10 Lessons Pastors And Church Leaders Can Learn About Creativity

10 Lessons Pastors And Church Leaders Can Learn About Creativity

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Brian Dodd on June 14, 2015 in Church Leadership

Successful pastors and Christian leaders are humble enough to understand the importance of continual learning.  One of the many places I learn from is Fast Company magazine.  In their June 2015 edition, this great publication did its annual listing of the Top 100 Most Creative People In Business.
Editor Robert Safian identified many similarities and trends from this group.  As I read his findings, I discovered 10 Lessons Pastors And Church Leaders Can Learn About Creativity:

1. The Value Of Diversity – There will come a day in the very near future when our children will say to us, “You mean there was once a time when churches were NOT multi-cultural?  You’ve got to be kidding me!”  The Top 100 included 53 women and 43 people of color.
2. Creativity Comes From Unexpected Places – The potential cure to the Ebola virus was discovered by Charles Arntzen, a little-known professor from Arizona using plant based technology.  There are dozens of great ideas within your church if you just know where and how to look.
3. Creativity Requires Taking Risks – Are the people in your church leaving their comfort zones?  Amy Poehler was very successful in television.  But she then moved out of her comfort zone to streaming video and producing.
4. Creative People Always Want To Make Things Better – Whether you create a sermon message, a service plan, a set design, discipleship curriculum or write worship music, once you have finished, then say to yourself, “Make It Better!”  This is self-leadership.  Jason Jones helped make Halo.  Rather than stopping there, he and his team then invented Destiny, the most successful new video game of all-time.
5. Creative People Fearlessly Follow Big Vision – Matt Carter, pastor of Austin Stone Community Church said at Velocity ’15, “Let’s be pastors who cast vision that are worth people giving their life for.”  Vian Dakhil of the Iraqi Parliament enlisted global leaders to assist her people, the Yazidis, in their struggle against ISIS.
6. Creative People Are Frustrated – You have people in your church with a holy discontent to change “what isn’t” to “what should be”.  Unleash them!  The magazine profiled creative leaders who are finding solutions to frustrating issues like outdated blueprints or unnecessary, debilitating ACL surgeries.
7. NO Means Next Opportunity – Creatives are relentless.  If they cannot find a ministry in your church, they will look outside your church.  Nike did not get the World Cup sponsorship so they developed a cross-media effort which garnered over 400 million views.
8. Creativity Makes Things Better – International Fund for Animal Welfare’s Azzedine Downes began using drones and other technologies to identify illegal poachers.  Enlisting more creatives in your church will make your ministry more effective as well.
9. Comic Books Are HUGE – Have you noticed, Marvel is on fire!  Every children’s ministry should consider Christian comic books as part of their discipleship curriculum.
10. Creativity Is Best Discovered In Young Leaders – Pastors, how many people do you have on your creative team under the age of 30?  Rarely do new ideas ever come from someone over age 45.  Isabella Rose developed clothing line for Nordstrom at age 14.

What other creativity trends are you seeing?