Will Mancini

I have always viewed Warren Bird as a stud- a great thinker who works a bit behind the scenes as a collaborative writer for many effective leadership titles. You can imagine how excited I was to see his review of Church Unique:

“Back in 1992, when churches were just beginning to think about vision statements, George Barna wrote a highly popular book called Power of Vision. In it he defined vision as “a clear mental image of a preferable future imparted by God.”

I predict Will Mancini’s Church Unique (2008, 271 pages) will succeed Barna’s classic as the go-to book for church leadership discussions…” read more

I was scanning blog entries for last week’s release of my book Church Unique (on Favebot.com). I ran across a a interview on vision with Nelson Searcy on a blog called Visional Life. Here are my two favorite snippets:

Cultivating a vision:
Where does vision come from? Vision can flow from a number of sources:

* Experience: Because of what I have learned from the past, I have a vision for the future.
* Inspiration: Because of an imaginative or spiritual spark, I have a vision for the future.
* Analysis: Because of my analytical study, I have a vision for the future.

The key point on vision is that it is unique to every leader. My vision must be cultivated out of experience, inspiration, or analysis. If you borrow a vision, you are simply managing another person’s vision, you are not leading. To borrow a vision is to fail to lead.

Verbalize clearly:
If you can’t say it clearly, you don’t know it completely. You may think that the vision makes sense, but your mind will fill in the holes of the vision without you being aware. When you verbalize the vision, you’ve taken the important step of examining the holes and resolving them – for yourself and for others.

I had lunch with Matt Neely this week who recently planted The Watershed Church, a UMC church close to my home in League City, TX. One topic of conversation centered around the idea that “vision” is a tainted word today especially for emerging leaders. Its seems that the abuses of the church growth movement and the overuse use of term generates a little skepticism. One of the difficult things in writing Church Unique was trying to figure out a name for a book on vision without using “vision” in the title. “Redeeming Vision” and “Ooze Vision” were top choices. Another option was “Quantum Clarity” as I believe the idea of clarity is the key for missional leaders to embrace a bold vision with an appropriate humility. To redeem the concept of vision keep in mind how and passion without pride come together around “clarity:”

–Clarifying vision is about looking to the past as much as the future
–Clarifying vision requires careful consideration of strengths and limitations
–Clarifying vision is as much about identity as it is methodology
–Clarifying vision is always about what God is already doing

I get a lot of questions about the relationship between a church’s vision and the senior or lead pastor. Does the vision originate from the pastor or from the people? What happens to the vision when the pastor leaves? While many variables can complicate these question, there is at least one principle we can assert with clarity: Even though a senior leader may be the primary voice of the vision, any effective leader with a worthwhile vision will raise up a leadership community that carries it. The better the clarity and integration into the fabric of an organization, the more the vision will transcend any one person.

Many people express skepticism about this point. Why? Because we have so few models of culturally integrated vision that it is easy to rely on a charismatic leader as the substitute for real vision.

Therefore, it’s a beautiful thing to behold when it is working right. One example is the recent pastoral transition at Mobberly Baptist Church in East Texas, an Auxano client from years ago. I talked recently with the new senior pastor, Glynn Stone. Glynn is a gifted leader who understood that the leaders did the hard work of discernment and articulation years before his arrival. His first ten weeks he preached two series: six weeks on the existing mission and four weeks on the existing strategy. Glynn recounts, “I noticed that the church had the vision. When it exists, and its biblical and its working, there’s no need to change it. When I told this to the search committee, they began salivating, because they wanted a leader who recognized what God had already done.” Read Glynn’s Blog

I ran across this short article that is worth passing along. The author is a business guy who talks about “aspirational fields” as a way to align culture and energize an organization. The aspirational field in an organization acts like a magnetic field that aligns all of the small iron filings (like some of us did in chemistry lab growing up). In the organization, its the people that all face a common direction with a shared heartbeat for a better future. The article is, A Shortcut to Cultural Alignment by Paul Levesque