On Selective Neglect

This post follows both logically and necessarily the last two topics.

Use this tool carefully.  But use it.  Sometimes good enough is. Sometimes you must let some things go.

You cannot attend every meeting.  You cannot make every visit that could be made.  You cannot read every book or journal.  You cannot do it all.

You cannot.

You are a pastor in the Lord’s Church.  You are not the Lord.

So you have to decide what you can let go until later.  You have to decide what you can let go for someone else to do.  You have to decide what you can just let go. 

You have heard it said, “Do not put off until tomorrow what you can do today.”  That often holds true, but not always.  Sometimes you should put off until tomorrow what you can.  In “A Contrarian’s Guide to Leadership” Steven B. Sample argues that a good leader at times intentionally puts things off until tomorrow.  Some things do work themselves out without our attention.  That’s part of the beauty of selective neglect.   

Of course some things do not work out over time; they fester.  So you have to select what to neglect and what not to.  Choose carefully.  Selective neglect should be used as a tool for more effective ministry, not an excuse of sloth.

Here are some tips to consider for the successful application of selective neglect:

• Check your motives.  Don’t be driven by your need for personal affirmation; rather be driven by what really needs to be done.  For example, do you visit that person in the hospital because it makes you feel good about being a pastor or because that person really needs to see a pastor?  Frankly, too much of what we pastors do is driven by our need for such affirmation rather than true ministry needs.

• Focus on the important not the urgent.  Put off responding to some emails so that you can do quality work on your sermon.  Pastors can get so caught up responding to all the little urgencies of the day that they never get to the important points of ministry.

• Prioritize according to duty:  God, family, congregation, self.  Frankly balancing the God and self part is harder than the family and congregation.  Think of selective neglect in terms of whom you are neglecting and not just what.  You will choose more wisely this way.

• Plan every day for more than a day.  Look ahead not only for the day, but also the week, month and year.  Planning helps you select not only what can be neglected, but for how long.  Some things can be neglected this week but must be taken care of next.

Give the day your best shot; do what must be done.  Get after it; get after it good.  If there are things that can and should wait, apply selective neglect—wisely and carefully.  Richard Swenson in “The Overload Syndrome” points out that any quitting time is an artificial distinction.  There is ALWAYS something more that can be done.  But there are also things that can wait.  Let them.

Remember God in all of this!  Your work doesn’t ultimately depend on you.  God works in and through you… and others.  Part of selective neglect is really trust in God. 

Every pastor should carry selective neglect in his bag of clubs.  Make sure you do too, and use it.  Carefully.