Deliberate Simplicity

Uprising

2011-12-28T15:35:00.001-08:00

You might call 2011 the "year of the uprising." It's been a year of riots and social unrest. All around the world we've seen people take to the streets in protest. There has been the "Arab spring" in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. In England a March on a police station led to a night of arson and destruction. In Athens over 100,000 revolted against pay and pension cuts. Millions protested in 80-plus countries during the Global Day or Rage.

While social media has been credited with facilitating these spontaneous combustions of protest, Twitter has ended up only being the paper on which the invitation was written. Researchers have identified two much more powerful, psychic contributors that actually provide the energy for large numbers of people to get off the couch and have their voice heard, at the risk of embarrassment, arrest or even death.

Clifford Stott, senior lecturer in social psychology at the University of Liverpool, has spent 20 years researching the dynamics of crowd violence, mainly among soccer fans. "Stott boils down the violent potential of a crowd to two basic factors. The first is what he calls legitimacy - the extent to which the crowd feels that the police and the whole social order still deserve to be obeyed. In combustible situations, the shared identity of a crowd is really about legitimacy, since individuals usually start out with different attitudes toward the police and then are steered toward greater unanimity by what they see and hear...The second factor in crowd violence, in Stott's view, is simply what he calls power: the perception within a crowd that it has the ability to do what it wants, to take to the streets without fear..." (Bill Wasik, Crowd Control, Wired, January 2012)

The transferability of these concepts to the Christian movement is obvious. The two co-conspirators to uprisings are 1) legitimacy, and 2) power. To see large numbers of people respond, the participants must be convinced that the cause is legitimate (worthy) and that they have sufficient power to do something about it.

For those of us who want to see Christianity spread like a plague, from life to life, home to home, and village to village, the insights are compelling. For Christianity to become a Great Awakening, participants must be imbued with the legitimacy of Christ's kingdom, and the feeling they have the power necessary to carry it forth. Of course, Christ is THE source of all legitimacy and power. In the commissioning passages (Matthew 28:19,20 and Acts 1:8), Christ even spoke of "authority" and "power." He was letting us know that we have everything we need to spark a movement.

The secular uprisings of 2011 may signal a deepening longing for people to be a part of something bigger than themselves, something world-changing. As Jesus described in Matthew 9, the people are "harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd." If the church of Jesus Christ can rise up in His legitimacy and power, 2012 may be a year when we see "a prevailing, multi-location church emerge that will transform the spiritual landscape." The harvest is great. Pray.

Surprise

2011-11-23T11:30:00.000-08:00

There have been many retrospectives on the life and times of Steve Jobs. The impact on society of Steve, and his company, Apple, has been significant. He transformed several entire industries: computing, desktop publishing, music, phones, tablets. He even made the commercial the best part of the Super Bowl, with his blockbuster ad in 1984. Really, Steve had different ideas about how we communicate. He took the value of simplicity to extremes, even in his annual lectures to the Apple faithful. It is here where those of us who are on stage (as teachers of musicians), can learn something. Listen to Penn Jillette, a master magician and a transformative communicator in his own right, reminisce about what he saw in Steve. In this article from Wired magazine (December, 2011) you might find some ideas to help you be a masterful, surprising teacher, like Steve, Penn, or better yet, like Jesus.

"Steve Jobs is famous for his keynotes. And of course he was wonderful when he unveiled the iCloud and the iPad2 earlier this year. But by then, he was already 'Steve Jobs.' At some point, when the Rolling Stones walk onstage, people cheer. But in 1984, he still had to earn it. And he did it with pure showbiz.

"Even then, in that first keynote when he introduced the Mac, Steve Jobs knew the importance of keeping secrets and the element of surprise. Everybody thinks they outgrow that. The file industry has decided that surprise doesn't matter at all - they'll show you the "Luke, I'm your father" moment in the trailer. But as a magician, I think about the use of secrets and surprise all the time. It's astonishing how well they work. What I find so fascinating in that, while Jobs was sophisticated and the ideas he was selling were deeply intellectual, he was using tactics that play right into our monkey brains.

"He structured this announcement so well. He's got something in a bag. And the word bag is funny, it's humble. It is also not a cliche'. Box would have been cliche'. Holding it in my hand would have been a cliche'. But bag makes it so personal and honest and childlike. And then he takes the computer out of the bag and it speaks - and it refers to Jobs as its father, which anthropomorphizes it and makes it cute and gentle.

"If you gave that routine to any other CEO, they would say, "I need 30 more jokes in there." But Jobs had the confidence not to do that. When (Penn's partner) Tell and I first played off-Broadway, it was wonderful to go onstage and start our show kind of slowly and easily, knowing that in 50 minutes the audience was going to like us. And Jobs was the same way that day in 1984. He didn't come in clapping his hands and going, 'Whoa whoa whoa, have we got something for you!' He knew that the way to do it is nice and easy and slow.

"Dai Vernon, who revolutionized magic in the 20th Century, said that onstage, movements should be natural. That's something that very few people in magic understand and very few public speakers understand. But Jobs followed that completely. There's nothing about the way he moves that you wouldn't do in a living room. Watch the way he pulls the disk out of his pocket and slides it into the front of the Mac. It's not too slight. He slides it in like bread into a toaster.

"So: He didn't do too much buildup. He let the surprise sell itself. He did just a few jokes and did them very well. And then he got...off the stage. You could structure a 15-minute magic show exactly the same way."

...Or a 30-minute sermon.

Seasons

2011-10-20T12:58:00.001-07:00

We sing, “Your holy presence, surrounding me, in every season, I know you love me.” I reflected on these seasons during a personal retreat, and felt led to share what I wrote:

Lord, thank you for the seasons in which you have been with me.

Childhood – You were the God I admired – the God of all the Bible stories I loved so much. You were also the love in the eyes of the people who taught me those stories. I believe. It all makes sense to me, actually. The God who made the water can walk on it. What’s the big deal? Why doesn't everyone believe this?

Youth – You were the God who called me. You spoke to me personally and powerfully. Am I nuts for hearing voices? No, I’m privileged. I loved listening to you. There is nothing on earth that matters more than getting in touch with heaven. (By the way, Lord. I want to do this with you again? Will you do this with me again? I thought maybe not, but now I think so.)

College – You were the God who burned in me. You gave me a love for your church. It is actually not my love for your church, it is your love for your church. Why does the church have to hurt people? Why does it have to be leaderless? Why does it have to be so ineffective? Do I have stuff in me to make a difference? Is that why you’ve called me? Is that why you have created me?

Young Adulthood – the church is more messed up than I thought. So am I, actually, though I won’t realize that until you break me down. I’m a shepherd, but I’m also a sheep. And you break the legs of stray sheep. Severe mercy. It hurts big-time, but in a way that lets me know I’m loved, not hated.

Middle Adulthood – You were the God who walks with me. Even though I walk with a limp, I still occasionally try to get out in front of you. It’s amazing. Prone to wander, Lord I feel it. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You occasionally hook me back in. You don’t allow me to get too far away. I remember my brokenness, and I revel in your attentive, amazing grace. Our relationship is complicated, but simple. As long as I stay connected to the vine, there’s fruit. Apart from you, I can do nothing. You allow me to see what you can do, and it is WAY more than anything I thought or imagined. Thank you for the front row seat.

Now – You are the God who is moving in me. Just when I thought I had you figured out, you moved. I was about to press the cruise control button, and you decided to go off-road driving. Wow, God. I need a three-point harness. Am I too old for this? I guess not, if you don’t think so. You are wild. I feel your Spirit on me. You are doing things I can’t explain. You are showing up in places I didn’t expect. And that angel standing behind me that one Sunday? I just wanted you to know I noticed. I’m excited about where this is heading, even though I don’t know where this is heading. Father Abraham had many sons, and I am one of them. I feel content in not figuring it out. I’m getting comfortable with my uncomfortability. Now, will you make the supernatural natural, and the extraordinary ordinary?

Words

2011-09-21T15:58:00.000-07:00

The tongue has the power of life and death (Proverbs 18:21). You may have experienced this power before in your own life. When someone says something negative to you, you can feel yourself wilt inside, as your spirit starts to die. On the other, when someone shares beautiful, encouraging words to you your spirit blossoms like a flower. Words are vehicles that take people places; toward life, or toward death.

A friend was telling me about how when he was a kid, his mom said in his presence, “I wish I had had an abortion.” That is a destructive statement that rings in his ears to this day. On the other hand, one person’s proclamation, positively, can have great influence too. This is where Jesus comes in. In John 1, when Jesus was calling out his disciples he found Simon. Simon was a "ready, fire, aim" sort of guy. But when Jesus called him out, He changed his name to Peter, which mean "rock." I wonder if anyone had ever believed in Peter like that, and said something that life-giving.

