J.D. Greear: Helping Your People Glimpse the Vision

Business guru John Kotter says that the place most leaders fail in effecting change is in assuming their people understand the need for change more than they actually do. By the time the leader suggests a change, he or she has spent months thinking about why the particular change is necessary. Others in the organization, however, haven’t felt these things yet; all they feel is the pain associated with leaving the familiar. What looks to the leader like a no-brainer seems to the employees like unnecessary inconvenience.

Chip and Dan Heath call this “the curse of the knowledge gap.” They say leaders fail to appreciate how far behind their people are from them in understanding. To happily put up with the discomforts required for change necessitates feeling the disadvantages of the current situation as keenly as the leader does.

Help Them See the Rabbit

I once heard a story about an old grandfather sitting lazily on the porch of his country home with his grandson, his six dogs lying underneath the porch. About a hundred yards across the field a rabbit darted out of a bush, stared back at the house for just a second, and then disappeared into the undergrowth. One of the dogs perked up, let out a short bark, and took off across the field. Immediately, the other five dogs jumped to their feet, yapping excitedly, in hot pursuit of the first dog.

The grandfather said to his grandson, “Son, let me tell you what is about to happen. In about 10 minutes, them other five dogs are doing to come back, one by one, heads hung and tongues out. In about 30 minutes, the first dog will come back with the rabbit in his mouth.”

Sure enough, that’s what happened. The grandson asked, “How did you know?”

The grandfather replied, “‘Cause that first dog, you see, is the only one who actually saw the rabbit. The others were just running and yapping because there was some excitement.”

Like those first five dogs, a lot of people in the church get swept up in the passion of a good sermon and start to tap and run … one by one, however, they come back, heads hung low, tongues out, clamoring for the way things used to be. Only those who have really “seen the rabbit” keep running until they catch him.

The only thing that enables members to push through the weariness of the constant inconvenience required for change—the only thing that sustains the motivation to sacrifice again and again—is glimpsing the vision of what God wants to give.

Taken from Gaining By Losing by J.D. Greear. Copyright © 2015 by J.D. Greear. Used by permission of Zondervan. Zondervan.com

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J.D. Greear
J.D. Greear

J.D. Greear is the pastor of The Summit Church in Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina, and is currently serving as the 62nd president of the Southern Baptist Convention. He is the author of several books, including most recently Essential Christianity: The Heart of the Gospel in Ten Words (The Good Book Company).

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