Leadership: Purpose, Values, Mission, Vision
Vision without action is merely a dream. Action without vision just passes the time. Vision with action can change the world. Joel A. Barker
Gregg’s Reflection
There are several elements that define an organization, give it direction, hold it accountable, and chart where it is going. Some elements are enduring, while others are time sensitive and will shift over time. This image helps to clarify the role of each element in defining an organization, whether it is a business, a nonprofit, or a church.
Purpose
As I think about my purpose on this planet, I think it is to help connect people with the compassionate love of God. For some reason, God touched me as a young adult, and I feel the call to share what I’ve experienced with others. The Who of my calling, given my background, are next generation pastors, professionals and entrepreneurs. Equipping next generation leaders for the Kingdom is my calling.
As I think our business, our father always said he started the business to provide for our family and to create good jobs for people, including veterans he knew From the war. Given my father’s background in construction, and construction equipment before the war, and his stint in the Corps of Engineers during the war, starting an equipment business was a natural progression.
As my brother and I led the business after our father died, we worked to build a learning organization to see our people reach their potential. This felt kind of noble in a three yards in a cloud of dust industry.
As I think about purpose for a church, here is a good example. Bryan Buck was our Associate Pastor at City Church-Eastside in Atlanta. He moved to Portland a decade ago and planted Oaks Parish. In their webpage on Mission, Vision, Values, they have a wonderful description of a healthy church:
At Oaks Parish, we believe that worship is not only an act of devotion but also a reflection of the beauty and creativity of God’s kingdom. Rooted in the historic rhythms of the Church, our liturgical worship shapes us through Scripture, prayer, sacrament, and song, forming us into a people attuned to the presence of God. The word liturgy comes from the Greek leitourgia, meaning “the work of the people,” emphasizing that worship is not a passive experience but an active, communal offering to God.
Discipleship at Oaks Parish is more than a program; it is a way of life. We believe transformation happens in the context of real relationships, where faith is formed through shared rhythms of prayer, study, and daily obedience to Christ. Life-on-life discipleship means walking together in faith, encouraging one another, and bearing one another’s burdens as we grow in the likeness of Jesus. It is in these intentional, everyday relationships that we are shaped into a people who reflect the character and love of God.
Does your church have this kind of clarity? Here is an image depicting Oaks Parish and what is important:
Values
For much of my business career, I struggled to live out my values in business. What I felt God calling me to live was in serious contrast with the needs of the business. However, our shared values of integrity, honesty, growing people through empowerment, in an organization rooted trust rather than fear were core parts of who my brother and I were as leaders.
Values only exist in an organization to the extent that they are lived out in the lives of leaders. Discipleship is an example for churches. If the pastor preaches about discipleship, I look to the elders and leaders. Do I see them embracing discipleship? Is it a requirement of leaders? If not, it is just lip service and will never get traction in the congregation.
Values shift in the different seasons of life. As we reared our kids, we focused on creating a loving healthy environment and helping them grow into competent adults. As we lived into an empty nest, we focused on a life beyond being parents. Genie and I each pursued second careers of calling, and we built our cabin to strengthen relationships with friends and family.
For a deeper dive into values, see my post on Living into my Values here.
Mission
The Mission of any organization defines the playing field. Another way to describe it is the Mission is like a frame around a painting. The Vision is the painting itself, what our desired future looks like. The primary Mission field for our Lutheran Church is the Estes Park community. Yet, we also take two trips a year to help La Puente, a nonprofit serving the least, the last and the lost in one of the most depressed areas in Colorado.
You can say it a thousand ways, but I think Jesus defined the Mission of the church: To be disciples, to make disciples and to feed the sheep. Matthew 28:19-20 gives us the Great Commission:
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.
You must first be a disciple before you can make disciples. So a core process of the church is disciple-making. Out of the disciples, one identifies potential leaders who can not only be disciples, but be disciple-making leaders.
The process of transformation in a healthy church looks like this:
People are changed by an experience of the Living God in worship. The church helps them identify their spiritual gifts and discern a calling. Then, the work is to equip them to live out gifts and calling and send them into the world to serve.
Unfortunately, too many churches focus their work on Time and Talent surveys, and getting people to serve the church, rather then equipping them to live out their gifts and calling and sending them.
A healthy, multiplying church needs a leadership pipeline. Ken Blanchard originated the idea of Situational Leadership symbolized by the square. Mike Breen brought it into the 3DM movement as one of the LifeShapes. Those symbols illustrate the inside of the square.