There are five ways we can take people toward life with our words:

1. Words of affirmation…about who they are (Antidote to: Insecurity). Insecurity is a big issue. There are a lot of negative messages out there, but none louder than the voices in our head. We need to find our identity in who we are in Christ. We also need to have that identity reinforced through the affirmations of others. When Kristyn and I were newly married and living in Tacoma. I was managing an apartment complex, working at a sporting goods store, going to seminary and serving in the church. Kristyn was in her first teaching assignment, fresh out of college. We were "out on our own" feeling very insecure, and a bit scared at times. But there was an older lady, Marie Robinson, who took a special interest in us. She always built us up, "You guys are doing so great! You are going to be just fine." She gave us a "warm fuzzy" every time we saw her. Years later, when our second daughter was born, we named her Jenna Marie.

2. Words of hope…about where they are going (Antidote to: Despair). On the fourth of July, 1952, Florence Chadwick, who was 34, set out to be the first woman to swim from Catalina Island to the mainland of California. She was the first woman to swim the English Channel. She set out with support boats on either side of her, with guns to protect her from sharks. She swam for nearly sixteen hours against rough water. About a half mile from shore she hit a solid wall of fog. Suddenly she wanted to stop. Her mother and trainer urged her not to quit, telling her how close she was. But she asked to be taken out of the water. Still thawing her chilled body several hours later, she told a reporter, "Look, I'm not excusing myself, but if I could have seen land I might have made it." It was not fatigue or cold or sharks that defeated her. It was the fog. She was unable to see her goal. One of the ways we can use our tongues in a life-giving way it to point out the end in mind.

3. Words of encouragement…that they can get there (Antidote to: Disappointment). People can know that God loves them and that he has a plan for them, and yet they can become disappointed in their progress. One day our son Daron came home from preschool with a handout, “Ways to make sure your child hates reading.” It was tongue in cheek, but it described how we as parents could point out his every mistake, become frustrated when he isn't "getting it," etc. On the other hand, we could celebrate every time he got a word right, and our child might like that better. In other words we have a part to play in how well they make it. One of the best lines from the cowboy song "Home on the Range" is "where seldom is heard a discouraging word." Don't you want your home to be like that? For Christians, and particularly for Christian leaders, there should seldom be a discouraging word (Ephesians 4:29).

4. Words of edification…that they will get there (Antidote to: Fear). People need built up. One of the reasons we don’t build up others as we should is that we don’t think about it. Our mouths are running, but our minds are disengaged. This section from an Al-Anon devotional is particularly salient: "There was a time when if a thought entered my mind, it would automatically come out of my mouth. Even if I wasn’t sure that what I was saying was true, the words poured out of me. I have learned to “Think” before I speak. When I’m tempted to respond to angry accusations with accusations of my own, I stop and “Think.” When I have an urge to betray a confidence, to gossip, or to tell something extremely personal to a total stranger, I stop and “Think.” And when my opinion about another person’s business has not been requested, I take the time to “Think” before I get involved. That way I make a conscious choice about how I will respond. Perhaps I will decide to say nothing, or choose a more tactful way to proceed, or question whether I really mean what I have been thinking. I may decide that this is not an appropriate place to discuss what is on my mind. Or I may choose to go right ahead and speak up in a very direct manner. Regardless of which option I select, today I am willing to accept the consequences of my actions because I have taken the time to make a choice."

5. Words of trust…that God wlll get them there (Antidote to: Doubt). God has called us to a life of faith. But sometimes we get shaky. So we need each other (Hebrews 10:25). Sometimes people need to borrow your faith. Sometimes you may need to borrow theirs. We need to band together so that we can be strong with each other, strong for others, and strong against our enemy….Satan.

I've been thinking about Satan lately, especially since the 10th Anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. And it occurred to me that Satan is always a hijacker. He cannot create anything on his own. He can only take the beautiful things that have been created and try to use them for a destructive purpose. He wants to hijack sexuality. He wants to hijack your appetites. And he wants to hijack your life...your mind, your tongue. You have life-giving power, but only if you will keep your tongue under the command of the Holy Spirit.

Educationalism

2011-09-16T21:01:00.000-07:00

Some churches are more like schools, than churches. They have teachers, classes, and textbooks. The people come "to learn." The pastor is hired "to teach the Word." It's all very academic. It's not education, a good thing. It's educationalism, a bad thing. It's the pursuit of knowledge for the sake of knowledge. Heads are full of info, but hearts are cold.

In my humble opinion, the gravitation for the church toward "educationalism" has come from two places:

1. The American School System. The Sunday School movement (which was a huge movement in the church a hundred years ago) patterned after the American school system. To a great extent, "discipleship" to this day is often thought to require a text book and a classroom. The American school system is very linear and departmentalized/compartmentalized (age graded, 101, 201, etc.). It is classic modernism from a decidedly Western viewpoint. Jesus' instruction was quite non-linear and holistic. It is from an Eastern, circular, viewpoint. The Hebrew model of education is a more "as you walk along the way" model. However, Jesus also modeled extended teaching times (Matthew 5-7) and Rabbis would often teach for long periods in the synagogue. We have an instance in Acts where a guy fell out the window because the teaching session got so long; obviously we don't want to kill people!

2. The Denominational Seminary. Seminaries are mostly lead by scholars, and what scholars can best model to their students is how to study in depth and teach in depth, not how to lead, evangelize, mentor, pastor or disciple. Greek professors will pound the lectern about how important it is to know Greek, but at times, I've gotten the sense that this point of view is also about their job security. As long as everyone is convinced they need to know the original languages to be a pastor, then students will pay the big bucks for a "seminary education." Lately, however, the secret is starting to get out that this whole business is oversold, and that while the pastor needs to be a student of the Word, he does not need to be a scholar of the Word. In fact, some of the most ineffective pastors are seminary trained, and there may be a bit of cause and effect there. So I like Donald Miller's statement: "The first disciples were not teachers, they were fishermen, tax collectors and at least one was a Zealot. We don't know the occupation of the others, but Jesus did not charge educators with the great commission, he chose laborers. And those laborers took the gospel and created Christian communities that worked, that did things and met in homes and were active."

For myself, I have done the schooling. I've earned the degrees. I have a Bachelor of Arts, a Master of Divinity and have completed coursework for a Doctor of Ministries. I'm not anti-education. But I am anti-educationalism. What we need is knowledge on fire. What we need is knowledge on purpose. We need heads and hearts that are in service to Christ and His kingdom. We need to remember that "teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you" is in service to "go and make disciples."

Oar

2011-09-08T09:15:00.001-07:00

On September 11, 2001, Jimmy Dunne was on the golf course when a tournament official rolled up and suggested he call the office. He tried. There was no answer. When he finally reached a friend, he was told, "You have to come to terms with the fact that most of the people in your firm are dead."

Dunne was a senior executive at Wall Street firm Sandler O'Neill, the "little big firm" that had its headquarters on the 104th floor of Tower 2. On that day 83 people came to work at Sandler, and 66 never went home. Dunne found he was the only surviving executive. Leading this shattered company through its overwhelming losses would prove to be the greatest leadership challenge of his relatively young (44 year old) life. Between that Tuesday and the following Monday (when the stock market opened for business again), Dunne attended countless funerals. He cried his tears and steeled his nerve. The company set up temporary headquarters on West 57th Street.

When he gathered with the survivors the next week he gave them this challenge: "Look, we've been involved in an international incident. It's not something we wanted, it's not something we were prepared for, but the reality is, we're right in the middle of it." He acknowledge that some in the company might want to leave the firm. As for himself, he was going to stay and rebuild. He continued, "Come on in! There's room in the boat. Everybody can get an oar. Now, there are some of you that are doubting. We cannot have you in the boat! We wish you well. But you can't come in the boat. Because if you're in the boat you have to have an oar."

The team signed on. Everybody grabbed an oar and started rowing.

The results have been astonishing.

The firm has grown exponentially in the past ten years to over 340 employees. Spurring their growth: the legacy of those they lost. They decided to take the proceeds of the firm and provide health care for the victims' dependents for the next ten years. As a group they committed to pay 100% of tuition, regardless of merit or need, for all the children of the deceased. Their work matters. The story of Sandler O'Neill is a great illustration of what can be accomplished when a group of people are called to active engagement in pursuit of a greater purpose.

At CTK we say, "Always a Place for You." But when we say this, we don't mean that there's room in the boat. We mean that everybody can get an oar.

Peaks

2011-08-29T10:38:00.001-07:00

One of the tricky "Can God do...?" questions you sometimes hear is, "Can God make two mountain peaks without a valley between them?" This is a question akin to, "Can God make a rock so big that he can't life it?" The answer to this kind of question is "God can do anything that is within his nature to do, and the fact that his nature does not allow contradiction is a positive trait not a negative one." But I digress. The main thing I want to talk about is how valleys come with the peaks.

Growing up in Alaska, I developed a love for Mount McKinley, the tallest mountain in North America. It rises up from the landscape in a daunting way, and can be seen from hundreds of miles around on a clear day. When I went to Colorado for college, I grew to appreciate the Rocky Mountain Range, as well. But, while the Rockies are formidable, experiencing the Rockies is not like experiencing McKinley. The difference? There are so many high peaks in the Rockies, that none stand out on the landscape quite like the solitary McKinley.

