We welcome good friend Mark Howell to Eagles In Leadership today. His article today is a reprint, used by his permission. Mark is a valued friend and wise leader. We know you will enjoy this installment.

What is the philosophy of your small group ministry?  Do you have one?  I think that the most fundamental step for every small group ministry is to develop a personalized philosophy of ministry.

Developing a personalized philosophy of ministry is critical because you will be the one defining priorities, determining next steps and defending actions.  Without a personalized philosophy of ministry what you do will be far more driven by the urgent and not the truly important.

Here are some of the core elements of my philosophy of small group ministry:

• Life-on-life is the optimum environment for spiritual growth. I’ve often said that what happens in a worship service is closest in kind to a defibrillator.  A great message and inspiring worship can jump start your heart spiritually, but it’s not permanent change.  It’s temporary.  As soon as you’re in the traffic jam on the way out of the parking lot you’re heart is back to where it was.  What does bring change?  Life on life.  Surgery or therapy happens when the Holy Spirit uses relationships.
• The best delivery system for life-on-life is a small group. Will it work for everybody every time?  No.  But the easiest way to impact the most people is a small group system that is pervasive.
• Interaction is a key to life-change. A smaller version of the worship service (singing together followed by listening to a Bible teacher) is not the ticket.  Facilitated discussion leading to personal application combined with the support and nurture of shared lives leads to life-change.
• Every believer is the relative shepherd to someone (and in most circumstances a group of someones).  The Small Group Connection strategy works because there is a relative shepherd in every group gathered.  The HOST strategy works because when I gather a few of my friends, I tend to be a step or two ahead of the ones I gather.  As my friend Brett says, “I don’t have to be Jesus Junior.  Only a step ahead.”
• Whatever I want to happen at the member level in groups has to be happening in the life of the leader. This is the raison d’être for a coaching structure.  Coaching is only about technique and skill training in the very beginning.  It is almost entirely about life-on-life once a group is beyond 90 days.
• Groups have a life span.  The normal life span of a group is about 18 to 24 meetings.  Groups can meet much longer than that but barring the infusion of new blood and a very proactive leader, groups that continue to meet become more about fellowship and less about transformation.
• Providing life support for dying groups is counter-productive. When I proactively send new members to a dwindling group I am usually keeping alive something that needs something a few new members won’t provide.  Better to build leaders and groups that are intentionally building new relationships outside the group.
• The easiest way to impact a community is through an ever growing network of outward looking groups. With the right curriculum and the right strategy…a church can impact the neighbors and friends of every member.  This is the essence of crowd-to-core.

These are some of the essential pieces of my small group philosophy.  Every group life discussion I have is influenced by this philosophical stance.  As I’ve often said, there is no problem-free solution to anything.  This philosophy produces the set of problems I’d rather have.

What’s your philosophy of small group ministry?  How is it different?

We welcome Brandon Cox back today with another insightful article that is sure to encourage and promote servant leadership around the globe! Thanks Brandon for sharing! You can learn more about Brandon at his website.

I just returned from a conference with close to 5,000 attendees, mostly pastors and church planters. The content was incredible and the people who lead it care deeply about the audience. The theme spoke to the soul and the workshops were spot on in terms of practical, helpful advice. In fact, Exponential is probably one of the best conferences I’ve ever attended and I hope to come back.

But like any good conference, there are side effects. Pastors are intriguing creatures who have a tendency to be some of the best at acting and projecting. I conclude this partly out of observation and experience and partly out of empirical data collected from DISC profiles that demonstrates that we have a tendency to adjust to the expectations around us to an extent that becomes difficult to sustain over time, often leading to burnout and emotional wreckage.

I also share it out of my own personal experience. I’m an introvert by nature and I find it easy to retreat into a shell, projecting confidence but feeling on the inside that I’m surrounded by people who couldn’t possibly find me valuable. I’ve learned to combat that lie with the truth of Scripture, basing my self-worth on the assessment Jesus made of me in the garden of Gethsemane. He purposefully went to the cross for me even knowing my faults and failures in advance. He did the same for you.

I want to speak a word of encouragement to Pastors about your value. Listen loudly to these two truths:

1. There are no LARGE churches. Some are smaller than others, but “large” is a relative word we should measure in terms of our actual cultural impact. Until we’ve saturated a community with the gospel and are seeing 90% or more of the population living life in a proper relationship with Jesus, we’ll just assume all churches are still small. I was on staff at Saddleback, a church that saw about 40,000 people this past Easter Sunday, but Orange County has a population of 3 million. Saddleback is small. There are too many people without Jesus and on their way to hell for any of us to boast in our numbers. We’re way behind.

2. There are no SMALL pastors. Stop sizing yourself up according to the relative size of your church. We tend to assume that large churches are led by large pastors, and small churches by small pastors. That’s a lie, from the devil, from the pit of hell. It smells like smoke. It takes a big leader to step before a congregation and shepherd them. A small church absolutely does not equal a small pastor!

I’m not concluding that all pastors are healthy. Yes, there are church leaders who are ego-driven, bigoted, dictatorial, and hypocritical. But assuming you’re in a right relationship with Jesus, you’re not small. Your impact is impossible to calculate and only eternity will show the full extent of the investment you’ve made into people.

