Zig Ziglar on Leadership: Do YOU Believe?

An article by Matt    4 Comments

I am a fan of Zig Ziglar.

A regular in my rotation of podcasts, Zig’s Inspiring Words of Encouragement, is something that I generally look forward to hearing because the man understands people.  While driving back from Baltimore a few weeks ago I was blown away by one of these podcasts… in fact, I have listened to it so much since that drive, I think Theresa has it memorized.

The podcast was titled “Why They Don’t Buy”, and while it is aimed at sales professionals, I think that there are some incredible applications for the church (and no, I am not thinking we need to start selling Jesus).  While listening I was struck by three major points: the importance of belief in what you are doing, the folly of waiting for perfection, and what motivates people to buy.  Over the course of three posts I want to unpack some of this, starting with the idea of believing in what you are doing.

I sold cars for a little while as we were preparing to plant a church.  I was a good salesman, but I wasn’t great.  Once I figured out what I was doing, I was consistently among the sales leaders in our dealership.  While I enjoyed selling cars, and could have made a good living at it, I was never going to excel at it.  Why?  Because I was not convinced that everyone who walked on our lot needed a car.  In fact, there were times that I told a potential customer that buying a car was a bad decision for them, and that while they would probably drive down the street and buy a car at another dealership later that day, I could not sell them a car and sleep that night.  In order for me to take the next step and be a great salesman, I had to be convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that everyone needs a new vehicle, and they need to buy it from me.  In the podcast Zig puts it this way:

It is beyond my wildest imagination to even begin to be able to understand or comprehend how anybody could even think about considering discussing the possibility of not wanting what I sell.

And if you do not feel the same way, I am going to urge you consider carefully why you are selling what you are selling.

Now, to be clear, I am not equating church leadership to sales: our calling as pastors is much more than simply convincing people that they need to buy the latest trinket on the market.  Having stated that disclaimer, here is what I am taking away from Zig:

• If we are leading a church and casting a vision in which we do not fully buy into, we are wasting our breath.  As we lead our congregations we are asking people to make sacrifices of time, talents, and treasure towards the vision of our church… the least we can do is believe in what it is that we are asking them to do.
• If we do not fully believe in this vision we have two options: work towards changing the vision or move on… and quickly.
• I fully believe that people can live full and abundant lives without a new car (this is why I will never be a great car salesman).  I am fully convinced that people can NOT live a full or abundant life without Christ.  I am convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Holy Spirit uses the local church to help people be reconciled with Christ, and because of this the local church is the hope of the world.  A church leader who is not utterly convinced that the local church is, and must be, a powerful catalyst for reconciliation and restoration needs to seriously rethink why they are serving in a church.

Do YOU believe in what you are doing?