This is a subtlety, to be sure. But the artistic servant of Christ realizes that what makes a peak stand out is surrounding landscape, not so tall. If quietness gradually builds to a crescendo, the crashing of the cymbals has great impact. If it's nothing but crashing cymbals from beginning to end? Well, that's called noise. A ten thousand foot mountain rising from sea level seems more impressive than a twelve thousand footer with a base a mile above sea level. I was reminded of the difference between McKinley and the Rockies a few months ago, in a worship service. The worship team, in this particular case, led us in four "epic" songs in a row. By epic, I mean a song that is so significant, and meaning-full, that it rises above. (I'm sure you realize that not all songs are created equal.) I could appreciate the desire the leader had to string several of these large-magnitude songs together. But in a way, by putting them all together, the impact that any one of them could have had was lost. There was no longer a "peak." Everything was on a plane at higher elevation.

How does this apply? In various ways. It applies to the attendance rhythm of the year. If you have a high attendance every week, it won't be a high attendance any more. It will be your low attendance. It applies to personal "ups and downs." You can't always be "on top of it." There will be times when you experience less than "peak performance." It applies to all the ways we "express" ourselves through worship and teaching. I've said this to many pastors through the years, but there is no need for a teacher to "hit a home run" every weekend. I always coach, "Just get the bat on the ball. When you make solid contact, every now and then the ball will go out."

As a servant of Christ, don't become overly discouraged when things are "down." The valley may just be wonderfully setting up the next peak.

Pace

2011-08-25T09:27:00.001-07:00

Had an interesting conversation the other day about the speed at which we sometimes move at CTK. As to their comfortability with the pace of change, the folks in the conversation represented the spectrum of possibilities, from early adopters to laggards. Some were "no go," some were "go slow," others were "go now." Each point of view had its rationale. As leaders in Christ's church, where should we fall on the spectrum? The answer: we should be moving at the pace of the Holy Spirit. In other words, we don't have a predetermined preference for fast or slow, now or later. Our preference is to be in sync with what God is doing, and when. Our desire is to be on His schedule, and sometimes that mean speeding up, and sometimes that means slowing down.

In Galatians 5:25 Paul says we should "keep in step with the Spirit." "With" is the key. We don't want to be arrogant and get in front of the Spirit. Like the early church, sometimes we wait in the upper room until the Holy Spirit arrives and comes upon us in power. We also don't want to be fearful and lag behind. When the pillar of fire and cloud moves, we move. We want to go with Him, beside Him. Truly, walking by faith is a real, lively experience between you and God.

I do think that walking by faith implies motion. There is a predisposition toward motion. It's the Christian walk, not the Christian sit. We are keeping in step, not getting stuck. So stay "in gear" even if your foot is on the brake waiting for the next green light. Like the children of Israel before leaving Egypt, if you are not yet moving, at least be packed and ready to go.

Reasons

2011-06-01T11:44:00.001-07:00

Apple (maker of the iPhone, iPad, etc.) is as secretive, as it is good. But Fortune Magazine recently released an article written by Adam Lashinsky entitled “Inside Apple,” which provides dozens of rare insights into the business and culture at Apple, as well as the mind of its CEO, Steve Jobs.

According to insiders, one parable that Jobs tells quite frequently is entitled “The Difference Between the Janitor and the Vice President.” In the story Jobs talks about his trashcan not being emptied in his office. Jobs approaches the janitor about why this is the case, and the janitor says, “I couldn’t empty it, because they changed the locks, and I could no longer get into your office.” It is a legitimate reason, and Jobs totally understands it. But Jobs goes on to make a distinction. It’s OK for the janitor to make excuses when things go wrong. But those in management don’t get that luxury. “Somewhere between the janitor and the CEO, reasons stop mattering. [That] Rubicon is crossed when you become a Vice President.”

Steve Jobs’ parable is particularly salient for us at CTK, since we are seeking to build a culture of empowerment.

In the CTK story, I would say that the Rubicon of Responsibility is certainly crossed when you become a pastor, or associate pastor…but we will take an entirely new step up as an organization if the Rubicon is passed at the Director level.

Empowerment means giving authority, as well as responsibility to those who need it. But it doesn’t mean authority instead of responsibility. In some ways it means having more responsibility than ever.

Noose

2011-05-13T10:55:00.001-07:00

Eric Metaxas has written a compelling and award-winning biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. On page 209 Metaxas gives the account of a sermon that Bonhoeffer preached from the book of Jeremiah:

"The picture that Bonhoeffer painted of Jeremiah was one of unrelieved gloom and drama. God was after him, and he could not escape. Bonhoeffer referred to the 'arrow of the Almighty' striking down its 'hunted game.' But who was the hunted game? It was Jeremiah! But why was God shooting at the hero of the story? Before they found out, Bonhoeffer switched from arrow imagery to noose imagery. 'The noose is drawn tighter and more painfully,' he continued, 'reminding Jeremiah that he is a prisoner. He is a prisoner and he has to follow. His path is prescribed. It is the path of the man whom God will not let go, who will never be rid of God…' He marched farther downhill: 'This path will lead right down into the deepest situation of human powerlessness. The follower will become a laughingstock, scorned and taken for a fool, but a fool who is extremely dangerous to people’s peace and comfort, so that he or she must be beaten, locked up, tortured, if not put to death right away. That is exactly what became of this man, Jeremiah, because he could not get away from God.'"

Of course, little did Bonhoeffer know when he preached this message that his "path of ministry" would lead to martyrdom at the hands of his countrymen - the Nazi regime. But his words definitely put the "call to ministry" in a different light, don't they? When God "gets" you, He gets you. Paul spoke of being "compelled" and being a "slave to Christ." If you are like me, you maybe sometimes fantasize about what it would be like to not be in ministry, to have a regular 9 to 5. But all ambivalence about where God has us needs to cease and desist immediately. God has us, and that is that.

Coach

2011-03-28T07:57:00.000-07:00

Maybe it's March Madness, but I see a lot of analogies between church and sports, and between pastoring and coaching.

1. Game Plan. Winning teams/churches have a plan. You see teams win with a running game, or win with a passing game. It almost doesn't matter what the plan is. It is far more important that there is one. Do you have a strategy for achieving your mission?

2. Playbook. Winning coaches hand out a play book. Have you put on paper "here's what we're gonna do"?

3. Practice. Winning teams rehearse. What do you need to be rehearsing because it is that important? Greeting? The teaching? Small groups? Perfect practice makes perfect performance.

4. Huddles. In every sport you see interludes during the game where team members put their heads together. These moments are ideal for play calling and encouragement. Are huddles happening in your ministry?

5. White board. Many coaches use a white board, not just to draw up plays, but to list priorities prior to a game. Is it time to white board some points of focus?

6. Yelling. During a game, you can sometimes hear the coach yelling at his players. It's immediate feedback. Have you been good about giving your leaders immediate feedback (perhaps in a soft tone of voice)?

7. Benching. When players mess up frequently (do more harm than good), they are removed from the game. When was the last time you benched someone?

8. Recruiting. Great coaches are always on the lookout for talent. Who was the last winner you recruited to your team?

9. Clear Goals. Teams often have clearly identified goals in mind - to make the playoffs, the win the championship, etc. What is your immediate goal?

10. Coaches. Along with the head coach, there are often assistant coaches who specialize in various aspects of the game. Are you identifying "faithful men" who will be able to teach others also?

11. Captains. On every team there are standout, experienced players. Have you identified them in your ministry?

12. Video. Following the game, the team may get together to review how things went. Some coaches spend hours reviewing film. What is your analysis process and how often does it happen?

13. Responsibility. On great teams, everyone feels responsible for their part - they don't leave it up to a couple stars to make all the plays. What is your level of involvement?

14. High Fives. Winning teams are happy teams, or maybe it's the other way around! How's morale?

15. Roles. Roles are important on a great team. (Seems like Paul might have mentioned this in 1 Corinthians 12.) Have you defined how everyone's contribution goes together?

16. Win. Coaches get all the "players" to get involved and let them know that they are contributing to "the win." What is a "win" in your context?

17. Celebration. As victories are won, winning teams take time to celebrate. Sometimes they will even say for how long ("We're going to enjoy this win today, but tomorrow we're going to be back practicing getting ready for our next opponent."). Are you celebrating along the way?

Anxiety

2011-03-21T11:28:00.000-07:00

Ministry is stressful. Some of the anxiety is good, and some bad. Only God can reveal whether the anxiety is coming from a place of dependence or independence. We see both types of anxiety in scripture.

There was good anxiety for Peter when he was being asked to get out of the boat.

There was bad anxiety for Jonah as he was getting on a boat.

There was good anxiety for Abraham when he was offering his son.

There was bad anxiety for Abraham when he was lying and saying his wife was his sister.

There was good anxiety for Hosea when he was marrying a prostitute.

There was bad anxiety for Judas when he was selling Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.

Times of anxiety are a test for a leader. A critical aspect to figure out is the origin of the anxiety. Is it arising because you are following God (walking by faith), or because you are going your own way?

What

2011-01-29T20:17:00.001-08:00

From time to time, people in your ministry will come up with novel ideas for ministry. "I have a friend who can shape balloons into little puppies. What if we went to the park every Saturday and did balloon art for kids and shared the gospel? Don't you think that would be cool, Pastor?"