You are valuable enough to God to move Him to send His Son Jesus to the cross for you. You are, as Paul put it in 1 Timothy 1:12, “counted worthy” being put into the ministry. You were chosen for the greatest task on the planet – telling others the good news, and your choosing is based entirely on grace so that neither you nor any other pastor on the face of the earth can ever boast in being bigger. In God’s eyes, there are just no small pastors!

Editor’s Note: We welcome our friend Alan Hirsch today. Writing on a most poignant issue today for the Christian leader, Alan has agreed to share this “gem” with us. It will included in his foreword to Lance Ford’s new book Unleader. Thanks for sharing Alan!

I must admit to been increasingly concerned with the culture of celebrity that surrounds the adulation of many popular Christian leaders in the West.  Aside from the fake, contrived, “heroism” that is embodied in such forms of leadership, to my eyes it looks like it an illegitimate attempt to steal glory from Jesus Himself.  The celebrity is a mere slave to the crowd; he or she needs the crowd as much as they long for a celebrity.  But this is not Christian leadership; it is way too codependent, narcissistic, and emotionally parasitical to be viewed as an extension of genuine discipleship—adherence to Jesus.  Clearly Jesus himself, while willingly serving the people, was never subservient to the crass, consumeristic,  groupthink of the undiscipled crowd.  Neither were any of our great saints and heroes—Paul, Augustine, Patrick, Francis, Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King.  It marks them off as different from the false heroisms of our day.

The second phrase in the Lord’s prayer affirms that God’s name (representing all that He is and signifies) is to be made holy (hallowed) through the obedient actions as His people in every arena of their lives. In other words in biblical worldview, God’s name is hallowed when I do things that cause others to honor and respect God and all that He is to the world.  To hallow the Name is therefore the highest ethical act we can do as believers….it is to bring glory to the One we love through the things that we do.  Its not hard to see that it lies at the heart of worship itself. Our lives must point beyond ourselves to that of the One we serve.  This is the very meaning of Christ-like-ness.  It also lies at the heart to the whole Biblical notion of being a witness. The quality of our lives do matter. In other words people read the message of our lives and God’s reputation is somehow bound up with them.

But implied in this call to hallow the Name is also the possibility of its opposite, what the rabbis call “blaspheming the Name”.   To blaspheme the Name of God is to distort its meaning in the world so that the character and purposes of God are thereby obscured, His glory veiled, and His name cursed by others because of what we as his witnesses do. Blasphemy inverts holiness and makes it inaccessible to others.  Our lives can therefore either hallow or blaspheme the Name. In short, it means bearing fundamentally false witness.  This is a justifiably a horror to all that love God truly.  Leaders, those people whose actions are amplified because of their influence on others, more than anything else are required to live a consistent life worthy of the Name they represent.  If they are not doing this, their acts distort (also in an amplified way) the nature and meaning of the Gospel itself.  God gets the blame when we get it wrong!

Viewed as such, Christian celebrity, especially in that ideological, primadonna-ish, spin-loaded,  cult of self that it embodies, distorts what Jesus essentially stands for and therefore amounts to false witness.  As someone who is involved in many of the forums that could so easily lend themselves to the cultivation of such celebrity, along with it’s false representation of leadership, I have to admit that I can discern in myself a slow but inexorable slide towards pride and conceit. I need to be constantly addressed by the Gospel, called to account by Lord and community, to repent and constantly surrender myself to the call to be an adoring follower of the He who won my salvation through culturally ignominious means—a life of suffering love and a death on cross.

Editor’s Note: Our good friend, Brandon Cox, is planting Grace Hills Church in Northwest Arkansas. As he does, his passion flows into his people and reveals his desire to stay focused on the mission of Jesus. Enjoy this reprint of his recent post, used with Brandon’s permission. You can check out Brandon Cox and his ministry at his website.

Grace Hills Church is eleven Sundays old, officially, and about eight months old, unofficially. And we’re in trouble. If we don’t do something, all of our effort will be in vain and all hope of planting the kind of church Jesus had in mind will be lost.

No, we’re not out of money. God has provided every step of the way. No, we’re not losing people. In fact, we’re seeing new attenders every week. And no, we’re not losing our leaders. We’re seeing new leaders emerge as each week passes. But I still contend that we’re in jeopardy of losing everything important to us… if we don’t fight for it.

Churches do not automatically thrive. The American church, as a local institution, has proven that it can coast along in almost-dead mode for many years. But there are no churches that are effectively reaching and changing their surrounding culture by accident. Recently, Rick Warren wrote a brief piece on Pastors.com about breaking three common barriers to church growth. In the comments, a troubling attitude emerged that is probably not too uncommon among believers in American churches – that growth is up to God (which I wholeheartedly agree with) and so any intentional effort to cause growth is somehow wrong (which I couldn’t disagree with more).

We’ve been having “good Sundays” at Grace Hills, but I’m still very much on guard. In fact, I sometimes find myself troubled at the rising threats against our success, not from any force outside of our fellowship, but from within it. Let me elaborate on some ways I believe the mission is in jeopardy even now…

If we fail to intentionally be the church, we will unintentionally just do church. And that’s true, no matter how much we say we’re going to “be the church.” Doing the Sunday gathering thing is what we’re good at, and even though we spend a lot of time and money on it, it’s still easier than scattering to be the church in our community.

