Leader Chat: Jeff Lawrence

Just had a great time catching up with Jeff Lawrence, pastor at Chatham Community Church. I love these leader-to-leader conversations. As usual with these, I came away with a list of books to read, web sites to check out, people to connect with, and thoughts to write about.

Jeff takes three weeks off every summer to recharge. He said that getting away for 4-5 days isn't enough for him, that it's barely enough time for him to begin to unwind. The old model of pastoral ministry was to take a "sabbatical" of 3-9 months after 5-7 years of ministry, but in today's culture, that is probably an outdated model. Ministry is too fast-paced and the demands of leadership too constant. You risk missing too much by taking that much time away, and you risk burnout by not taking shorter breaks more often. I'm thinking I need more regular "silent retreats" and other short breaks during the year. Kind of like the Jeff Galloway method of running pain-free by taking frequent walk breaks.

We also talked about The Leadership Lab and how it might be able to help his church. He is working to transition the culture at Chatham and to develop more leaders. I left our conversation feeling once again that The Lab is onto something and has the potential for tremendous impact in leaders, churches and ministries in this part of the country and beyond.

Jeff's recommended resources: two talks from Advance The Church, one by Mark Driscoll about becoming a missiologist, and one by Tyler Jones about the culture of the New South. I look forward to checking them out.

Good conversation, and a good vibe here at Foster's Market in Chapel Hill.