Now before you answer that, let me give you a tool that might be helpful: In your response, try to connect their "what" with your "why." Sometimes the ideas that people have (the whats) are a little off of the church's mission (the why). If you don't connect the "whats" with your "why" you will end up with a lot of divergent ministries, going in a lot of different directions. If you can connect the "whats" to the "why" you can end up with a lot of creativity pointed in the same direction.

Taking the illustration of the balloon artist (something I made up...so no offense please), your response could go something like this: "Interesting idea. I've been thinking lately about our mission, and how we want to create an authentic Christian community that reaches out effectively to unchurch people with love, acceptance and forgiveness. Is there a way that you can see your idea expressing authentic Christian community that would reach out with love?" Now we're talking. You've got them thinking about your "why" and how to connect their "what" with it.

I find that some pastors, when outside-the-lines ideas come to them, are a little too quick to say, "No, I don't think that would work here" and miss a very teachable moment; a moment when you can teach them, not what to think, but how to think. And you just might end up with a new balloon ministry that is on mission.

Positivity

2011-01-10T08:27:00.000-08:00

One of the great quotations from the inspirational movie Remember the Titans was “Attitude reflects leadership, captain.” The context is that two football teams from two different high schools (one white and one black) are being merged together. One of the black players is frustrated that white players are not blocking for “Rev,” one of the black running backs. In return, the black players decide to not give their complete effort for the white players. When one of the white captains of the team, Bertier, hears about this, he exclaims, “That’s the worst attitude I’ve ever heard.” To which Big Ju responds, “Attitude reflects leadership, captain.”

As a Christian leader it is incumbent upon us to model positive attitude. There are three kinds of sunny outlooks we can captain. The first is optimism -- the firm belief that things will go well. The second is hope -- the belief that things might or could go well. The third kind of outlook I will call "relentless positivity.” Relentless positivity is not an optimistic belief that things will go well, or could go well. Nor does it involve denying or ignoring bad things that happen. Rather, it is a determination to stay positive, even though one knows already some bad things are going to happen.

In any social enterprise – churches not excluded – there will be challenges (read: disagreements, disappointments, frustrations, misunderstandings, et al). At these setback moments a leader must behave more like a thermostat than a thermometer. But for a Christian leader, the positivity is fueled by a promise from Christ himself: “I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.”

Sweet

2010-12-29T13:27:00.000-08:00

Many money managers diversify. They attempt to spread their risk by placing smaller bets on a broader number of stocks. But that is not what the best money managers do. The best money managers (Bruce Berkowitz, Warren Buffett) have narrow portfolios, maybe 25 stocks in which they are heavily invested. These are stocks in which they really, really invest, and from which they expect big, big returns. Berkshire Hathaway's Charlie Munger: "Why would you want to put money on your 35th-best idea?"

That is a great question for ministries - particularly those that are trying to do too much in too many areas. Why not put more emphasis, resources and talent toward a few things that you have reasonable certainty will pay off? Throughout history CTK has placed more resources into fewer areas - Worship, Community, Outreach - and it has paid off. The challenge, of course, is to keep doing that.

In The Science of Hitting by Ted Williams there is a graphic showing the sections of the strike zone where Williams hit for highest average. For a hitter, certain pitches are more hit-able than others...you might call it the hitter's sweet spot. For a pitcher, you definitely don't want to throw to the batters sweet spot. Part of being a great hitter is being a picky hitter. Not only will the great ones not swing at every pitch, they won't even swing at every strike. They put all their energies into the pitch that they can hit the absolute best. They put the "deliberate" in deliberate simplicity.

Do you need to double-up this year on what will really pay off? Do you need to cease doing some things that, while well-meaning, are essentially drawing resources away from what really needs to be done? Where's your sweet spot?

Private

2010-12-20T18:37:00.000-08:00

To be a person of integrity you must be the same person in private that you are in public. Some are publicly "big" but privately "small." In fact, men and women with great talent to lead others and organizations have found themselves unable to lead themselves.

King Saul was publicly big but privately small. He presented much better than he was. In contrast, David was publicly small (a simple shepherd), but privately big. Like King Saul, Pharaoh was publicly big but privately small. On the other hand, Moses was publicly small - a solitary shepherd on the backside of the desert - but privately big. Not coincidentally, Saul and Pharaoh wanted to be leaders. David, on the other hand, wasn't looking for leadership when it came looking for him, and Moses didn't feel at all qualified. (It is a danger sign when being publicly "big" is more important than being privately big.)

Private success precedes public success. Jesus said, "When you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you" (Matthew 6:6). Your ministry must come out of the overflow of what God is doing in your private life. A branch can only produce fruit out of the excess of the nourishment it needs for its own life (John 15). Psalm 1 says, Blessed is the man who is planted by a stream. If you stay close to God, and close to God’s word, (like a tree) your leaves will be green, there will be lots of fruit for people to see. If you don’t stay close to God (like a tree) you will eventually wither up and die. Cause and effect are separated by time and space.

Why

2010-12-18T22:18:00.000-08:00

Larry King, the suspender-wearing minimalist talk show host, just retired after twenty-five years on television. Larry has interviewed some very notable guests; politicians, celebrities, athletes. But on his last show, the table was turned and King himself was interviewed. The questions were predictable. "What was your favorite interview?" (no straight answer to that one), and "What question did you ask more than any other?" To which King immediately replied, "Why?" When the interviewing then asked, ahem, "Why?" King went on to explain: "Why is the best question for two reasons. First, because the question does not allow for a one-word answer. And second, because it requires the person to actually think."

My twenty-five years of pastoral experience have told me that in the church we don't ask why nearly enough. We love to ask "How?" We gravitate toward "When?" We even like "Where?" But church leaders tend to stay away from "Why?" Why opens up a can of worms sometimes. Why do we worship on Sunday mornings? Why do we meet every week? Why do we teach for thirty minutes? Why do we sing first, then teach? Why do kids ministries happen during the service? Why do we advertise in the newspaper? Why do we use the word "program" instead of "bulletin"? My point is not to supply answers to these questions, but to say they all begin with the right word.

In the coming year maybe we can all resolve to ask deeper, better questions. The next time you get together with your team, if your team doesn't ask you why, ask them. After all, if Larry's gone, somebody needs to wear the suspenders around here!

Super

2010-12-10T15:23:00.001-08:00

There is something in us that wants to be "super." Faster than a speeding bullet. Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Long after we lose our fascination with comic-book characters, we still dream of being extraordinary, and once you are born again, you begin to think about how the Holy Spirit - his giftings, his power - can make your dreams come true.

In 1 Corinthians, Paul was writing to a group of believers who were in search of the "super gift" - the gift that stands apart from other gifts as particularly other-wordly. Was it prophecy? Was it speaking in tongues? Paul gives the answer in chapter 13. The "super gift" - the one that tops all others - is love. Love is, far and away, the greatest spiritual gift. While some gifts are distributed by the Spirit specifically, this one is given generally, to all of God's children. While other gifts are restricted, this gift is always appropriate, in every context. Even if you can speak in the tongue of an angel, you'll find that nothing beats love. And when it beats out faith and hope, you know it is truly "super."

At CTK, love is our (not so) secret weapon. We don't have a lot going for us, other than this. Our people are not particularly charismatic, or bright, or photogenic. We have, however, gotten reasonably good at loving. And it is amazing what doors are opened by love. If, like Clark Kent, we keep stepping into our prayers closets, and keep clothing ourselves with compassion (Colossians 3:12), the church of Jesus Christ will be unstoppable.

Radical

2010-12-03T06:36:00.000-08:00

I finished reading David Platt’s book Radical, while waiting for a flight from New Delhi to Hyderabad, India. The book had been recommended to me by several friends, so I decided to throw it in my bag for my recent tour (training pastors in the Philippines, India, Pakistan, Kenya and South Africa). The book calls us to a much deeper commitment to following Christ, and reaching others – two themes that get my blood going. So thanks to David Platt for stoking the fire. For the most part the book accomplished its mission well.

On the other hand, there were places where Platt got my blood boiling in a not-so-helpful way - a little too radical. In an effort to make his points, I felt that Platt pressed too hard, and stretched the supporting evidence. I would chalk it up to “too much of a good thing.” Here are my (hopefully) gentle critiques:

1. I feel like a radical life for Christ needs to be motivated by radical love for Christ. We need to be givers, but cheerful ones, not from compulsion. I felt there was a little too much compulsion in Platt’s book. I didn’t find much sense of cheer. While I can tell that Platt is on the move from his legalistic up bringing, I get the feeling that he has a way to go. At several points in the book I got the distinct feeling that Platt was preaching at me, instead of to me (maybe before the book went to print he had already received that feedback….he seems to apologize on p. 214). In my opinion there wasn’t nearly enough of “the love Christ compels me” and a little too much of “come on, you guys, you should be ashamed of yourselves!” Granted, we all need a kick in the pants now and then, but there’s a line we can cross where we can “exasperate our children,” particularly if you are a child who wants to do what is right. Count me among the exasperated.

