Grace-Paced Ministry Leadership : Alan Fadling

Full-Text Transcript

As pastors and ministry leaders living in a world that glorifies the hustle lifestyle, is it possible that slowing down and pulling back a bit might actually make our ministry more effective?

Jason Daye
In this episode, I’m joined by Alan Fadling, certified spiritual director, founder of Unhurried Living, and an award-winning author. Together, Alan and I explore how we can reframe our contemporary understanding of ministry leadership, and instead, allow Jesus to guide us into what he modeled, grace-paced leadership. Are you ready? Let’s go.

Jason Daye
Hello, friends, and welcome to another engaging episode of FrontStage BackStage. I’m your host Jason Daye, and every single week I have the distinct privilege, the honor, of sitting down with a trusted ministry leader, and really diving into a conversation, all in an effort to help you, and pastors and ministry leaders just like you, embrace a healthy, sustainable rhythm in both life and ministry. And we are blessed to be a part of the PastorServe Network. And you can learn more about this episode, and in fact, our team creates an entire resource around every single episode, around each conversation that we have. And if you and your ministry team at your local church would like to dive more deeply into the topic that we’re discussing today, you can find that toolkit at PastorServe.org/network. And if you would like to have someone to talk to, have someone that could come alongside of you, and maybe speak into your life and into your ministry, our seasoned coaches would love to offer you a free coaching session. And pastors, you can register for that complimentary coaching session at PastorServe.org/freesession. Now, if you’re joining us on YouTube, hello, it’s good to have you along with us. Take a moment to give us a thumbs up, and in the comments below, if you’d drop your name and the name of your church, our team loves to get to know our audience better, and we’ll be praying for you and your ministry. And whether you are joining us on YouTube, or your favorite podcast platform, please be sure to subscribe. Please be sure to follow so you do not miss out on any of these great conversations. And like I said, we have a great conversation for you today. At this time, I would like to welcome Alan Fadling to the show. Alan, great to have you with us.

Alan Fadling
Thanks for the invitation. It’s nice to be with you.

Jason Daye
Yeah, brother. Now I’m I’m very excited that we’re having this conversation, especially at this time of year, we’re winding down a year here, if people are watching along or listening to this once released, and getting ready to jump into a new year, and that is always really a time for us in ministry to kind of reassess and kind of take a look at what the next year might hold, and are there things that we might want to adjust in our lives. But Alan, as pastors and ministry leaders, we often feel very busy, right? And again, especially at this time here, you know, we’re in the Christmas season, Advent season, right. And there’s typically much at all times of the year, that really feels like it needs to be accomplished. And Sunday has an interesting way of rolling around very consistently. Every single week, there is a Sunday, there’s always something that seems to need to be done. And as ministry leaders at times, we might feel the pressure to produce or to accomplish, maybe even the pressure to justify our position, our role in the church. And then Alan, if that’s not enough, layered on top of all of that, the world that we live in, in general, is a hectic, hectic world, right? It moves at a hectic pace. And it feels oftentimes, like we’re being swept up into that. So the concept of living as an unhurried leader, as you’ve written about and as you’ve shared to so many ministry leaders, it might seem like a really great idea, an intriguing idea, but not necessarily a real possibility. So Alan, how would you respond to ministry leaders who are kind of wrestling with this sort of perception?

Alan Fadling
Oh, yeah. Well, first of all, I’d respond with great empathy. Because I understand exactly how that feels. The thing I’d like to say, you know, all of us know what busy feels like, you know, there’s always more to do than you feel you have time to do it. That’s true for most anybody but maybe it’s especially true for pastors because when you’re caring for people, the work is never done. So there’s always stuff, there’s things to manage, they’re schedules to plan, there’s programs to develop and implement, but in it all, there’s people to care for. So the thing that I always want to say to a leader is when I talk about unhurried, I’m not talking about some idyllic, you know, sit at your favorite Caribbean Beach, sipping your favorite drink. I’m not talking about some ideal setting or situation. I’m talking about what happens inside of you when you’re busy or not busy. So in other words, one of the things Dallas Willard used to say is you know, that busy and hurried are not the same thing. Busy is your calendar, hurried is your soul. So what I’ve been experimenting with for quite a while now is, can I work hard without working hurried? And what I’m discovering is, you can if you’d like to, you can.

