Is There a Best Personality… for Church Leadership?

Click below to listen to this post about personalities in churches on my Candidly Kendra podcast:

People are obsessed with personality tests, which is strange, considering that we so clearly only consider one personality valid. The go-getter, the strategist, the realist with only a touch of goal-oriented optimism – that’s the man or woman who’s going to go out there and do big things for God.

The Lion.

The Dominator.

We all stand back in awe and imagine that our churches are better off with them at the helm, as slowly, inch by inch, our churches lose their heart.

The Lions want to lead and others are happy to follow. But we need to remember that our Savior Jesus was our example of a servant leader. He showed us how to lead for love instead of for fame.

But hold on. Let me take a step back and show you where I’m coming from.

My Sluggish Awakening to the Beauty of All Personalities

When my family moved to Colorado in 1991, I was a teenager and my dad was the new Associate Pastor at our new church. He worked for a Lion. A strong, tough, strategic leader at our large church. My dad, on the other hand, was a Beaver. He was a hard worker, behind the scenes, making sure every small detail was taken care of. His hard work boosted the Lion into the accomplishment of his goals and dreams for the church. Every Lion wants a Beaver working for him.

(By the way, I’ve rather unintentionally slipped into the terminology introduced by the Four Animals Personality Test. You can test yourself with that here.)

As I grew up and watched my dad in the workplace I saw his success as a hard worker who never let anyone down. I also saw the glory that the highly successful types of men and women received, as they achieved the American ideal, as they put in hours of hard work and checked off their checklists and became the central character in every large-scale project.

I decided that I would also be that kind of high achiever, in the workplace, in God’s kingdom, wherever God would have me. I would accomplish. I would succeed. I wouldn’t fail.

One day in particular stands out to me as I sat on an airplane, flying back to Barcelona, Spain, where I worked in ministry, and I thought it would be a great exercise to make an acrostic with my name, developing a set of personal goals with the letters of my name.

Here’s what I came up with:

K – Kind (so far so good)
E – Enthusiastic (this is so deeply me, I couldn’t part with it if I tried)
N – Never-Failing (this is where I went wrong)
D – Devoted (This one is good – I can get caught up in tasks and leave people behind. I’d rather be devoted to God and to people than caught up in work.)
R – Risk-Taking (meh)
A – Always Kneeling (Yes, good. I need to remember to pray instead of just acting.)

Alright, do you see my problem there? That Never-Failing haunted me. And controlled me. And took me away from the best things in my life. The best gifts from God became obstacles to my productivity.

The best gifts from God became obstacles to my productivity.

“Oh, hey, Owen. You want to play with me. Sorry, I have work to do so that no one will ever say I didn’t work hard enough.” That very last part may have gone unspoken, but it was there, and it ruled me.

And then I met my sweet friends, Rachel and Sarah, who were students at Colorado College when we moved back to Colorado. They asked if I could meet with them for mentoring. (Yes, please!) But as I jumped in the way I had been trained to do, teaching them to be leaders on their campus, pushing them to be forceful voices for the Gospel with their peers, Rachel gently said, “Kendra, I need you to let me be myself.”

Rachel began to show me who she was in her own unique personality, and what it looked like for her to walk with God. I saw that as a gentle, quiet, trusting child of God, her faith spoke volumes even if she wasn’t going to stand on a soapbox. Her sweet and tender spirit, in the power of the Holy Spirit, could make a difference as she lived out of who God created her to be.

I began to consider that maybe I could let my love of God speak louder than my checklist.

The Indispensable Body of Christ

Rachel and Sarah opened my eyes to the beauty of the whole body of Christ.

“If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body.

The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor.”
1 Corinthians 12:17-23

Friends, God made you because he wanted a you in this world. He wanted a you in his church. He said, We need a __________ (insert your name), and then he made you. And he saw that it was good.

God made you because he wanted a you in this world. He wanted a you in his church.

So, go out in your strengths, trusting God to be sufficient in your weaknesses and love the world you were created to love in Christ’s name.

Let’s Staff our Churches With Every Personality

Churches, please hear me here. The Lions have large visions. They have impressive strategies. But they are desperately in need of the rest of the body of Christ. It is tempting to fill your church staff with the planners and strategists, but compassion needs a voice on your staff team. Your church needs a Rachel on your leadership team; and she needs to be encouraged to live out all of her Rachel-ness for God’s glory and for the good of your church.

Don’t lose your heart, churches, for the sake of the strategy. Don’t be like the church in Ephesus, who did many great things in the name of God, yet along the way, they relinquished their love of God.

“I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. …Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. Consider how far you have fallen!”
Revelation 2:2, 4-5