2. Platt tends to overstate things a bit in order to make a point, particularly in his chapter How Much is Enough, critiquing the American dream:

a. “Caring for the poor is one natural overflow and a necessary evidence of the presence of Christ in our hearts. If there is no sign of caring for the poor in our lives, then there is reason to at least question whether Christ is in our hearts.” (p.110)

b. “If our lives do not reflect radical compassion for the poor, there is reason to wonder if Christ is really in us at all.” (p.111)

c. (on the story of Lazarus) “This story illustrates God’s response to the needs of the poor.” (p. 114)

d. “Isn’t the hidden assumption among many Christians in our culture that if we follow God, things will go well for us materially? Such thinking is explicit in “health and wealth” teaching, and it is implicit in the lives of Christians whose use of possessions looks virtually the same as that of our non-Christian neighbors.” (p.117)

For me, these over generalizations tended to lessen, not increase, the impact of his argument.

3. Platt has problems with the American church and I share his pain. But while He diagnoses the disease as largely spiritual, I think it is largely sociological. The church turning in on itself is quite natural – it is what organizations naturally do. By virtue of being organized together, over time, we get to know each other. As we get to know each other we become aware of each others’ concerns. As we become aware of each others’ concerns, we create programs to meet those concerns. In the end, our own concerns end up being plenty to keep us busy, and the mission is largely forgotten. It is purely natural. Of course, God does not call us to natural, but to supernatural. What I see happening in the American church is not unspiritual as related to spiritual, but natural as related to supernatural. I think the hearts of most Christians are well-meaning. I think they are just trapped in a self-reinforcing system where they can’t see beyond our own needs. If nothing else, I can see Platt’s book as a huge favor to get us to look up and see there is far much more beyond ourselves.

4. There is a lot of classic either/or (black/white) thinking in this book. For example, “We can stand with the starving or with the overfed. We can identify with poor Lazarus on his way to heaven or with the rich man on his way to hell. We can embrace Jesus while we give away our wealth, or we can walk away from Jesus while we hoard our wealth.” I’m not sure that those are the only choices. There may be some other combinations or shades of gray, but Platt doesn’t allow for the possibility of being interested in the plight of the rich man, only Lazarus. In response I would cite Jesus’ second great commandment, “love your neighbor as yourself” and his great commission, “go into all the world.” He could has said, “love your poor neighbor as yourself” but Jesus is interested in everyone, rich and poor, Lazarus and rich man. He could have said, “go into all the poor world” but Jesus is broad, not narrow, in his instructions. Jesus told us to go into all the socially and economically diverse world.

5. It would be possible, not popular, to make the argument that the church has spent more of its efforts reaching the poor, than the rich. Perhaps not in America, where the cost of the mega-model draws our attention to the rich suburbs (nearly all of the top churches in America being precisely located). But in other parts of the world, where poverty reigns, the church has done little to target political and business leaders, instead going to the people with the least power, and least ability, to change the system.

6. In some cases possessing great status and wealth may be precisely what God wants for a person’s calling (see Joseph); at other times such wealth and status should be forsaken (see Moses). One size does not fit all. Platt “cherry picks” the passages that fit his argument.

7. Platt tries to make me feel guilty for the price I pay for food, relative to “half the world struggling today to find food, water, and shelter with the same amount of money I spend on french fries for lunch.” This is a superficial argument, and contrasts like this abound in our world. Having just come from the Philippines I could say that they are enjoying much better pineapple than I am where I live, and a fraction of the cost. In India, their transportation costs (per person/per mile) are pennies on the dollar. So? The cost of something in one culture, relative to another, is sexy, not substantive.

8. Culture is water to fish. If you live in it, it’s hard to describe; if you live outside of it, it’s hard to understand. I wonder if the two-thirds world misunderstands America about as much as America misunderstands the two-thirds world, in their actual experience. If so, Platt seems to reinforce these misunderstandings. Many in the two-thirds world live very simple lives, with a daily diet of inexpensive rice and chicken. They do not have electric bills, insurance, health care, automobile repairs, college bills, a mortgage or debt. (Remind me again, who am I supposed to be feeling sorry for?) I guess what I am saying is that Americans are not nearly as “wealthy” as people think. At times, I have to say, when I travel in the two-thirds world, I don’t feel as guilty, as I do jealous. I think they may be rich in ways that matter.

9. I think it is important to make a distinction between struggling and suffering. Platt makes no such distinction, putting the cost of daily living on par with how many children die of malnutrition every year. It seems to me that a believer’s primary concern should be those who are suffering, a smaller subset of those who are struggling, and certainly a much smaller number than “half the world.” Ironically, it is a particularly western point of view to blur the two. As Americans, we don’t like to struggle (I think we think it is suffering), but sometimes we are spiritually richer for it. After all, it is in the Lord’s prayer where we read, “Give us this day our daily bread.” For most people in the world, this prayer actually makes sense, and the people praying it are blessed for doing so.

10. I think Platt’s interpretation of the rich young ruler negatively colors his perspective on wealth throughout the book. I like that story a lot, but I don’t come at it from a money-centric angle. Simply put I don’t think Jesus talked with the man because he was interested in the topic of money. I think he talked with the young man about the topic of money because he was interested in the young man. This was a personal challenge that came out of personal concern: “what do I still lack?” (what is in the way?). The answer? Whatever is in the way of him, and it could be (maybe often is) money. But Jesus made it clear in other contexts that is it could be relationships (mothers, brothers, sons or daughters) or something else valuable to us, like our time, our job, or our ideas. It would be a mistake to say that money is everyone’s issue, or every American’s.

11. One question that naturally arises for Platt and his church, which is of the “rubber meets the road” variety: What are they doing with the greatest accumulated asset of their ministry – their multi-million dollar church facility? He is obviously aware of the question, but there is not even so much as an oblique answer (“Every Sunday we gather in a multimillion-dollar building with millions of dollars in vehicles parked outside” (p.115). Platt comments negatively on how much money has been spent by others on such edifices (I pastor a multi-national church where we spend 13% on facilities in the US and less overseas, so I appreciate frugality here). Platt even suggests downsizing our homes (something else I am all for). But Platt doesn’t take his reasoning to its natural, radical conclusion: Shouldn’t the church sell its “home” and give the proceeds to the poor? I raise the question, not because I think they should sell their building, because I’m not sure they should. I raise the question to point out that there are times where it is more strategic for the overall mission to keep an asset than to give it away. The old fable, “Don’t kill the goose that lays the golden egg” comes to mind. At a certain point I don’t become more effective for Christ without a car (or phone, or laptop, or roof over my head), but less effective. For example, I work closely with an apostolic leader in India, and I think he needs to have more in the way of resources, not less, even though his standard of living already exceeds that of most Indians. This makes me think that the real challenge – largely missed in Platt’s book – is stewardship more than sacrifice. Shouldn’t our objective be to steward the resources of the world, particularly our own, in such a way that we “seek first His kingdom and his righteousness”?

12. I wish that Platt would have spent more time on Christian strategies to relieve suffering, beyond “give more.” What is a Christian strategy for alleviating suffering altogether, beyond writing a check? For those who “have something” to “sacrifice it” only addresses matters short-term. Shouldn’t we consider Jim Collins’ advice to “strengthen the core” while we “expand the frontier”? Doesn't justice need to be paired with mercy? While it in no way alleviates my moral responsibility to respond generously, even sacrificially, I believe that thoughtful people want to understand how their gifts are really making a difference. The situation in Haiti comes to mind, for example. If there is a gigantic hole in the bottom of the bucket, no matter how many resources we pour in the top, we are going to end up with an empty bucket.

Differ

2010-10-04T16:07:00.000-07:00

In case you haven't noticed, I enjoy interacting with ideas (my top result from Strengthsfinder: "Ideation"). For that reason I enjoy reading thoughtful authors who write creatively about the church, men like Neil Cole and Alan Hirsch. I am in sync with these guys in so many ways that we could be the "three amigos" (I would be the Steve Martin character, I think). So I hesitate to differ with their points of view. O.K...I guess I'm not going to hesitate to differ, partly because in the world of ideas, significant differences are what lead to great conversation. So I'll get the dialogue started. Here are two differences I have with Cole and Hirsch in how I view the church.

1. I don't think there's anything better than the early church. Neil Cole, in his book Church 3.0 uses the analogy of software and it's evolution, from version 1.0 (usually glitchy and unstable) to 2.0 (better) and 3.0 (best). as a way of thinking about the evolution of the church. By way of this analogy he puts the Jerusalem church in a less-than-adored light. Cole says that it can be and has been improved upon. I beg to differ. I don't think that it "gets any better" than what we read in the brief description of Acts 2 - a church that was seeing people come to Jesus every day, meeting needs even at the point of personal sacrifice, experiencing great unity, convening in private and public spaces, and changing the world. I think a technological analogy breaks down when you are dealing with something organic, like the church (ironic huh, since Cole's most popular book is Organic Church). What I believe we need instead is an aesthetic analogy - something from the realm of beauty, or art. A beautiful woman (say, Sophia Loren) is a beautiful woman and always will be. There will be other beautiful women, to be sure, but I'm not sure I would say there will be women who are "more beautiful." The language of technology differs from that of the aesthetic. In technology we talk about "glitches." In art we talk about "beauty marks." Take the Mona Lisa, for example. There will be other great paintings, but the Mona Lisa is a singular work, and most artists can only dream of doing something so significant (you wouldn't probably hear an artist say, "I think I just painted something that's better than the Mona Lisa."). I see the Jerusalem church in that light. We are all trying to get back to that beauty, and maybe some are getting closer than others, but I don't believe we've seen a more beautiful form of church than we saw in the original.