Jason Daye
Yeah, well, that well, that’s definitely good news. So as we’re looking at that distinction, and that possibility, that ability to work hard, but not work hurried. What does that really encompass then? I mean, how can we kind of make that distinction and not just lump those things together and feel overwhelmed again?

Alan Fadling
Yeah, absolutely. So it might help if I were to describe some of the… I think they’re different varieties of soul hurry, that are probably familiar to many of us in pastoral ministry. So one of them for me is anxiety. You know, anxiety is an element of nearly all hurry. And so if I’m leading anxious, I’m leading hurried inevitably. And the thing is, and this is an odd thing to say, but for the longest time I imagined my anxiety was an asset. It drove me. It energized me, it pushed me to high standards. I just thought maybe Jesus is wrong about anxiety. But the longer I’ve lived with that, and the more I’ve thought about what Jesus says, that it doesn’t add an inch to your stature, doesn’t add a minute to your life. Actually, my anxiety as a form of soul hurry does not improve my ministry, not one bit. In fact, again, Jesus just might be right, it might actually be a liability. And I found that when I lead from anxiety when I lead driven from anxiety, if it’s fuel, it’s fuel that burns dirty. It does, it’s not sustainable. You want to use contemporary language, peace, peace is green fuel. You can live and lead that way for as long as you’d like. So that’s one way I think the differentiation between busy and hurried comes. There’s a second, and there’s others, I’ll share one other. And that is that a lot of my hurry in the past, has been about my deep need, felt need for the approval of other people. Like, I needed everybody to like what I did, I needed everybody and more of them to come to the things I planned. And that is a, that’s an identity treadmill. Doesn’t matter how fast you run, you’re not getting anywhere. So when, when my leadership was rooted in what does everyone else think? It was very hard to stop. It’s very hard to say ‘no’ to something that I knew I probably needed to say no to. So those two alone, anxiety and that whole craving for recognition, are both engines for hurry that you could decide aren’t working so well for you.

Jason Daye
Yeah, that’s great. Alan, you know, it’s interesting as we look at Jesus, right, and think through this, because I think in ministry, I know, one of the things that I’ve always carried around with me is this, you know, sense of urgency, like, you know, this is a big deal here. This is… these are people’s lives, eternity is at stake, right? But then the Spirit reminds me to step back and take a peek at Jesus, which is always you know, good practice for all of us. And there was so much on Jesus’ shoulders, I mean, so much more than is on our shoulders. And yet he had this incredible rhythm and this incredible sense of peace, like you said, Alan, about how he was living his life, how he was ministering, how he was setting that example for us. And one of the things that you talk about is this: us allowing Jesus, sort of, to set the pace for our life and ministry, and which again, sound amazing. But how do we actually do that? I mean, what does that really look like in our life as leaders, letting Jesus set the pace?

Alan Fadling
So part of it comes down to the idea of what does it mean for me to be a disciple of Jesus? Sometimes, I’d imagine, that the main thing that involves is doing the sorts of things Jesus does. And it does, of course it does. Or that it mostly is about saying the sorts of things Jesus says, and again, of course, that is very much what following Jesus looks like. But maybe underneath all of that, like the fertile soil out of which the works I do and the words I say grows, is that, following his way, is something that we need to cultivate. We need to watch how Jesus does what he does. This is sometimes, we sometimes get lost on this. Jesus says, I am gentle and humble in heart. As followers of Jesus leading in the kingdom, is gentleness and humility, shaping my way. I like to talk about the kingdom, the pace of the kingdom is a pace of grace, not a pace of drivenness. It is a pace of peace, not a pace of anxiety. It’s actually it’s a pace of joy moreso than a pace of excitement. Joy works all the time. Joy works when everything sucks in your life and your work. Joy still works. Excitement is profoundly situational. So to me, all of these are descriptions of the kingdom and the pace of the kingdom. But even more so they are descriptions of who Jesus is, and how Jesus does the things he does. And in that sense, as I read the gospels, as I watch Jesus, I can learn to actually follow his way. And it isn’t isn’t an interesting that those first followers, one of the things they were called were the Way, followers of the Way. I just think that has something to say to us how we do what we do may be the main place this unhurried leadership invitation meets us.