If we fail to intentionally make disciples, we will unintentionally just make fans. I believe in making Jesus famous and bringing people into the enjoyment of His glory, but our mission is more than increasing the popularity of the church. The mission is to help people become reproducing, sold out Jesus-followers.

If we fail to intentionally be authentic, we will unintentionally just perform. I’ve performed before. In fact, I’m a recovering performer and have struggled with an addiction to the approval of others, so admitting my weaknesses is tough, but essential. I no longer trust my autopilot to lead me into genuine authenticity. Being real takes effort, and if we aren’t real, nobody heals.

If we fail to intentionally embrace all people, we will unintentionally play favorites. And the apostle James warned us about the danger of insulting the cross by picking and choosing those with whom we want to do ministry. Rather than hanging out with only the “churchy” people, of our color, of our political persuasion, of our cultural background etc., the gospel itself demands that we purposely break free and seek out new friendships for the gospel’s sake.

If we fail to intentionally be generous, we will unintentionally consume everything. By default, we spend it all, and we tend to spend pretty much all of our resources on ourselves. Churches tend to fall into the trap of sustaining their institutional machinery, maintaining their buildings and budgets, and begging for more volunteers and bigger offerings to keep the snowball rolling. Generosity requires purposeful sacrifice (if we can even use that word in light of the cross).

Grace Hills is in jeopardy of existing for us rather than them. We’re in jeopardy of growing the institution of the church rather than the people of the church. And we’re always in jeopardy of becoming a well-liked brand rather than pointing the culture to the infinite goodness of God.

So what should we do? How do we stop our drift and shift out of autopilot? With focus, intention, and effort, we need to:

• Check our hearts and our motives.
• Remind ourselves of the mission often.
• Repeat the vision regularly.
• Keep Jesus at the center.
• Put people before the organization.
• Do it all with a sense of desperation.

After all, if we fail to take the reins, we’re already as good as dead no matter how long we keep the doors open. So… go.

by Pastor Mark Haines

We welcome Pastor Mark Haines to Eagles In Leadership this week. He is a happy husband, father, grandfather and pastor living in the Great Lakes Bay Region of Michigan. You can learn more about him at his website.

Our church has been struggling financially.  Many of our members lost their jobs as well as their savings in this recession.  How can we pray for our church’s finances?

Here are a few suggestions based on God’s principles for finances and generosity.

Principle #1: God evaluates your giving based on your heart motives and your ability to give, not on the amount of your offering.

(Mark 12:41—44; 2 Corinthians 8:2)

• Ask God to help your congregation’s constituents to see every tithe and gift to the Lord is important.  That way no one will miss out on a blessing by thinking his/her giving won’t be missed.
• Pray for the ability to give generously.

Principle #2: Find help and instruction to help everyone in your church to enjoy the freedom of getting out of debt.

(Romans 13:8; Proverbs 22:7)

• Pray that the families and individuals in your church will pay off any outstanding debts they may have in order to experience financial freedom.

Principle #3: Giving should come from the cheerful generous heart of one who loves God.

(2 Corinthians 9:6—8)

• Pray for your church members to love the Lord so much that they see giving to Him through the church as a joy and a privilege. Then, they will give generously as God enables them.

Principle #4: Give to God not only as an act of thanksgiving, but also in obedience to His command. When you obey Him, He promises to meet all your needs and to bless your lives.

(Malachi 3:6-10; Philippians 4:19)

• Ask the Lord to give each member the courage to accept God’s challenge to test Him by giving at least a tithe (10%) of his/her income, even if it seems impossible.
• Thank the Lord for honoring His promise to pour out a blessing on those who give.
• Ask that as God pours out His blessings, whether material or spiritual, the person receiving them will know them as God’s blessings sent because of their obedient giving.

Principle #5: Your tithe should be the first thing you pay.

(1 Corinthians 16:2)

• Ask the Lord give each member the courage to trust Him to meet all his or her needs as they give to Him first and then pay their bills.

Principle #6: Money can be used for good or for evil.

(1 Timothy 6:6—10, 17—19)

• Ask the Lord to give each member the sense of contentment we all need to resist greed, and the desire to “keep up with the Jones’s.”
• Pray for wisdom in how you spend and invest your money, especially so you can reap eternal dividends.

QUESTION OF THE DAY:

How do you pray for your church’s finances?

By Dave Ferguson

We welcome our good friend Dave Ferguson back to Eagles in Leadership today. We know this article could change your 2012 in ways only God can imagine. With that in mind, we submit this great idea to you for your consideration:

My good friend Bob Bouwer was having lunch with the campus pastor of COMMUNITY a couple weeks ago when he said, “Everyday at the top of my journal I write these three letters:  E (emotional), P (physical) and S (spiritual) and then give myself a 1-10 rating.” He went on to explain how this daily routine of rigorous self-evaluation helps keep him in a healthy place.