2. I don't think that ecclesiology necessarily follows missiology; it can be the other way around. Alan Hirsch has laid out three priorities for the church: Christology, Missiology, Ecclesiology, in that order. I absolutely agree that Christology comes first. Jesus is the alpha, the omega, the beginning and the end. There is no question that Christology gets the gold. But does missiology earn the silver, and ecclesiology the bronze? It is at this point I slightly diverge from the "missional mindset." I see ecclesiology having every bit the value as missiology. In fact, I would tend to frame the three concepts as a triangle, with Jesus (Christology) at the peak, and both missiology and ecclesiology on par, below. I hear what Hirsch is saying - our mission should shape our community. I wouldn't disagree with that. All that I would say is that at times our community is going to shape our mission, too. And this is also quite biblical. In the first epistle of John you hear the apostle say that we have a fellowship with the Father and with one another, and it is out of that community that we are inviting others. So I see a dynamic interplay between mission and community. The arrangement varies from time to time. Missiology precedes Ecclesiology sometimes. Sometimes, Ecclesiology precedes Missiology.

Trots

2010-09-30T09:54:00.000-07:00

HERESY ALERT: The following dMail could get me branded as a heretic. It contains new takes on "tried and true" ideas. Read at your own risk.

Radio personality Paul Harvey popularized the saying “Now you know the rest of the story.” Often there is more to the story than originally thought. I have made "The Rest Of The Story" an acronym: TROTS. As CTK evolves we gain further insights into ideas we’ve held dear, such as:

1. People are the ministers. The pastors are to equip the people for the work of the ministry.

TROTS: Leaders have a role to play in architecting and even initiating ministry activities. Sometimes we have to engage in the ministry to model effectiveness.

2. Small groups are the basic building block. Groups provide friendship, growth, encouragement and outreach.

TROTS: The goal is meaningful, Christ-centered relationships. Small groups can deliver that, but so can coffee times and parties if they are intentional. While small groups are still our "plan A," it doesn't hurt to have a "plan B." Alternatives need to be explored, particularly to meet the needs of the time-challenged.

3. Keep the arrows pointed out. The goal is not to get people to come to us, but to get us to go to them.

TROTS: There is a certain percentage of the population that would just as soon come to us. Some actually appreciate having a larger service where they can "hide" while they explore the claims of Christ.

4. Learn to say "Yes, sure, you bet." Our goal is to cooperate with God in what He is doing.

TROTS: This assumes a number of things on the part of the person wanting to "do something": correct motives, general alignment with our mission, vision and values, and some reasonable expectations of effectiveness.

5. Think "more" instead of "bigger." By decentralizing the ministry we can reach an unlimited number of people.

TROTS: We are a hybrid of intimacy and impact. We are a blend of small and big. At times we need critical mass for impact so we centralize. At other times we break things down for intimacy so we decentralize.

6. Relationships are the basic currency. The church is a people, not a building.

TROTS: Physical structures do impact our ability to relate to people. We shape our building and our buildings shape us. The shape of the environment can’t be totally disregarded. The same group of people can meet in a cozy coffee house, or a sterile gymnasium and have a very different experience in how they relate to God and each other.

7. Our task is to Identify, Deploy, Train, and Support leaders. Deploy first, then train.

TROTS: There is an information exchange at every stage of IDTS. The more information we can exchange in the identification (I) stage, the better for them and us.

8. Keep it simple. Focus the ministry around the priorities of Worship, Small Groups and Outreach.

TROTS: Be aware of “focus fatigue.” Leaders will become weary of being a one-stringed banjo long before people will. It takes a lot of discipline and hard work to stay focused, which is why most don’t do it.

9. There's hope for the future, forgiveness for the past. We have a redemptive God.

TROTS: Theologically and philosophically this is a fixed reality. Relationally and politically, not as much. To restore sinners to fellowship sometimes requires coaching and management on both sides.

10. Good enough is good enough. Do the simplest thing that could possibly work.

TROTS: Good enough really does need to be good enough. Good enough varies with each context, and the bar does get raised with growth.

Underconfident

2010-09-30T09:52:00.001-07:00

Pride is a problem. I think we all know that. What we sometimes miss are all the forms in which it shows up. It shows up as overconfidence, obviously. It also shows up as underconfidence.

You've probably all met the Christian (maybe it's you) who, when asked to serve in a capacity for which they are clearly gifted, responds meekly with, "Awe, shucks. I don't think I could do that. Surely there's someone more qualified than little ol' me. But thanks for asking." Their face says, "humble." But what is going on inside? Sometimes, ironically, too much worry about self: how self will be perceived, whether self is too involved, whether self can pull it off, whether there is someone more qualified than self, etc. In other words, they are self-ish. There is way too much self involved. True humility is to be so God-focused that His kingdom's agenda matters more than self.

Ray Stedman once said, "We all tend to fear rejection if we are seen for what we are. The Satanic lie is that in order to be liked or accepted we must appear capable or successful. Therefore we either project capability (the extrovert) or we seek to hide our failure (the introvert)." Currently, for every believer who is over-confident in their area of giftedness and passion, there are ten who are underconfident. Sadly, some are thinking that sitting on the sidelines is actually spiritual. It's not. It's tragic. The body is made up of parts, and all the parts are vital and necessary. It's time for us to get over ourselves, and that means selflessness - thinking of our selves less.

Row

2010-08-09T14:32:00.000-07:00

A team of four just broke the record set in 1896. They crossed the Atlantic in a rowboat. It took them 44 days, eleven fewer than it has ever been done before. Of course, they had more gadgetry on board, too. Unlike previous crossings they had advanced communications and tracking devices. They had up-to-the-minute weather reports. Solar panels generated electricity. This was not your father's row boat, to be sure. But in the end, none of that sophisticated technology got them from one side of the ocean to the other. As the team captain said, "Every bit of technology that we had seemed to break. In the end it came down to four men and four oars." Four men. Four oars. Lots of rowing. That is the formula.

Ministries today are blessed with more gadgetry than at any other time in history. PowerPoint. Email. Acrylic pulpits. Mixing boards. But in the end it comes down to rowing. What is "rowing" in a ministry context? Loving people to Christ. The way it is put in our mission statement is: effectively reaching out to unchurched people in love, acceptance and forgiveness so that they may experience the joy of salvation and a purposeful life of discipleship. The most basic thing we have to offer is salvation through Jesus Christ. Not marital or financial advice, though sometimes this is needed. Not 10 steps to a better (fill in the blank), though sometimes this is helpful. In the end it is about seeing as many people as possible, as quickly as possible, come to a life-altering relationship with Jesus. Every person matters. Every person deserves to be loved. Reaching out effectively in love, acceptance and forgiveness is hard work. So hard, in fact, that many ministers prefer the digital to the personal. But the kingdom of God advances one person at a time.

Strong

2010-07-30T16:14:00.001-07:00

In our never-ending quest to firm up our leadership, many of us take inspiration from Paul's words to Timothy: "And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others." Truly, the greatest amplifier of our impact is leadership development, as described in 2 Timothy 2:2. But that is the second verse, not the first. The first is, "You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus." Before we strengthen others, we strengthen ourselves. And in a very particular attribute: grace.

It seems like a mixed metaphor to be "strong" in "grace." But if you're Paul, you know all too well how the two go together. After his conversion, Paul was not readily accepted by the Christian community. He had an unsavory past. Fortunately for him, Barnabas (an established Christian leader at the time) was strong in grace. He put his arm around Paul and welcomed him into the community. It was a strength that Paul would evidently develop within himself, as he continued to face doubters throughout the rest of his ministry (in nearly every book Paul wrote, he included some "defense" of himself). Such, you might say, is the life of a murderer who comes to Christ and becomes an outspoken apostle. But when Paul tells Timothy that he will also need to be strong in grace, he reveals an important insight: a Christian leader needs to be strong in grace, not by virtue of the fact that they have a dark past, but simply by virtue of the fact that they are a Christian leader.

When I became a pastor I didn't realize that I was stepping into a storm. The storm goes by different names - legalism, moralism, judgmentalism - but it is always driven by winds of fear. There are always people in your ministry who will try to blow you and others off course from the life-changing, life-giving message of grace. Like the Galatians of old, their skepticism will be clothed in religious-sounding garb. They will use words like "accountability" and "protect the flock." Only, they won't be talking about the standards laid out in scripture, they will be talking about their own list. They will try to exert control over the ministry and the people in it. Frankly, these moralists will dominate the church, if you let them, and have done so in many ministries across the country. What is the antidote for these fear-mongers? Leaders who will stand strong in God's grace. If you don't, who will?

