Charles Stone asks a great question in a post at his blog today. He asks, ‘should you stack your leadership team with your best friends’?
I’ve seen churches where best friends, college room mates, brothers and family members, etc. made up the board.
And I’ve seen churches where the boards actually despised one another.
Is either of these scenarios a good thing?
QUESTION: How good of friends are you with your board members?
Are there lines that you don’t cross with them?
Do you get together with them individually for lunch? Go on vacations together?
Or do you keep it entirely professional?
Is there danger is having your bffs on the board?
Is there any point where accountability wanes (or at least becomes harder) if you have your best friends or family members on the board?
What do YOU think?
I’d love to hear your comment below!
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In addition to the Biblical requirements for eldership, I also require us to love each other and have each other’s backs. Too many church boards are all about politics and/or business, and even seem cutthroat at times. I believe that eldership, like all other ministries, should be relationship based. So, all of my elders are friends. Not all BFFs, but friends.
Any solid church board needs to be mixed with paid and non paid elders…that will include casual friends, close friends and sometimes can include family, but that has to be limited for many reasons, including IRS regulations.
As I have led churches, a number of the elders have been very close friends, including many family times together, let alone small group and one to one times with other men. The issue is trust and accountability. They can go together…Paul’s missionary band of Silas, Timothy, Epaphroditus, Titus, Trophimus and others somehow struck the balance.
The question would be WHY are you stacking your board with certain people. It seems to me that there are some minsters that want to stack the board with “YES” people so they can “run” the church as they see fit and NOT as God would see fit. There will always be times of conflict within a church but even having the appearance of stacking a board is something that I believe should not be done because it has the appearance of the ministry trying to have his way.