In addition to the Great Commission, Jesus gave us the Great Commandment in Matthew 22:37-39:
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
These both articulate a church’s call to mission. To make disciples who love God with all their heart and soul and mind, and to love the neighbor. Jesus gave a startling answers to the question of “Who is my neighbor?’ with the Parable of the Good Samaritan.
Vision
Vision describes an outcome, not a process. A vision describes a desired future as if it already exists. If the Mission is the playing field, the Vision is the score of a game played well. And our Values define how we play the game, the rules we follow to be consistent with our beliefs.
What is missing from most Vision exercises is a clear statement of our starting point. My friend Mike Foss, in a visioning workshop, said it this way:
Your are starting at Point A, and your Vision is Point B. If you are clear enough about where you are going, your leaders will build a bridge to get there. The biggest reason you fail to reach the vision is that you misdiagnose Point A and start building the bridge about 20 yards out into the water.
That is so true. With every vision I have cast, I have underestimated the time and resources required to reach the vision.
So, to create an effective Vision requires a clear statement of an outcome describing your desired future, a brutally honest look at reality, and clear action steps to move you from your Current Reality to your vision. This tool is called a Tension Chart, and it empowered our business success, and my life of calling. For a deeper look, check out my post on Leadership: Personal Mastery.
Shared Vision is one of the disciplines of the Learning Organization Peter Senge describes in The Fifth Discipline. One key element I discovered when we began casting vision for our business is that all vision is rooted in personal vision.
If you want everyone aligned with an organization, then they must answer the question: “What’s in it for me?” I began meeting with leaders throughout our organization one-on-one to hear their personal vision of career. For many, there was none. So, I helped them articulate one. When the people saw the boss interested in what they wanted, they got invested in helping us reach our vision. All organizational vision is rooted in personal vision.
As you implement the Vision in the organization, it should drive all the goals of the business, nonprofit or church. And all goals in the organization should support the Vision, as this image illustrates.
Between the pandemic and the financial meltdown of 2008-2009, I found that no business is more than three years from dying. So, the challenge is to cast a new vision every three to five years to keep renewing the organization.
Churches, on the other hand, can take decades to die. However, as the church moves from plateau to decline, it becomes harder and harder to renew it.
See why clear purpose, values, mission and vision are critical to building a great organization. Blessings
Journaling Prompts
What brings you alive and gives your life meaning? In what ways does your past pain or joy point toward your purpose? What principles have guided your best decisions? What is the “playing field” of your current season of life or organization? What does your desired future look like in vivid detail? What is your current reality—brutally and honestly? Does your personal vision support and align with a larger organizational vision?
Scripture
Where there is no vision, the people perish.
Proverbs 29:18
Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart.
Jeremiah 1:5
By their fruit you will recognize them.
Matthew 7:16
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind… Love your neighbor as yourself.
Matthew 22:37–39
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations…
Matthew 28:19-20
Feed my sheep.
John 21:17
For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Ephesians 2:10
Ancient Writing
If a man knows not to which port he sails, no wind is favorable.
Seneca, Epistle 7
The soul, like the eye, must be turned away from the world of becoming and toward the world of being, and then it will be able to bear the sight of being and of the brightest part of being, which is what we call the good.
Plato, Republic, Book VII, 518c
Modern Writing
The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.
Attributed to Mark Twain (authorship debated; widely cited)
He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.
Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols
The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.
Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC
You must constantly communicate vision. People will not automatically follow a vision they do not know about. Without vision, people will find another parish.
— Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Church: Growth Without Compromising Your Message & Mission, p. 83.
The church is the only society that exists for the benefit of those who are not its members.
William Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury
Goals form a hierarchy. Vision gives rise to organizational goals, which in turn give rise to divisional goals, which in turn give rise to local goals. Each lower-level goal serves its higher-level goal, and ultimately, all serve the vision.
Robert Fritz, The Path of Least Resistance for Managers, p. 148
Shared vision is vital for the learning organization… It fosters a long-term commitment.
Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline, p. 206
A vision is a dream with a deadline. I had always dreamed of being an Olympic High Jumper. Only when I committed to making the Olympic team in 1968 did my dream turn into a vision.
Dwight Stones, Olympic Silver Medalist, motivational talk I heard in the ’80’s
Vision without action is merely a dream. Action without vision just passes the time. Vision with action can change the world.
Joel A. Barker, Discovering the Future: The Business of Paradigms