Jason Daye
Yeah. And that distinction between what we’re doing versus how we’re doing it is really important, because we can get all of the ‘what’ right, you know, kind of technically, but if the ‘how’ is not beneath it, you know, how are we reflecting Christ, then all the work that we’re doing, you know, it can, it might have some impact, but it can easily burn us out completely, which is the real danger. And we’ve seen that more and more across the landscape of the church. And when we think of ministry leadership, Alan, oftentimes, our minds will first go to, you know, responsibilities, tasks, organizational items to keep our church on mission, things we have to check off, you know, check the boxes on. But Alan, you focus on this concept of holy influence as kind of really being at the heart of ministry leadership. So can you share with us a bit about what exactly do you mean by holy influence? And how does it reframe the way we understand leadership?

Alan Fadling
Yeah, so I love that word as a way of describing leadership, because of the fact that it is implicitly relational. In other words, my influence is not mostly in the program I plan but who I am when I lead that program. It’s not mostly in all the things I scheduled, but it’s who I am when I’m with people in those scheduled moments. So my influence is who I am. One of the ways I’ve said it is that you don’t have to have a position of influence to be a person of influence. You can be a person of influence, even if you don’t have the mic. Even if you don’t have a programmatic responsibility in that particular gathering you’re in, who you are, when you visit with people, who you are, when you meet with people, who you are, is your influence. Next month, I will have been in paid church ministry of one form or another for 40 years. And I look back over 40 and I could not tell you one of the programs we were a part of 30 years ago, but I can tell you about the people who’ve made a great deal of difference and still matter to me. Well, turn that around. That is our influence as pastors, who we are with the people we serve. That’s our influence. And that’s, that’s the fruit that lasts I think, that Jesus talks about in John 15 it always involves people and it always involves our influence in their lives.

Jason Daye
Yeah, Alan, I love that. And when we begin to look at our leadership more as this holy influence, as opposed to just the organizational things that we’re doing, you know, just keeping the church on mission, keeping things moving forward. How does that shift the way that we actually live out our lives as ministers?

Alan Fadling
Yeah. So I think one of the things that begins to happen little by little over time in in our, what Eugene Peterson called a long obedience in that same direction, in this direction of Jesus Way, is that our values change? I think it surprises, it would surprise us if we thought about how many ways cultural values have become high impact in how we do what we do? Jesus, if you were to ask Jesus what his five year plan was, I don’t know that that’s a question he’s interested in answering. I’m not saying five year plans are a bad idea. I think I had two. But I don’t get preoccupied with five years from now. And I don’t get engrossed in dreams about what five years from now is gonna look like. What I get engrossed in, is now, this is the moment I have, this is the moment whatever it is I’m doing, you and I are talking. This is the universe for me right now. This is my opportunity to live in the grace and to express the grace of God. So what happens over time is we begin to realize what matters to Jesus, and what matters to Jesus begins to shape what matters to us as pastors. And we start valuing slightly less the things that used to drive us, and we start valuing a little more things that, clearly, Jesus is interested in. And it’s subtle, and it’s slow, but it’s substantial when that happens.

Jason Daye
Now, Alan, you’ve mentioned this idea of grace different times, and you write extensively, actually, on the idea of grace in An Unhurried Leader. I would love for you to kind of unpack a little bit, because oftentimes, when we think of leadership, and developing as leaders, grace isn’t necessarily one of the first words that comes to mind, you know what I mean? And yet you make incredible, I don’t necessarily mean argument, but just a position about this, the power of grace, and why it is really necessary to embrace a healthy rhythm in leadership. And can you talk to us, unpack this idea of grace a bit more?

