OHHH Silo-mia

I’m sure you’ve heard the term silos in ministry. The meaning is each department of the church is basically its own entity taking care of and watching out for its own interests. If you work in a church you already know this is a true concept. Each department runs like the land-grabs of the old west. The words, “it’s ours/mine” are uttered at least once a day. The sad part is this selfish behavior doesn’t end with things, it involves people, and attention as well. Everyone wants as much as they can get! The thought of working on a cohesive and comprehensive strategy that bridges all age groups is as foreign as having more money than you need.

The church SHOULD run as a collective group of people helping others know, learn and apply the things of God! Yet when you can’t work together as leaders how can you help others throughout their spiritual life? The children’s ministry should be happy when they have a group of kids move up to youth, because the youth and children’s departments have worked together in planning a great strategy for the spiritual growth of each child. The youth ministry should be thrilled that the college or young adult ministry is filled with their former students because those students are taking the next step in the well thought out plan that’s in place do to leadership working together. Sadly this is rarely the case, instead it’s every man (department) for himself.

We need to break this cycle, we as children’s leaders need to be willing to share and cooperate with other departments. We need to rejoice when they get a new toy! We need to cheer when our kids can’t wait to get into the youth ministry. We need to encourage our fellow leaders and support them. Not just in word, but in action as well. Most importantly we need to work together to make sure we’re doing all we can to support our families and kids by having a life-long strategy in place on how and what we’re going to teach. It’s time to break down the silo walls, and work together! 

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