A Summary of the Lessons God Teaches When We Move into a Time of Transition

    Dr. Bobby Clinton, Professor of Leadership at Fuller Theological Seminary, has studied over 500 Christian leaders and their experiences over a lifetime. A student of his, Finzel, studied a variety of Christian leaders as to what marked their periods of transition. An initial theory of "boundary process items" is in development. This means that there are certain common experiences that Christian leaders go through to learn lessons for the next phase of their spiritual leadership journey. Basically, nine common experiences during transition periods were identified. Theory about transition periods is a crucial concept in at least two important ways. One, it is crucial for the momentary impact in the development of a leader and two, it is integral to the overall understanding of the development of a leader’s life.

    The transition period itself consists of three basic stages: 1) Entry stage = the beginning of the transition, such as, graduation from a program, changing jobs or ministries, the onset of sudden serious illness, etc. 2) Evaluation stage = an extended period during which the leader reflects on past experience; and God teaches a variety of Christian leadership lessons, commonly between four and nine lessons, although there may be more or less. 3) termination of transition stage = a period of forward planning as clarity emerges.

    Here are the nine common experiences with the lessons God teaches during transition. These experiences and lessons are not confined to transition periods, but have been found to be the most common.

• Divine Contact. A Divine Contact is a person God brings into our lives at a crucial moment in order to:

Affirm leadership potential
Encourage leadership potential
Give guidance on a special issue
Give insights that may lead to clarity of an issue
Challenge the leader to go deeper with God
Open a door of ministry opportunity
Other: helps the leader make guidance decisions.

• Crisis/Life Crisis. A Crisis hardly needs defining, but could be experiences such as a threatened loss of life, property or way of life; conflict of various kinds; situations needing urgent change; inner turmoil; the need to have God’s guidance and so forth. Pressure is always present. A Crisis can be used by God to shepherd a leader more deeply into God’s heart making a stronger leader with a deeper experience of God and spiritual authority that accompanies it. (Spiritual authority comes from a life and ministry that demonstrates the presence of God.)
• Ministry Challenge. A Ministry Challenge describes the way a leader is prompted to accept a new ministry assignment accompanied by a sense of God’s guiding to this ministry. God uses a Ministry Challenge in three ways: 1) To cause the leader to wait for a sense of God’s presence in a particular calling; 2) To cause the leader to grow in faith by accepting the challenge; and 3) To grace the leader with the joy of knowing what it is to be a channel for God.
• Faith Challenge. When a leader takes steps of faith and experiences God’s divine affirmation and ministry achievement, his or her capacity to trust God grows. The Faith Challenge refers to this fact.
• Conflict Challenge. When conflict arises, a leader is challenged by God to trust and depend on God to a greater extent; grow in faith; and grow in his or her inner life. One’s character is exposed in conflict. It is important to notice ones strengths and weaknesses in conflict, and to celebrate the strengths while learning to understand and overcome the weaknesses. This is the lesson God teaches through Conflict.
• Leadership Committal. A Christian leader, whether full-time or otherwise, comes to an inner realization that he or she will put service to God above other vocational efforts. When a leader has reached the willingness to be used in ministry in whatever way God leads, that leader has made a Leadership Committal.
• Isolation. There are times a leader must, because of circumstances, or by a God-led choice, cease from normal ministry involvement. God desires to teach such a leader to go deeper in the God relationship and also to go deeper in experience of God. This usually last for an extended period—months or years, not days or weeks. The best spiritual discipline to practice is acceptance. Whenever doubts arise as to the leader’s value or whether there will ever be further ministry, turning one’s thoughts to trust in God makes the time spent waiting very productive.
• Destiny Revelation. The Destiny Revelation experience takes place when a leader has an unusual sense of God’s presence working in them by virtue of a clustering of incidents or experiences which confirm a future destiny and perhaps begins to clarify the leader’s nature. This experience could take place through a dream, insight, scriptural insight, confirmation by mentors, a sudden clarity or deep inner knowing, affirmation by others, and/or a convergence of affirming circumstances or insights.
• Negative Preparation. When events, people, conflict, persecution or experience focus on the negative, it may well be that God is making the leader uncomfortable enough to move on and seek the next thing God has for him or her. It is important to go through a discerning process to see if this is simply to make the leader stronger or whether it is to thrust them into a new venue.

To summarize, if you are in a transition phase, note what stage you are in: Entry, Evaluation or Termination. Unless you are in the termination phase, settle in for an extended period and watch for the above nine experiences, or at least some of them, to come your way. Try to respond according to God’s desiring.

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