Reverend Tommie L. Pierson, Sr.
Senior Minister
Greater St. Mark Church in St.
Louis, MO,
in association with
Calvary Church
in St. Peters, MO
This conference was one of the best that I have attended because I was able
to network and meet with senior pastors. It was a blessing for me to hear them
tell their stories. Rick Warren and Wayne Cordeiro shared experiences they have
encountered, from the planting of their churches to the present, that have
enabled me to relate and reflect upon my own story of the planting of the
Greater St. Mark Family Church. That was truly a great blessing for me, and
being able to hear their philosophies on methods strengthened me.
NCNC2 has blessed me tremendously. As I leave to go back to my work in St.
Louis, I leave with the idea of equipping the church to become partners with me
as senior pastor, so that we may become servants together to transform lives.
The people were fantastic and the services were uplifting and inspiring.
Everyone I met was friendly. I saw a real coming together as a community of
faiths. I hope that in the near future we can somehow be more instrumental in
getting more African American pastors and laypeople to attend the conference.
Since attending my first Leadership Network meeting in 1999, our congregation
was about 50 in attendance; today we have approximately 250 attendees. Your
works is very good—may you live long and continue to bless others.
Thank you, Leadership Network, for the wonderful work that you are doing.
Following are my notes from the conference sessions.
Rick Warren talked about his definition of vision, which is the ability
to see what God is doing and then act on it. His long-range plans are about 30
days. The most blessed ministries are the most criticized. He believes in small
groups. Large groups are for celebrating; small groups are for ministry. Growth
comes from health, and health comes from balance. Another philosophy of his that
really helped me: "If you get the job done, I like the way you are doing
it." He also said that he doesn’t just love the people at his own
church, but he also loves the ones who are not there yet. He stated that to
reach his plateau, trusting people is a must.
As the session continued, Erwin McManus enlightened me as well. As he
began his talk by referencing the September 11th terrorist attack, he
said that the safest place to be is in the center of God’s will. You do not
have control over how you die, but you do have control over how you live. If you
are not called out, maybe you have stepped in. He referred to Matthew 5, which
says we are the light of the world, and in every human being there is a longing
to be something. Your dreams must be God’s dreams. He also stated that on
September 11, nineteen people were willing to die for evil, but most of us are
not willing to live for God.
From Wayne Cordeiro, I learned that in equipping we have to remain
focused on what the "bread and butter" of our church are. He was able
to share with us that we, as leaders, need to be able to pass the baton in our
leadership roles. The passing of the baton only takes a second, but passing the
heart of the baton takes a decade. Those of us who serve as senior pastors need
to pass the leadership of the church before we die. We have to train people,
empower them and then release them. As a team we minister together—pastor and
people. We have to become good managers. We must manage the journey after
announcing the destination. We don’t want to be seagull managers because we
don’t want to fly in and make a lot of noise, dump on everybody and then fly
off. We want to be serving leaders and not self-serving leaders. Newborn babies
are a good example of self-serving. They don’t come home from the hospital and
ask if there is anything that they can help with around the house. Finally, he
shared with us that other people who have goals use people who do not have
goals.
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