As I heard Bob talk I was inspired to do the same; but to use a tool that is a regular part of our coaching of leaders at COMMUNITY and explained on page 120 of Exponential:  How You and Your Friends Can Start a Missional Church Movement.  We refer to this tool as “checking your RPM’S.”  This tool is based on Luke 2:52 that says, “Jesus grew in wisdom (mental) and stature (physical), and in favor with God (spiritual) and men (relational).”  So for the last week on a daily bais I have put at the top of my journal these four letters: R (relational), P (physicial), M (mental) and S (spiritual) and given myself a 1-10 rating.

I am already convinced that using this tool on a daily basis, rather than just during coaching sessions may be one of the most powerful self-leadership tools around.  I would strongly encourage you to try it for yourself.  Let me briefly explain each of these and give you a few questions to ask in your own daily self-evaluation.

RELATIONAL:  Our relational world typically includes the people with whom we interact on a regular basis: our immediate family, friends, neighbors, coworkers, and small group members. Here are some questions you can ask yourself.

• How are my relationships at home?
• What about my marriage, dating, or family life is going well? What’s not going so well? What would I like to change?
• Who do I consider my closest friend? How is God using that relationship to grow me?
• What are my relationships at work like?
• Which of my relationships give my energy and life? Which are the most challenging or draining?

PHYSICAL:  Our physical well-being is often the most overlooked aspect of a leaders life. Yet diet, exercise, sleep, and rest are all vital to our ability to lead effectively. If we are serious about developing as a whole person, we have to take seriously our physical well-being.  Here are some good questions to ask:

• Am I getting enough rest?
• How is my current energy level?
• What am I doing to maintain good health when it comes to exercise and eating habits?
• Is there anything about my physical health that I’d like to change?

MENTAL:  Another often-overlooked aspect is the development of our minds. In order for us to stay sharp and be a lifelong learners, we need to be challenged. Here are some questions we can ask to see if we are developing mentally:

• What have I been learning lately?
• How am I applying what I are learning?
• What magazines, books, or websites do I read or access?
• What thoughts have been dominating my mind? Are they drawing me closer to God? Are they pulling me away from him?

SPIRITUAL:   It is also imperative that we discover and act on whatever it is that helps us grow deeper in our relationship with Jesus. Here are some questions we can ask to see how we are developing spiritually:

• How would I describe my relationship with Christ right now?
• What does it look like when I am feeling closely connected to God?
• Which spiritual disciplines seem to help me draw closer to Jesus? Prayer? Journaling? Worship? Solitude?
• Who is holding me accountable to practicing these disciplines?
• What has God been saying to me lately through his Word? The Holy Spirit? Other Christ followers? Prayer?

The longer I am in leadership the more I am convinced that the most important leadership we can offer is self-leadership.  Use this tool everyday and lead yourself!

This article was first published on December 15, 2011 at daveferguson.org and is used by permission.

By Dr. Russell Moore

The Christian response to immigrant communities in the United States cannot be “You kids get off of my lawn” in Spanish. While evangelicals, like other Americans, might disagree on the political specifics of achieving a just and compassionate immigration policy, our rhetoric must be informed by more than politics, but instead by gospel and mission.

I’m amazed when I hear evangelical Christians speak of undocumented immigrants in this country with disdain as “those people” who are “draining our health care and welfare resources.” It’s horrifying to hear those identified with the gospel speak, whatever their position on the issues, with mean-spirited disdain for the immigrants themselves.

This is a gospel issue. First of all, our Lord Jesus himself was a so-called “illegal immigrant.” Fleeing, like many of those in our country right now, a brutal political situation, our Lord’s parents sojourned with him in Egypt (Matt. 2:113-23). Jesus, who lived out his life for us, spent his childhood years in a foreign land away from his relatives among people speaking a different language with strange customs.

In so doing, our Lord Jesus was re-living the life of Israel, our ancestors in the faith, who were also immigrants and sojourners in Egypt (Exod. 1:1-14; 1 Chron. 16:19; Acts 7:6). It is this reality, the Bible tells us, that is to ground our response to those who sojourn among us (Exod. 22:21; Ps. 94:6; Jer.7:6; Ezek. 22:29; Zech. 7:10). God, the Bible says, “executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing. Love the sojourner, therefore, for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt” (Deut. 10:18-19).

This is much more than a “political” issue, abstracted from our salvation. Jesus tells us that our response to the most vulnerable among us is a response to Jesus Himself (Matt. 25:40). God will judge those who exploit workers and mistreat the poor. No matter how invisible they seem to us now, God hears (Isa. 3:15; Amos 4:1; Jas.5:4).

This is also a question of our mission. There are upwards of 12 million undocumented immigrants in this country right now, and many more in the Latino community who came here legally. If our response to them is to absorb the nativism and bigotry of some elements of society around us, we are showing them a vision of what the Bible calls “the flesh” rather than the Spirit. If our churches ignore the nations around us who are living in our own communities, we will reflect 1970s Bible Belt America rather than the kingdom of God which is made up of those from every tribe, tongue, nation, and language (Rev. 7:9).

