{"id":2187,"date":"2012-05-22T03:00:41","date_gmt":"2012-05-22T10:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.scottcochrane.com\/?p=2187"},"modified":"2012-07-19T15:28:22","modified_gmt":"2012-07-19T22:28:22","slug":"4-vital-steps-when-your-vision-is-not-aligned-with-your-church","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/2012\/05\/22\/4-vital-steps-when-your-vision-is-not-aligned-with-your-church\/","title":{"rendered":"4 Vital Steps When Your Vision is Not Aligned with Your Church"},"content":{"rendered":"

What do you do when your vision is growing apart from your church\u2019s vision?<\/p>\n

That was the question posed by a young man I\u2019m mentoring these days. He\u2019s on staff in a local church, and is finding that the direction he wants to take his department is at odds with the overall direction of the church.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Image via iStockPhoto.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

How do you handle that?<\/p>\n

Here are the 4 steps I suggested to him, and these may serve you if you find your vision growing apart from your church\u2019s vision.<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0\u00a0 Remain fiercely loyal to the leadership of the church<\/strong>
\nYour vision may be different than the vision being cast by the church leadership. Your vision may even be better<\/em> than the \u201cbig church\u201d vision.<\/p>\n

But at the end of the day, the leaders of the church are<\/em> the leaders of the church. And your job begins with whole-heartedly supporting the direction they are taking the church.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0\u00a0 Pour your energies into producing great results<\/strong>
\nYou mustn\u2019t allow your concern for \u201cbig church\u201d issues to divert you from doing your job with excellence.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0\u00a0 Be a positive voice of change<\/strong>
\nWho knows? You may be stewarding a vision that God will want to use to steer the entire direction of the church. So you must position yourself to be able to \u201clead up\u201d to those steering the organization.<\/p>\n

And for your voice to be heard you must be increasingly seen as a positive voice, not a dripping faucet of complaint. You must be positioned as one who cares deeply and passionately about the overall church and who is willing to suggest creative ways to move her forward.<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0\u00a0 Make the tough decision<\/strong>
\nWhat if step\u2019s one, two and three prove ineffective? What if you remain loyal, do your job well, and attempt to positively influence change, all to no avail?<\/p>\n

If you can\u2019t reconcile the gap between your vision and that of the church you may have no other choice but to \u201ctake your vision elsewhere\u201d and resign your post.<\/p>\n

(If it comes to that, leave well\u2026but that\u2019s a post for another day!)<\/p>\n

Have you ever found yourself at odds with the vision of your church? How did you handle it?<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What do you do when your vision is growing apart from your church\u2019s vision? That was the question posed by a young man I\u2019m mentoring these days. He\u2019s on staff in a local church, and is finding that the direction he wants to take his department is at odds with the overall direction of the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,478,584],"tags":[857,19,832,878,122,658],"class_list":["post-2187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church","category-featured","category-vision-2","tag-alignment","tag-change","tag-decision","tag-loyalty","tag-results","tag-vision"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2187","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2187"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2187\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2375,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2187\/revisions\/2375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scottcochrane.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}