Alan Fadling
Yes, absolutely. So you’re right. I think a lot of times, the way we understand and define leadership is in terms of leadership activity. And, of course, there are plenty of good things God gives us to do that make a big difference. But right alongside that, and maybe as the heartbeat of that is our practice of a receptivity. We have to receive from God that which we give to others. If we’re truly living in the kingdom of God, then what we have to offer has first been given us. This has been how it is in the kingdom all along. When, when God invites Abraham into his community, into his friendship, is the way he puts it as I will bless you, and you will be a blessing. Grace is the first part of that. And in fact, grace is the second part of that, too. Grace is the basis of my friendship with God. And in fact, grace is the basis of my influence, I receive those things that are best, and then I share them with others. There’s an odd way of thinking about leadership that doesn’t really require God very much at all. And to me, that way of understanding leadership is, is grace insufficient. It’s grace deficient. Whereas instead, like Paul, who says, you know, I’ve learned to rejoice in my weakness, because when I’m weak, actually, that’s when I’m strong, that’s when the power of Christ is made perfect in me. Like all the things I want to be as a leader, strong, able to bring salvation to others, you know, that message, all of those require an experience of grace, that enables me to express grace to others. The last thing I’ll say is, grace is more than a theological category, it’s more than a doctrine to affirm. It is, it is the the entire journey of the Christian life is a journey of grace and responding to grace.

Jason Daye
I love that. And I love that idea of, you know, we receive the grace, which is very helpful in ministry, because we don’t always get it right. So it’s nice to know that we are living in, you know, the grace that God extends to us. But then as ministers, we’re extending that same grace to those around us and that that can kind of help us pull back from the drivenness as as you’ve spoken of, you know, that almost feeling like we’re on that treadmill, you know, but not really getting anywhere and feel like we have to exert more and more and more. We can rest in God’s grace and allow others around us to share in that  same grace and model that for those around us, which I think you know, is vital for us in ministry. What would you say, Alan, are some of the biggest roadblocks, biggest impediments, for us as pastors, as ministry leaders, as we’re looking to, you know, embrace or experience life as an unhurried leader?

Alan Fadling
Well, so some of them are going to sound like that definition of hurry I gave toward the beginning things like your your anxiety, things like your leader’s need for the approval of others. I think that identity question is a huge one, you know, Henri Nowen was the one who sort of said, we have this unholy trinity, in terms of the way our culture defines identity. In our culture, you are what you do, or you are what you have, or you are what other people say about you. None of those are sustainable. They are all subject to the law of diminishing returns. Because if you are what you do, then how much do you need to do to be somebody? The answer to that is: more. And if you are what you have, then how much do you have to have to be somebody? And the answer is: more. And the same with what other people say about you. For some of us, leadership crises, even mid midlife crises is a moment when you realize that whole system doesn’t work. Like none of it works. You were never what you do, you are never what you have, and you are never what other people say about you. The good news is when we learn that our value is intrinsic, because of who God has made us ,that our being made in the image of God. That’s our essential worth. That’s our name. We don’t go into our work to prove an identity. We go into our work in our ministry to express an identity. And there’s a world of difference between those. I go into my work from a place of abundance. I don’t go into my work with a deep thirst for something I still need. I look to my work, my ministry to get something I need? I’m already losing. I’m expecting something from the people I serve that they were never meant to give. God is glad to give me what my soul most thirsts for.

Jason Daye
Yeah, that’s powerful. Now, Alan, how then, very practically speaking, as a pastor watching along right now, what are some practical steps, some things that we can put into motion to help us free us from the anxiety, urgency driven, you know, busyness that we feel, the hurried sense of life and ministry, to help us kind of pull back. Because, you know, what you said about the idea of what we produce? You know, that’s, that’s very real, you know, and in church, there are pressures to do, to accomplish certain things. If you’re not accomplishing certain things, then oftentimes we feel less than. So what are some actual practices or things that we can engage in that can help us move in this direction?