It is easy to lash out at undocumented immigrants as “law-breakers,” and to cite Romans 13 as reason to simply call for deportation and retribution. But this issue is far more complicated than that. Yes, undocumented immigrants are violating the law, but, first of all, most of them are doing so in order to provide a future for their families in flight from awful situations back home. Many of them are children (as our Lord Jesus was at the time of his immigration).

And, even given our nation’s Romans 13 responsibility to maintain secure borders, the message our nation sends to those across our borders isn’t clear and univocal. As Southern Baptist leader Richard Land puts it, there are two metaphorical signs on our border: “Keep out” and “Help wanted.”

This isn’t to say that there aren’t real political challenges here. I agree that the border should be secured. I support holding businesses accountable for hiring, especially since some of them use the threat of deportation as a way of exploiting these vulnerable workers. I support a realistic means of providing a way to legal status for the millions of immigrants already here. But there are many who disagree with me, and for valid reasons.

The larger issue is in how we talk about this issue, recognizing that this is not about “issues” or “culture wars” but about persons made in the image of God. Our churches must be the presence of Christ to all persons, regardless of country of origin or legal status. We need to stand against bigotry and harassment and exploitation, even when it’s politically profitable for those who stand with us on other issues.

And, most importantly, we must love our brothers and sisters in the immigrant communities. We must be the presence of Christ to and among them, even as we receive ministry from them. Our commitment to a multinational kingdom of God’s reconciliation in Christ must be evident in the verbal witness of our gospel and in the visible makeup of our congregations.

Immigration isn’t just an issue. It’s an opportunity to see that, as important as the United States of America is, there will be a day when the United States of America will no longer exist. And on that day, the sons and daughters of God will stand before the throne of a former undocumented immigrant. Some of them are migrant workers and hotel maids now. They will be kings and queens then. They are our brothers and sisters forever.

We might be natural-born Americans, but we’re all immigrants to the kingdom of God (Eph. 2:12-14). Whatever our disagreements on immigration as policy, we must not disagree on immigrants as persons. Our message to them, in every language and to every person, must be “Whosoever will may come.”

<<<<>>>>

Russell Moore is the Dean of the School of Theology and Senior Vice-President for Academic Administration at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. This article is reprinted by permission from his blog.

We welcome Ed Stetzer to Eagles In Leadership with his poignant guest column today. Ed first posted this blog Monday December 21, 2009 at his blog and he has graciously allowed us to reprint it here.

Ed Stetzer is LifeWay’s director of LifeWay Research and missiologist in residence. Before coming to LifeWay in June 2007, Stetzer served as the senior director of the Center for Missional Research at the North American Mission Board (NAMB) for nearly nine years.

Stetzer holds a doctor of philosophy degree from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and a doctor of ministry degree from Beeson Divinity School, as well as two master’s degrees and a bachelor’s degree. He has planted churches, served as a pastor and helped revitalize churches in four states.

The author of multiple books for B&H Publishing Group including Breaking the Missional Code, Comeback Churches: How 300 Churches Turned Around and How Yours Can Too, and Lost and Found: The Younger Unchurched and the Churches that Reach Them, Stetzer is recognized as an authority on evangelism and church planting.

He and his wife, Donna, have three children.

Stetzer holds a doctor of philosophy degree from The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and a doctor of ministry degree from Beeson Divinity School, as well as two master’s degrees and a bachelor’s degree. He has planted churches, served as a pastor and helped revitalize churches in four states.

The author of multiple books for B&H Publishing Group including Breaking the Missional Code, Comeback Churches: How 300 Churches Turned Around and How Yours Can Too, and Lost and Found: The Younger Unchurched and the Churches that Reach Them, Stetzer is recognized as an authority on evangelism and church planting.

He and his wife, Donna, have three children.

Barna’s End of Year Review

Posted on December 21, 2009 at 7:44 AM

Editor’s Note: Our friend Dave Ferguson has kindly agreed to share some of his insights into the expanding ‘New Thing’ ministry. We know the lessons he has learned will help many of us as we prepare for a new year of ministry. Thanks Dave for the article!

by Dave Ferguson, Lead Pastor – Community Christian Church / Movement Leader – NewThing

www.daveferguson.org
www.newthing.org
www.communitychristian.org

It was ten years ago that Community Christian Church started a new campus for the first time. Since that time we have started a total of nine campuses and have seen our weekly outreach has grow from 700 in one location to 5000+ in nine locations. It was five years ago that Community planted our first new church and went on to form the NewThing Network. Since that time our networks outreach has grown from 2500 in one church to more than 13,000 in 21 churches in three networks. During the last decade our passion has been about starting new things – new campuses and new churches. And during the last decade we have learned some lessons about starting new things.

1. VISION LESSON: The “God-Thing” Often Comes before the VISION

If you would’ve asked me a few years back how change is initiated, I would have said it starts with vision! I would have said it starts with a compelling vision from a gifted leader. And while that is true … it’s not the whole truth in my experience. I didn’t really have the vision for being a multi-site church. God did! It was a God thing! I will often get the credit for being a visionary leader, but what is closer to the truth is this: God did something extraordinary and I share what God has done with the rest of the church as the vision … and they follow. And when you are able to share where God is at work … that is always a compelling vision that people want to follow!