Possibility

2010-07-26T16:53:00.000-07:00

Peter Bloch writes, "Possibility without accountability results in wishful thinking. Accountability without possibility creates despair." Which comes first, accountability or possibility? We need them both, so don't feel like you need to embrace one and neglect the other. But which one will be in the driver's seat, and which one will be in the passenger seat?

The church in which I grew up put accountability in the driver's seat. If we could just be dedicated enough (or fill in the blank, sincere enough, holy enough, etc.) we would become a great community. We never got there. Accountability is a great passenger, but a lousy driver. We spent most of our time pulling ourselves out of the ditch. At CTK we've made it clear that possibility is in the drivers seat, and accountability is along for the ride, to fix sandwiches, engage in conversation, and switch the channels on the radio. Now we're getting somewhere!

Possibility is made primary in various ways, but largely through the hope-filled language we use to describe the community we are creating together. Phrases like "hope for the future and forgiveness for the past" or "an authentic Christian community that effectively reaches out" let people know that this is an enterprise filled with possibility and that they can come along for the ride. It's a fun ride when possibility is at the wheel. On the other hand, possibility won't get to reality without accountability riding shotgun.

When you have a vision of a preferable future, you are ready for accountability and will respond to it well. If you have a goal to become a judo master, you are far more open to the instructor's training, and correction. When the instructor says, "Jump" you ask, "How high?" But if you don't have a goal to become a judo master, and someone comes into your life and says, "Jump," you don't respond with, "How high?" but "Say what?!" This explains the rebellion that has been seen in many legalistic settings, where accountability in a leadership role, instead of a support role. Accountability is a handmaiden to possibility.

Principles

2010-07-12T09:45:00.000-07:00

I was asked to speak about the organization of CTK recently, and instead of whipping out the org charts and bylaws, I decided to share more on the idea-level about how we are structured. Here are some of the organizing principles behind the CTK story.

• Christ is the head of the church. “Christ the King” is not just our name, but the starting point for our organizational structure. Jesus owns the church – He paid pull price for it. We are clear on this point. The church is his body. We are depending on God for His leadership of our lives, and our story.

• Our organizational philosophy is “freedom, with handrails.” Within the handrails of our “beliefs” and “brand” there is freedom granted for individuals to do what needs to be done to achieve the mission Christ gave us. We are more committed to the Master and the Mission, than the Method and the Manner.

• We are minimalists when it comes to structure. We only want the minimum amount of structure with maximum flexibility. Our structure is “chaordic” – a combination of chaos and order. We have often referred to it as “following the bread crumbs.” We first try to discern where God is going, then we try to follow Him there, organizing accordingly. As a multi-site story, CTK closely resembles the apostolic organization of the early church.

• Two key words that serve as filters for our organization are “virtuous” and empowering. By virtuous we mean “inherently good.” The word is defined as “having or showing moral goodness or righteousness.” The word can apply to groups as well as individuals. A second guiding light is the word “empowering.” One of the defining questions for any organization is, “Who gives power to whom?” In a bad organization, the organization receives power from the participants. In a good organization, the participants receive power from the organization.

• “Staff are to create and sustain an environment where the people of CTK can carry out their ministries with minimum obstacles and maximum fulfillment” (CTK Job Description). We want our organization to serve the people, rather than for the people to serve our organization. The key word is not control, but empower.

• The “Jesus style” of leadership is servant-leadership. Greatness is found in serving rather than being served. The emphasis at CTK is on leaders who are higher in the organization serving and supporting the leaders below them.

• We want to be efficient with things, effective with people. Effectiveness with people means treating them as individuals and getting to know their story. Ministry is simply helping people where they are, with what they need, to get where they need to go.

• We see our various Worship Centers as “beads on a string”…different shapes and sizes held together by a common thread. The common thread is our mission, vision and values. The mission we share is more important than our diverse opinions. The needs of the group outweigh the needs of individuals. We major on the majors and minor on the minors.

• There is an invisible line in any organization between faith and fear. We are clearly trying to operate in faith, with hope for the future and forgiveness for the past. To this end we are not only trusting the Lord with the church, we are trusting the Lord’s people with it.

• The Church Council is the official governing body of CTK. The Council consists of the Lead Pastor, Elders, and Consultants. The Bylaws outline the powers and responsibilities of the Council. The Council is responsible for hiring and evaluating the Lead Pastor. “Primarily, the Council will ensure that the Lead Pastor is guiding Christ the King Community Church in accordance with its stated mission, vision and values, and that the business side of the church is administrated with excellence” (CTK Bylaws, Article IV). The council appoints an “Executive Review Committee” each year that is chaired by one of the Regional Pastors. This committee is in communication with the Lead Pastor throughout the year, reviews the leadership of the Lead Pastor through an annual report, responds to concerns as they arise, and, if necessary, initiates disciplinary action, calling upon an established group of outside pastors. They also maintain a succession plan in case of the Lead Pastor’s death.

• The Lead Pastor oversees the CTK network. The Lead Pastor is responsible for the hiring and placement of department heads and pastors. The Lead Pastor works with an Administrative Review Team and Regional Pastors to give support to the network.

• The Local Pastor oversees the spiritual and ministry aspects of the Worship Center in accordance with established priorities. The Local Pastor is responsible for the hiring and placement of local directors and group leaders. Pastors may designate individuals to help give oversight to the local ministry, and are free to utilize language as they deem appropriate for those who are their colleagues; including staff, directors, associates, assistants, leaders, advisory team, etc. These individuals do not have a standing office, but serve at the will of the Pastor.

• Accountability and authority flows through relationships. We ask everyone to be a part of a small group for friendship, growth, encouragement, and outreach. It is in the small group that we can take “relational responsibility” for each other. Organizational authority is mediated through pastoral relationships. All Pastors are asked to have monthly meetings with their supervisor and colleagues. The lines on the flow chart represent “advice,” which flows in both directions. This responsibility is managed by different people at different levels of the organization.

Small Group Leader - Cell

Ministry Director - Community

Local Pastor - Congregation

Area Pastor - County

Regional Pastor - Country

Champion - Continent

Lead Pastor - Church

• In a relational church, relationships are the end and the means. Many questions that get answered “organizationally” in other churches are answered “relationally” at CTK. A phrase to describe our commitment to relational infrastructure is “Span of Care.” Ideally we ask leaders to limit their Span of Care to not more than five to seven people for themselves and those they support.

• From time to time, differences may arise with the authority placed over us, particularly when authority blocks our goals or challenges our will. When we have a difference of opinion with authority, we need to learn how to make an appeal. An effective appeal requires a right attitude, humility and a teachable Spirit. In moments of conflict, what is happening in us is the most important consideration. Appeals should be directed first to the person to whom we have the conflict, then, if necessary, to their supervisor. An ultimate appeal can be made to the Church Council: “Should any individual, participant or guest feel aggrieved by the action of any officer acting in his or her official capacity, said individual shall have the right to appeal to the Church Council. The Council, after hearing such evidence as it deems appropriate, shall have the authority to affirm, modify or reject the action of the officer” (CTK Bylaws, Section VIII).

• We believe in strong church leadership that serves the best interests of God's people. The church needs to be led thoughtfully, Biblically, and aggressively by spiritual men who care about God's work and his people (1 Peter 5:1-4). Biblical leadership is sensitive to the needs of the followers, is motivated by service, and built upon trust (Ephesians 5:22-29).

• God has given apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers to the church and it is important to us to support them in their ministry. Ideally the church should be led by leaders, pastored by pastors, taught by teachers, etc. Good leadership and good followership are partners.

• The office of Elder is designated in the Church Council. “The Elders shall assist the Lead Pastor in the administration of the church and in all matters of business pertaining thereto. Further, the Elders shall act, at the direction of the Church Council, in matters of personal discipline and restoration” (CTK Bylaws, Article V). Only male pastors may serve in the office of Elder (1 Timothy 3:1-7).

• Though we have many deacons, we do not have an office of Deacon because in scripture deacons (diakonos, literally “servants”) were not decision makers but individuals who carried out responsibilities. In our story we are less interested in the title, and more interested in the behavior of servanthood, which has been modeled so well by so many.

• Our objective is to become an organic, relational movement, not an institutional, attractional ministry. Organisms are alive, with inherent energy. Growing and expanding stories require organizational flexibility. In an organism, cells regenerate and grow naturally by multiplication. An organism continues to branch and seed with spontaneity and mystery. The cells reproduce and self-organize at all levels with fractal similarity. Paul deployed Timothy; Timothy deployed others, and so on. It is everyone’s job to identify, deploy, train and support leaders.

Emulate

2010-05-26T12:14:00.000-07:00

There are great ministries all around us, and we can learn a lot from other Christian leaders and churches. But Peter Senge, in his book The Fifth Discipline, encourages us to try to glean transferable "disciplines" rather than models or practices:

"Practicing a discipline is different from emulating "a model." All too often, new management innovations are described in terms of the "best practices" of so-called leading firms. While interesting, I believe such descriptions can often do more harm than good, leading to piecemeal copying and playing catch-up. I do not believe great organizations have ever been built by trying to emulate another, any more than individual greatness in achieved by trying to copy another 'great person.'"