Alan Fadling
Yeah, so I said earlier, sometimes we focus only on leadership as activity and need to learn to cultivate a leadership as receptivity mindset. It’s like breathing. You know, if as we’re having this interview, I just start saying sentences and decide I’m not I don’t need to inhale. I just keep talking. Pretty soon it’s going to be really bad for me and the interviewer is going to sound dumb. So inhaling and exhaling. That’s how breathing works. No big surprise, no mystery there. No one got surprised by that statement. But in the way we do leadership, sometimes it’s as though we’re only exhaling. And we just don’t know how to inhale. Jesus had this remarkable rhythm where he would engage with the crowds to care for them, to heal them, and then he’d withdraw lonely places to pray. Luke says he did this often. I think there’s something about cultivate cultivating this unhurried way of leading, this unhurried way of Jesus, is learning to couple disciplines of disengagement with our disciplines of engagement. So suddenly, spiritual practices like Sabbath, which for the average pastor is not the worship day, that’s not your day to rest. So someone like Eugene Peterson just had a long standing habit, that Mondays, he and his wife would take a walk, and they wouldn’t talk and they’d be in the forest and they would just breathe, and enjoy each other. I often joke that I can get much more done in six days than I can in seven. And I think that’s real. I don’t think that’s just some old Jewish rule. I think it’s the fabric of Creation. So Sabbath is a practice. I’ve for years, decades really, have set aside one day a month to just step away like Jesus does for no other reason than to be in the presence of God, what I need is a non-utilitarian relationship with God. I don’t want every moment I have with God to be for a ministry purpose, like, Okay, now it’s sermon prep. And now I’m praying for the people. And now I’m planning a program and it’s all utilitarian and Okay, Lord, bless it. I need some moments, just God and I, that have nothing to do with the ministry. So all of these sort of receptivity or disengagement practices, finding those that fit you, is sort of the inhale, that matches the exhale of your activity. So that’s like a big picture. And you can, I hope it in that, hear a lot of very practical possibilities. The last thing I’ll say is, wherever you happen to find yourself, start small, do something little, find a little bit of one day a week that you can literally put down in the smartphone, and don’t check email and just do something you enjoy. Be in the presence of God with the people you care about. Start small.

Jason Daye
Yeah, you know, that’s really helpful and, and kind of that mindset piece, I think Alan, is so key because we, we live in a culture that encourages us to keep going, keep going, keep going, keep going. And so sometimes that, stepping back, pausing, receiving from God helps us, you know, take that breath. You know, breathe in the Spirit and helps us overcome some of that push. Alan, your book, An Unhurried Leader, which we’ve been referencing some things out of, it goes into much more depth and detail about much of what we’ve been discussing today. But you’ve recently released a new book, and it’s really a resource to help us practice, sort of, the grace-paced rhythm. And that book is called A Year of Slowing Down. And I’d love for you to share with us just a little bit as really, maybe the ‘why’ behind, because you’ve written An Unhurried Life, you’ve written An Unhurried Leader, both, you know, award-winning books, and you know, highly, highly read. But this is a bit of a shift. I mean, the same vein, but there’s it has a very kind of practical bent to it. So talk to us a little bit about A Year Slowing Down.

