I Am Not Indispensable

at The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection and I hope that you are not indispensable at your place of employment. My wife, Nicole, brought this idea up to me and I think that she is right on. The true leadership of a congregation should be in the gathered people and not in any single individual. This is at the root of the United Methodist Church as early Methodists societies formed and were visited by a traveling preacher on a regular but perhaps not frequent basis. The society continued to function even as the traveling preacher was elsewhere at other gatherings of the faithful.

A critical role of a leader is to empower and equip the next generation of leaders that will take over when a transition becomes necessary to continue to fulfill the mission and vision of the organization. The need for transition can be a result of a change in appointment, illness, or other reasons but the result is the same. Any particular leader is not indispensable and it is the responsibility of the leader to ensure that this is the case.