During the years that I served as a senior pastor of a church, I was told by some people that I was too controlling. I listened to what others had to say, but I made the final decision in almost all matters that directly affected the whole church. When it came to matters that affected only one or two parts of the church, however, I usually left the decision up to the person in charge of those parts of the church. If the one or two parts of the church were of substantial importance, I typically left the decision up to one of my associate or assistant pastors. The youth were our church’s most important asset, and therefore I gave them my closest attention. The youth pastor, although he had several years of experience serving in that capacity at another church, was allowed to make decisions of only limited importance and his job was to be certain that my vision and goals for the youth were brought about. I spent a minimum of 50 hours a week at the church and often as many as 70 hours and therefore I was very accessible for any young people who felt a need to talk with me about matters that concerned them.
When people accused me of being too controlling, I reminded them that God had placed me in the church as the senior pastor and that the associate pastors, assistant pastors, and the rest of the church staff were placed by God in the church under my authority. One assistant pastor, Ken, and his wife who shared some of his pastoral responsibilities (only with the women in the church) believed that I was too controlling and shared that thought with the other pastors. This resulted in a meeting of the pastors with me and the senior associate pastor agreed with Ken and insisted that I needed to delegate more authority to my staff, and all but one of the other pastors agreed. The hour drew late and we decided to continue the meeting the following night.
The one pastor who agreed with me rather than Ken recognized that a potentially dangerous situation had arisen and that I was very concerned about the danger so he took me aside and told me not to worry because, contrary to the outward appearance that night, God had the matter under control. When we continued the meeting as planned, the senior associate pastor, who had the night before agreed with Ken, told Ken and the others that he had spent much time in prayer over the situation and that he now very clearly and unmistakably understood that God had placed me in the church as the senior pastor and that the rest of the church staff were placed by God in the church to assist me in caring out His goals under my leadership. All of the other pastors gave their “amen” and the matter was settled. The church grew very rapidly and in less than two years time we had to quadruple the size of our facility.
In my opinion, a youth pastor with no prior experience serving in that capacity needs to be on a very short leash. If a senior pastor is indeed too controlling and was not placed in his position by God but by men making a mistake, serving under that pastor would likely prove to be a mistake as well.