Alan Fadling
Yeah, thanks for asking. So, you know, the first two books, An Unhurried Life, An Unhurried Leader, really are sort of manifestos in a sense. They are an attempt to express a vision of life and a vision of work or ministry or leadership that is, you know, lived in the spirit of Jesus’ unhurried way. Well, one of the things I’ve learned, you know, because a lot of my work is the spiritual formation of leaders. Formation is a process. It’s not an event. And it’s a long process. And that’s good news, actually. The fact that it’s a long process means that you’re doing good work. And it means that it’s going to bear substantially lasting fruit. So this book was really meant to be a living out of the ideas of the first two books. I’ve said to some that I envisioned it as like a five minute daily retreat. You know, sometimes you read a devotional and it’s an inspiring little thought, but you sort of leave it behind and you enter your day. I hoped that, and I designed this book that it would be, a way to start your day, and then you’d go into the day with an idea, or even a question that you could sort of keep in the back of your mind through the day. So my hope, and the way I wrote this book is that by the end of the year that you’ve read it, you will find that you have made some significant progress. You haven’t just had 365 individually, separate experiences, but you’ve been on a journey. And that’s, that’s the spirit in which I wrote this book.

Jason Daye
Yeah, I love that. And I really encourage people who are listening along or watching along that if you are intrigued by what Alan has been sharing about this life of an unhurried leader, a great way to… you said start small… great way to really start small in this is to really jump into A Year of Slowing Down and that gives you those, it creates that rhythm, that daily rhythm, of you know, really beginning to slow down, beginning to move beyond the busyness to a more unhurried posture in our life and in our ministry. So what a great resource. Alan, how, if people want to connect with you, with your ministry, obviously, if they want to pick up your books, what’s the best way for them to do that?

Alan Fadling
Well, the most basic way to reach us is just to find us on the web. Our website is UnhurriedLiving.com. We have you know, a weekly free email that we send out. My wife and I write those every other week. We both, my wife and I, have podcasts, I get to interview fellow authors and talk about these kinds of ideas, you know, every week. And then we have a lot of other free resources. We have some classes we offer, we have some coaching groups and different sorts of things. As far as the books, you know, you can buy those wherever you like buying books, it’s out there pretty much everywhere.

Jason Daye
Excellent, Alan, and for those watching along or listening in, we will have links to Alan’s website, the ministry website, will have links to the podcasts that he mentioned, and the links to the books, these resources. So if you want to check those out, you can find those at PastorServe.org/network. It’ll be in our weekly toolkit. So Alan, it has been an absolute pleasure having you with us, thank you for sharing with us. Thank you for taking the time, and just really, probably the nudging of the Spirit, to put pen to paper, you know, and thoughts into words that we can all receive, that we can read, that we can take in that we can kind of savor and help us on our journey of spiritual transformation, and as ministry leaders, as pastors, to really begin to let Jesus set our pace. So thank you for that brother.

Alan Fadling
Of course, it was great to be with you.

Jason Daye
All right. Thank you so much. God bless you. Now, before you go, I want to remind you of an incredible free resource that our team puts together every single week to help you and your team dig more deeply and maximize the conversation that we just had. This is the weekly toolkit that we provide. And we understand that it’s one thing to listen or watch an episode, but it’s something entirely different to actually take what you’ve heard, what you’ve watched, what you’ve seen, and apply it to your life and to your ministry. You see, FrontStage BackStage is more than just a podcast or YouTube show about ministry leadership, we are a complete resource to help train you and your entire ministry team as you seek to grow and develop in life in ministry. Every single week, we provide a weekly toolkit which has all types of tools in it to help you do just that. Now you can find this at PastorServe.org/network. That’s PastorServe.org/network. And there you will find all of our shows, all of our episodes and all of our weekly toolkits. Now inside the toolkit are several tools including video links and audio links for you to share with your team. There are resource links to different resources and tools that were mentioned in the conversation, and several other tools, but the greatest thing is the ministry leaders growth guide. Our team pulls key insights and concepts from every conversation with our amazing guests. And then we also create engaging questions for you and your team to consider and process, providing space for you to reflect on how that episode’s topic relates to your unique context, at your local church, in your ministry and in your life. Now you can use these questions in your regular staff meetings to guide your conversation as you invest in the growth of your ministry leaders. You can find the weekly toolkit at PastorServe.org/network We encourage you to check out that free resource. Until next time, I’m Jason Daye encouraging you to love well, live well, and lead well. God bless.