everyone invited to leadership in order for the leap from phase two to phase three to be successful.

Phase three -- when you hand over primary leadership to others -- requires an accurate assessment of the abilities of your volunteer leaders. One of the ways you can stumble at this point is to give leadership to someone who isn’t ready or capable. It seems like a simple concept, but if we’re honest with ourselves we sometimes hand off leadership as a reward for faithful attendance or spiritual maturity or some other reason unrelated to a person’s actual ability to lead! I think there may be a subconscious reason for this. If we put someone who’s not competent to lead in a leadership role we remain as the de facto leader. That’s the other -- and much bigger -- hurdle in making the transition between two and three. Many of us in ministry seem to be genetically averse to allowing others to take complete control of a ministry. That may seem harsh, but you know it’s true.

I can’t count the number of ministries I’ve seen crippled by the professional church staff’s inability to let go of leadership. There are hundreds of nuanced ways we sabotage our volunteer leaders’ ability to succeed. Perhaps the most popular is the need to comment on every little thing. We hand off leadership and step back to do the “I watch” part but our watching becomes a constant barrage of advice and running commentary. Eventually the frustrated volunteer will hand control back to us. That confirms our conviction that we’re really the only ones who can make the ministry run. The biggest key to success in making the leap from two to three is your ability to shut-up. I’m being purposely harsh because right at this moment some are questioning if you really have to let go that much. And the answer is a resounding, “YES”!

Another classic mistake is keeping secrets – even if you don’t think of them as secrets. One ministry I consulted years ago couldn’t figure out why everyone who took leadership struggled to do as well as the guy who founded the ministry. After a little probing I found out that every new member who came to the group under the original leader was taken out to lunch. He spent time with them and picked up the tab for lunch. It was a great little welcoming gesture. The problem is, when he handed off leadership he failed to tell the next person about his lunch outings. This wasn’t malicious, it was something he did personally and didn’t want to burden the next person with. However, his act of hospitality was key to the success of the group. As you hand off leadership to the next generation consider every single thing you do as a leader. Yes, some of it will be personal style that others won’t need to duplicate. But there are things that are crucial elements of substance you must make sure are communicated in the hand-off.

In the “I watch” part of phase three your role is to guard the core vision and values of the ministry. If someone has come into leadership and behaves in a way that is truly a threat to the integrity of the ministry you have an obligation to step in, remove them, restore balance and hand the ministry back to another leader. I’ve experienced well-meaning people who come into leadership with a different idea as to why the ministry exists or what the ministry should be doing. They are a threat to the core. While I need to evaluate my process in bringing them into leadership I also need to confront the differences and, if they won’t concede, remove them. Good solid work in phases one and two are the best guard against ever having to do this.

Ministry leaders who follow these simple steps have a much higher success rate in navigating the Grand Canyon:

1. Hand off primary leadership to properly equipped and gifted people

2. Communicate every aspect of the leadership role – no hidden agendas

3. Respect differences in personal style

4. Intervene only if the core integrity of the ministry is at stake

5. Refrain from offering advice or comments unless invited -- and even then, be brief.

Accomplish these things and you’re ready to move on to phase four, “You Lead, I Move On.” Not much to explain about this one. Once you’ve moved people through the first three phases you really can move on. Go launch another ministry, take a vacation, spend time with family, whatever you’d like. There may be the occasional need to check in with existing leadership to see that things are on track, but for the most part when you reach phase four the ministry is firmly rooted for success. As long as you’ve taught the phases to the new leaders and they follow them to transition leadership to the next generation the ministry can continue as long as is necessary.

Tim Kurth served as a Director of Christian Education in the Midwest for more than 20 years. During that time he assisted churches in starting a variety of volunteer ministries. He’s a husband, father, author and speaker. He and his wife Elizabeth live in Loveland, Colorado, where he currently serves as Camp Project Leader with Group Workcamps Foundation.