Jeff Norris Assumes Lead Teacher & Directional Leader Position
During weekend worship services of February 23 and 24, 2019, founding pastor and Lead Teacher Randy Pope announced his plans to transition from lead teacher and directional leader to a full-time position as an assistant pastor of Perimeter Church and president and CEO of Perimeter’s Life on Life discipleship ministry. Randy Pope planted the church in 1977 and faithfully served as senior pastor for 42 years. Randy shared that the 20-year succession planning process had yielded a “bullseye” with Jeff Norris. Jeff was installed as senior pastor on Sunday, September 22, 2019.
An official Nominating Committee was elected during a congregational meeting on March 3, 2019 and made a formal nomination of Jeff as the succeeding pastor to Randy Pope. Once the official nomination was put before the congregation, they voted to confirm Jeff that same night.
We encourage you to hear Randy share about the transition in full by watching the video provided below.
Transition Q&A with Tom Rhodes
Transition Timeline
- March 2018: Randy Pope announces his transition to ELT and EMT.
- December 2018: Provisional Pulpit Committee created
- February 18, 2019: Provisional Pulpit Committee completes review and unofficially recommends Jeff Norris with a unanimous accord.
- February 19, 2019: Transition announcement to staff.
- February 21, 2019: Transition announcement to officers.
- February 23/24, 2019: Transition announcement to congregation.
- February 23/24, 2019: Announcement and call for a congregational meeting to vote on making the provisional pulpit committee the official committee and to hear and affirm their recommended nomination of Jeff Norris as the succeeding Lead Teacher and Directional Leader.
- February 27, 2019: Live Transition Q&A
- March 3, 2019: Congregational Meeting 6 pm in the Main Sanctuary.
- May 7, 2019: (provisional) New call made for Jeff Norris and Randy Pope made at presbytery meeting.
- September 22, 2019: (provisional) Installation service for Jeff Norris, with reception following.
- TBD: (provisional) Celebration and appreciation service for Randy and Carol Pope.
Succession Planning Process
20-Year Process:
- Five-Year Check-in: From the very beginning of the church and starting with the very first Elder Ministry Team (EMT) Randy had a standing five-year check-in, where both the EMT and Pope would openly share and communicate their desire to keep him in the role of Leader Teacher and Directional Leader of the church.
- Year 20: It was during Randy’s five-year check-in at the 20-year mark of the church where he communicated to the EMT that it was time to start a succession process for a new Senior Pastor. The EMT pressed in on Randy asking what was causing him to want to leave the church at that time. Randy replied that he was not wanting to leave at this time, but that he would be in about 20 years, so he thought it was best to begin the planning and preparations for that transition. Randy had always had it in the back of his mind that 40 years was an appropriate timeframe for being Senior Pastor of a church.
- Created teaching team so the congregation would hear multiple teachers on a regular basis.
- Concentric Layers of Options: Over the 20 year process the Executive Leadership Team created five layers of strategic options that could potentially produce or bring into relationship a viable succession candidate.
- Center Bullseye: Nomination of a current Teaching Team member.
- Next Layer Out: Recruit from former Teach Team Members.
- Next Layer Out: Create a Church Planting Residence program.
- Next Layer Out: Start a Young Leader Teaching Series in the summer.
- Next Layer Out: Resort to typical effort of blindly searching within the PCA.
- Transition of Executive Leadership Team (ELT): Starting in 2017 the current ELT members volunteered to transition their position at age 66 with an appointed next generation leader. Dan Case transitioned off and Jamey Short replace him. Jeff Norris was added as a next generational leader. Bill Wood will transition in January 2020, followed by Gordon in the fall of 2020. Chip Sweney will remain on the team with no immediate plans of transition.
- Year 40 Check-in: In the winter of 2018 Randy announced to the ELT and the EMT that he felt it was time to announce and take the steps necessary to transition him from Lead Teacher and Directional Leader. Randy gave these three reasons as the primary factors for making the transition within this timeframe:
- Next ALL IN Initiative: Randy felt strongly that with the next ALL IN initiative coming up in the fall of 2019 it needed to have the vision and emphasis for the next leader and not the one who would transition out of it in the middle of the campaign.
- Greatest IMPACT: Realizing the obvious that his years left to effectively serve in ministry were getting fewer, Randy wanted to do what he thought would have the greatest impact in the time remaining. He knew that there are other great teachers who can support worship ministry of the church, but that God has uniquely gifted him to have world changing impact through envisioning and teaching other church leaders in the arena of life-on-life missional discipleship.
- 40 Years is a “Good Run”: From the very beginning of his vision for planting a church Randy had 40 years as a target length of time to lead and give direction to a church. His mentors Baird and Barker both modeled that same 40-year season in their ministries. Moses spent 40 years in the desert. Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness.