2. STRATEGY LESSON: Should Fit On A Napkin.

If it can’t be explained on a napkin it is too complicated. Make sure everything from your slogan, to your process for disciple-making to how you will create a movement can be explained on a napkin. Many leaders never have a following because the vision and strategy can not be explained simply. If it is simple and reproducible you can mobilize the masses.

3. FINANCE LESSON: Money Always Follows Vision

People give money to a compelling cause with a clear vision. When economic times are hard leaders are tempted to reduce the budget and the shrink their vision. When economic times are hard that is when you need to increase the vision and the money will follow. Never forget – God is always at work and vision is free!

4. INNOVATION LESSON: Lead With A “Yes” And Ask “How” Later

If you want to lead in bringing about innovation, you must learn to lead with a “yes” and not a “how”. When others approach us with new ideas our first reaction is often “no” or “how”? What people need is affirmation of their dreams and space for them to figure out how to make them really work. People are born with dreams from God and they want to make a difference. What they need most is a leader who will say “yes” when they ask for permission to give it a try.

5. REPRODUCING LESSON: Take Risks on Emerging Leaders.

Resist the urge of telling young leaders to wait a few years; they need and deserve opportunities to lead. You will always have young and emerging leaders who will come to you and want to do a new thing. You can dismiss it or you can bless it. Bless it. What we need to do is take risks on young leaders and give them our blessing.

An Overview Article on
Will Your Congregation Still Exist Ten Years from Now?
Factors That May Impact your Survivability, Vitality, and Vibrancy

By George Bullard
Strategic Leadership Coach with The Columbia Partnership

Voice: 803.622.0923, E-mail:  GBullard@TheColumbiaPartnership.org

Web Site: http://www.TheColumbiaPartnership.org

Editor’s Note: We welcome George Bullard to EaglesInLeadership.org today. If you find this article of help, we encourage you to check out more at his website. We believe this article will be a great help to church leaders.

North America has at least 350,000 congregations. Best estimates indicate one percent of these congregations close each year. In ten years 35,000 congregations will no longer exist. Will your congregation be one of them?

What is the survivability quotient of your congregation?

Congregations die for various reasons. It is not just from old age and the lack of attendance and resources; although these may be the biggest contributors to the closure of congregations. A certain number of new congregations fail to thrive. Some die within the first two years, while others survive for six to ten years before they are declared unsuccessful. Merger is a choice in some situations. When two or three congregations merge there are one or two fewer congregations.

What if we were to expand the definition of exist? What if it included not only those congregations who are no longer alive, but also those congregations who lose their vitality? Congregational vitality is the capacity to create and sustain meaningful Christ-centered, faith-based existence that focuses more on being on mission than on maintenance. How many congregations lack vitality? A bunch! Coming up with an actual number is impossible. It must be determined one congregation at a time.

Many congregations struggle with vitality. Rather than being clear about their mission, purpose, values, and vision, they are stuck on the ritual habits or patterns of doing church. They act like cultural enclaves or hospice ministries. While the quality of what they do may be acceptable, the vast majority of their decisions and actions are based on their past to present culture and rather than a sense of the new thing God is doing in their midst.

What is the vitality quotient of your congregation?

Dare we expand the definition of exist one more dimension? What if it included not only those congregations who are no longer alive or who lose their vitality, but also those congregations who lose their vibrancy? Congregational vibrancy exists when a congregation expresses obvious passion around its vision for a future that captivates its spiritual imagination. This vision energizes the disciplemaking processes and missional actions of these congregations. They know who they are under God, where God is leading them, and they are intentionally moving in the direction of their current spiritual discernment.

Congregations who lack vibrancy begin to age as organisms and in the demographics of the people who attend. While they are a long way from closing their doors, they are on the side of the congregational life cycle that leads to non-existence. Any congregation more than 20 or so years old is always ten years or less away from losing their vibrancy. How many congregations is this? It is all congregations who are at least a generation old.

Deep transition and change is necessary each decade for congregations to retain their vibrancy. Too many congregations assume the way they operated during their first generation of life will sustain them forever. Too many congregations assume if they transform after their first generation of life the new focus will sustain forever. Too many congregations are wrong about this.

What is the vibrancy quotient of your congregation?

Survivability, vitality, and vibrancy quotients are crucial for congregations. Vision, leadership, intentionality, expectations, tenure and age of members and regular attendees, generosity, worship, conflict capacity, balance of financial allocations, condition of facilities, and the ability of management systems to empower rather than control, all impact these quotients.

Current efforts focus on 25 factors and suggest three dimensions for each factor. One dimension leads to closure for the congregation, one represents a lack of vitality, and one is the evidence of vibrancy.

For example, no apparent clarity on values leads to closure, fuzzy core values leads to a loss of vitality, and clear core values lead to vibrancy. However, no one factor decides. It is the synthesis of multiple factors.

Wonder where your congregation is on these 25 factors? Wonder what your survivability, vitality, and vibrancy quotients might be? You can see the 25 factors at http://www.BullardJournal.org and then make contact for dialogue at GBullard@TheColumbiaPartnership.org.

[George Bullard is a Ministry Partner and the Strategic Coordinator for The Columbia Partnership at http://www.TheColumbiaPartnership.org. He has been consulting with and coaching congregations and denominations for 35 years.]

Editor’s Note: We are pleased to post this thought-provoking and insightful article from our new friend, Mike Halleen. If you enjoy this, we encourage you to check out Mike’s book. Thank you Mike for permission to reprint!

FIRST AT THE ROYAL BLUE
By Dr. Michael A. Halleen

“If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all.” (Mark 9:35)

I led a group of travelers into the breakfast room of a large, old-style hotel in Moscow in the days when the city was just opening to westerners.  The room was a sea of classic linen.  Sunlight filtered through sheer curtains on tall windows, creating a movie-set atmosphere.  Not a single table was occupied.  Four waiters sat smoking in the waiters’ room near the entrance and looked at us with surly glances that said not welcome.  One of them swept his arm across our view of the tables and said, “No room.”  They had no desire to be disturbed.  A sizeable gratuity changed their minds, and we enjoyed a modest breakfast in a grand setting, assisted by a man for whom serving us was clearly a burden.

Michelle waited on tables at Royal Blue, an all-purpose diner where I used to have an occasional breakfast.  A single mother, she worked the early morning shift seven days a week, needing extra hours to provide for herself and her daughter.  Michelle was casual, friendly and efficient, gliding among the tables, coffee pot in hand, always welcoming, always welcome – even at the back table where the stern-looking owner and his cronies gathered daily to pass the morning hours.

One morning a group of women circled a table at the front of the restaurant.  The conversation was loud and lively, much of it concerning the quality of service these days.  There were comments to Michelle about the length of time it took to get the order straight and where was the busboy with more water and wasn’t this the table where we found chewing gum stuck last week.  Michelle saw that I had been overhearing and raised her eyebrows with a grin as she passed me on her way to the kitchen.  ”Customer’s always right, ya know,” she said.

Michelle knew it wasn’t so.  The customer is not right to presume superiority over one who serves.  There are no distinctions of class – only of character.  Example is leadership, and by keeping her cool while others were losing theirs, Michelle became their leader, worthy of honor.  Neither is the customer right to think the power to purchase implies a right to be arrogant, impatient or sarcastic.  Michelle’s ability to maintain poise – and even a smile – put her first in line.

I left a larger than usual tip that day.  Michelle had reminded me of the value of serving others with a willing heart

-  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -  -

You can contact Mike at mhalleen@att.net to be added to his weekly devotional email list, “Monday Moments.”

Also check out Mike’s book “You Are Rich: Discovering Faith in Everyday Moments”:
http://snipurl.com/mHalleen (Amazon info)

Copyright 2009 Dr. Michael A. Halleen. Permission is granted to send this to others, with attribution, but not for commercial purposes.

I have been on twitter for less than a year, but it has already changed my life.

Twitter is less than two years old, with fewer than fifty employees and, as far as anyone can tell, no business plan. It has grown so fast that the site is rickety and unreliable, with the “fail whale” icon showing up all too frequently (a sign that the volume of tweets has overwhelmed the site’s ability to keep up). When you’re using twitter you get same feeling our ancestors must have when they turned the crank of the model-T.

But I can’t imagine life without twitter. A case can be made for twitter on the basis of twitter’s role in the communications revolution (this would lead me to defend tweets during worship), or in political revolutions taking place around the world (Iran, for example). But I want to make a more personal case: Twitter makes me a better Jesus disciple, partly because twitter is my laboratory for future ministry. Here’s why.

1) Followership

Twitter only knows two categories: who are you following, and who are your followers. Twitter’s categorical imperative is one of followership, not leadership.

Jesus’ category is “leader.” My fundamental category is “follower.” Even when Jesus calls me up to the front of the line, I still lead “from behind.” For the last fifty years the church has made a fetish of a word that is hard to find even once in the New Testament (“leader”) and has ignored a word that is found hundreds of times (“mathetes” or “follower,” “disciple”). Twitter is a daily reminder that everything doesn’t rise and fall on leadership but on followership—-who am I following, and who is following me. The name “Christian” (“little Christ”) was given to believers in Antioch (Acts 11:26) because people saw in them the Christ they followed.

Paul said “follow me as I follow Christ.” In twitter’s ethic of followership, I am constantly reframing reality in ways that are more Jesus—more grace-full, more forgiving, more loving, more humorous—-and helping my “followers” to better follow Christ. I am constantly on the prowl for things that could encourage, enrich, inspire. I want my tweeps either to smile after reading one of my tweets, or to shake their head and sing, “What a Tweep We Have in Jesus.” In my ongoing battle with self-transcendence over self-absorption, twitter has helped me become more others-focused.

For the One who taught us to be “in” the world but not “of” the world (or “out of it” either), the question is not “Would Jesus Tweet?” but “What Would Jesus Tweet?” The twitter question of “What are you doing?” has been replaced in my mind with “What is God doing?” and “Where do I see Jesus?” and “What am I paying attention to?”

With a new list of followers every day, and an unlimited number of potential followers, I am also reminded daily that the most important people in my life I haven’t met yet.

2) Sound Bytes that Bite

If you can’t say it in everyday words, you probably don’t understand it yourself. And if you can’t say it in less than 140 characters, you can’t say it in a way that can connect with a Google world. The first task of a missionary is to learn the language. In a Google world there is no logos without logo.

In spite of all the warnings about trading in caricature and cliche, most of history’s greatest books and thinkers have distilled their thoughts into a 140 character tweet. In fact, the single killer sentence is what has changed the world.

No one was better at tweets than Jesus. Jesus was a master at sound bytes that bite with terseness and immediacy. In fact, he was always twittering the gospel in pithy, memorable phrases, and even expressed his gospel in The Great Tweet: “Love one another as I have loved you.” I suspect his followers would be well advised to RT (ReTweet) everything he said.

3) Surface

To say that someone is bubbling in or around the surface of a subject is not to say something nice. This is the greatest critique of twitter: its numbing, crushing banality. Do I really need to know when you finished brushing your teeth this morning? Or what toothpaste you used? Do I really need to see a picture of your kid in the hospital with a fork through his nose with the tweet “What happens when you run holding a fork straight up?”

But life is not just about the depths. Life is also about the surfaces. I spend large parts of my life with academics who spend their careers exploring the depths. Many seldom come up. You come up for the air of communication and relationship, and when you spend all your time in the depths you find yourself talking only to yourself. People with highly sensitive seismographs for souls, like writers and artists, often rail against the shallowness of living and refuse to compromise and play in the spray. That’s my theory for the high incidence of suicidal behavior if not suicide among artists and poets.

We need a theology of the surface in tandem with our theology of the depths. As Alice in Wonderland reminds us: “All this digging deep I dislike because if you dig deep all you dig is a pit into which you may fall yourself, or a well at the bottom of which there is nothing but treacle.”1 So far from the surface replacing the depths, in looking for something to tweet about, I find myself paying attention to life in heightened ways. With twitter every day is an awakening to things that never would have registered before. Twitter gives me openings in which to dive into newly discovered depths.

Life is a bunch of little things. These little things add up, and twitter reminds me to be grateful for the little things and to celebrate the little and the simple. In my list of “50 Reasons Why I Love Twitter,” Reason #33 is “A place where serious people can think serious thoughts about trivial things.” Terry Tempest Williams, in her book Finding Beauty in a Broken World (2008) says: “I used to believe that truth was found only below the surface of things. . . But something changed. . . I am interested now in what my eyes can see, what my fingers can touch.”2

A good beer is a subtle symmetry between froth and substance. A good life is a dance of depth and surface.

One of the highest compliments you can pay me? “Sweet, you do shallow well.”

4) Global Commons

This was the reason that initially convinced me to enter the twitterverse. Social media guru Aaron Linne challenged me to think of twitter like a medieval village green. If we were living a millennium ago, our lives would revolve around a village commons. In the course of a day, we would physically pass each other many times and exchange greetings: “How was your lunch?” “Who you working for now?” “What is in your hands?” Wireless technology enables those multiplicity of personal exchanges to take place today, except now it’s with people from around the world. Twitter is the new global commons.

Like soothsayers reading entrails, I conduct twea-leaf readings. Twitter both connects me to others and to what’s hot, what’s current, what’s the reigning gossip and styles of this new global village. There is nothing sadder than Young Turks turned into Old Geezers. And it can happen overnight. In fact, I like to think of myself as the “pastor” of this twitter parish. In the course of a day’s passings (“postings”) on the village commons, I try to find ways to encourage my “parishioners” (Barnabas blasts, I call them), and be a positive, healing energy in their lives.

The question social media poses is one easily answered: are the residents of your global commons reflective of our global community? Or are they only mirrors of yourself? How many people of different races, classes, continents, and religions are part of your social universe?

5) Social Solitude

I’m a hermit at heart. Twitter is made for hermits. It enables me to shut myself off without shutting anything or anybody out. It enables me to simultaneously give myself away and never stop hiding. You might call the twitterscape one of social solitude.

My life is like a barbell: lots of weight on the social end, and lots of weight on solitude end with not much in between other than the handle (read long lines at airports) that connects the socialness with the solitude. Twitter now let’s me do my solitude in society; it let’s me be anonymous in groups.

These 5 reasons may explain why of all the social media (MySpace, Facebook, etc.), twitterers are the most religious.3 But for me, these are the 5 Ways Twitter Has Changed My Life and made me into a better follower of Jesus.

© 2009 by Leonard Sweet

1. Alice in Wonderland
2.  As cited by Tom Wylie in The Bloomsbury Review, January/February 2009
3.  Beth Snyder Bulik, “What Your Favorite Social Net Says about You,” Advertising Age, 13 July 2009, 6.

Dr. Leonard Sweet is the E. Stanley Jones Professor of Evangelism at Drew University, and a Distinguished Visiting Professor at George Fox University. Voted one of the “50 Most Influential Christians in America,” Dr. Sweet is the author of more than one hundred articles, over six hundred published sermons, and a wide array of books including The Gospel According to Starbucks (WaterBrook) and So Beautiful: Divine Design for Life and the Church (David C. Cook). twitter:  lensweet facebook:  lensweet www.sermons.com www.leonardsweet.com