I believe that every ministry story has its own personality, unlike any other. If this is true, the key for leaders is to not so much script a story as to discern the nature of the story in which a leader finds himself. At the end of the day, every ministry is custom built to unique specifications, and the blueprints are not transferable to another job site. There may be ways in which you ministry resembles others, and that is ok. But there should also be ways in which your ministry is unlike any other one in the world. Embrace the uniqueness of what God wants to do in your situation. Some might call it walking by faith.

Collectivism

2010-05-10T17:25:00.001-07:00

The Christian philosopher Francis Schaeffer has said that there are no small churches and no big pastors. Nevertheless, it does take a “big” pastor to cooperate with another pastor, and a “big” church to cooperate with another church in the building of Christ’s kingdom.

Clay Shirky suggests a hierarchy of social arrangements—sharing, cooperation, collaboration, and collectivism—that can bring us together. There is increasing coordination with each step. Sharing involves things. Cooperation involves ideas. Collaboration involves projects. And collectivism involves vision. The sequence of these steps is quite logical. But even before you get to the first step, there is a preliminary threshold you must clear: communication.

One thing is for sure: interdependence is hard, wherever it is attempted. I’m a fan of marriage, but when you think of it, it is a really challenging proposition. Marriage is two people, of different genders, from two different families, trying to do life together as a unit. Good luck with that, especially when visions collide. Everything is cool until the visions vary, and then cool quickly becomes hot. It’s a collision course that I’m not sure can be negotiated, at least in our own strength. But God is not beyond asking us to do something that can’t be done apart from His help. In the movie A League of Their Own, Tom Hanks’s character responds to a complaint of hardship by saying, “Hard is what makes it great!” Perhaps the best part of coordination is what God will have to do in us for it to happen.

To validate those whose ministry is different from ours, we need to recognize, rejoice in, and report on what God is doing throughout the world, particularly in ways that are different from what we’re used to doing or are doing. His work is much bigger than any of us. Other churches can reach people that your church cannot, and in ways that your church does not. Do I hear an Amen? Validate the thing that is different from you, maybe the opposite of you. For those of us in less structured, organic settings, it might mean expressing thanks for the ministries that are programmatic, institutional, or traditional. For those of us in a church that is traditionally organized, it might mean expressing thanks for those who are less structured in their approach. When was the last time you said to a pastor of another church, “I thank God for what you are doing over there”?

In our CTK services, I like to pray publicly for the other churches in the community. I think it sends an important message that there are other family members around that have valid ministries, even though their perspectives may differ from ours. As I pray for different denominations by name, I can sometimes discern that some of “our” people are squirming. We have done too good a job of differentiating ourselves from other churches, and not a good enough job of communicating our mutual dependence. But this can change. Sheep are prone to follow. And if they have followed us to independence, I believe they will also follow us toward interdependence.

The slogan we need for the church in America is the one printed on our money: E pluribus unum (out of many, one). At times in the church, there has been too much pluribus and not enough unum. Of course, the Lord’s Prayer (not the one He taught us to pray, but the one He actually prayed) was for unity. As Christ is praying for unity, there is also an enemy roaming who is intent on division. C. S. Lewis, in The Great Divorce, illustrates this point as he recounts a bus ride from heaven to hell. Instead of finding fire in hell, he finds a neighborhood full of empty homes on deserted streets. Lewis asks what has happened, and he gets a chilling answer. There used to be a great population in hell, he is told, but on the first day when someone would arrive, he would start quarreling with his neighbor, and within a week he would move to another block. Of course, someone else would move in next to him in that neighborhood as well. So the person would have to move again to get away from his neighbors. This cycle was repeated many times, until the person had moved to the edge of town, where he had to build another house. And that was hell—a constant drive to get away from others. Hell meant growing—rapidly—apart. That is a metaphor for hell on earth, and also an indicator of what heaven on earth must be like: coming together.

Affirmation

2010-05-05T08:13:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine said something pretty interesting to me: "I came to my first pastorate looking for a group of people who would affirm me. But what they were looking for was someone who could lead them to hope in Jesus."

I found this to be an especially honest reflection. The fact is, a person can find a fair amount of affirmation in ministry. Maybe you've heard this before: "Thank you Pastor. That was just what I needed to hear!" Or this: "That was such a beautiful prayer." Or: "I want you to know that you are a blessing to me." God's people can be awfully kind sometimes. When I was a young pastor I didn't know what to do with the encouragement, so on the surface I was way too godly: "All the glory goes to Jesus sister!" Meanwhile the "internal me" was far too human. Secretly I would look forward to these comments far too much and feel like I was going through withdrawal when they were not forthcoming. I think I've grown a little since then.

1. I got clear that my ministry is unto the Lord and people are just the beneficiary of that, instead of the other way around.

2. I started living for the ultimate, final affirmation - "well done good and faithful servant" - instead of the temporal, passing affirmations.

3. I understood that the same people who shout "Hosanna!" on one day will cry "crucify him!" days later. If I put too much stock in the compliments it is harder to divest myself of the criticism.

4. I realized that the truth was somewhere in the middle - I'm not quite as good as my best day and not quite as bad as my worst day. While people tend to notice the unusually good or bad, I've tried to put more energy into raising my average.

5. I got clear that "It is not about me." Truly, as my friend said, I just need to be a finger pointing to Jesus.

As I began to grow in my character something interesting started happening in my response to affirmation. I started saying, "Thank you, I appreciate that" to compliments, but in my self talk reminding myself that I am holding treasure in a jar of clay. I'm doing much better, if I do say so myself.

Sampling

2010-04-25T19:10:00.000-07:00

Post cereal introduced product sampling to American commerce. The concept is simple; before someone commits to a larger purchase, let them try it first. After the concept caught on, it expanded significantly, with test drives, introductory offers, and money-back guarantees. Maybe the church could learn a thing or two.

I learned something about sampling recently when a man called and set up an appointment to talk with me. He said he wanted to talk with me about the church. I found this odd, since I knew this man from the community and had never seen him attend one of our services. In fact, he hadn't. But when he showed up for our meeting he was carrying with him all manner of CTK literature: brochures, DVDs and printed pages from our web site. He even had a dog-eared copy of Deliberate Simplicity with him. He was studying up on us, he said, because he wanted to know what we were all about before he came for a visit. The care he took in his investigation was every bit as intensive as that of Consumer Reports. He had particular ideas about what he was looking for, and he was not even going to visit until his curiosity was satisfied.

Clearly my friend is an "outlier" when it comes to being an information hound. But in an info society, where people are used to being able to browse a book online before buying it, or play a clip of a song before downloading it, it makes sense that the church provide options beyond "attend the service and you'll find out." So here are some questions:

Does your ministry provide samples of recent teaching? How about a video or audio of a recent service? Handouts? Maybe a copy of the Sunday program? Giving people a sample will make them feel that they already know you, before you even meet.

Does your ministry give guests pictures of what they can expect to see when they visit? Is there a map of the facility that they can peruse? Some may be worried about "what's behind those doors." Put their mind at ease. Take a few snapshots of the entry, hallways and auditorium so it's not such a mystery. Remember, people are already used to zooming in on buildings through Google earth and getting a roadside view. Let them come inside before they come inside.

Does your ministry allow people to "meet" some of the important people before they meet them? Is there a brochure of the directors? Are there bios on the web site? Maybe you think it's obvious who the worship director is, but for newbies they are wondering, "Who's the guy who gets up there every week and plays his guitar?"

Does your ministry give people a chance to "try" a small group, before committing to one? Some are skeptical about jumping into community with both feet. Maybe we should whet their appetite for it, by offering 5-10 minute small group opportunities in the worship service, or limited-duration groups that let people get their feet wet first.

Don't allow the enemy to use the fear of the unknown to keep seekers at bay. Give people a chance to "taste and see that the Lord is good." Sampling is a preventative strike at fear.

Honest

2010-03-16T15:11:00.001-07:00

Jesus said, "Simply let your 'Yes' be 'Yes' and you 'No' be 'No'; anything beyond this comes from the evil one." Jesus encouraged an honest life that has eluded many Christian leaders. I find many leaders are frustrated, saying "Yes" when they mean "No," then resenting others for it. The anger stems from a lack of honesty with themselves, first of all, then with others.

It is dangerous to your health to be a "yes man." Jesus gave us permission to say both yes and no. I know this is hard for some Christians to believe, but sometimes the best answer is "No." We have a limited amount of emotions, time, money and strength. When someone asks you to engage, and you don't have the emotional strength to do so, the answer needs to be "No." When someone asks you to participate, but you don't have the time, the answer needs to be "No." When someone asks you to contribute, but you don't have the money, the answer needs to be "No." When someone asks you to help, but you don't have the strength, the answer needs to be "No." And Jesus says you don't have to explain or excuse yourself either. Just say "No, I'm sorry, I can't." Let your "No" be "No."

If you really want to frustrate the rest of us, keep saying "Yes" when you should be saying "No." After awhile it will become clear that you don't really have the ability (emotions, time, money, strength) to follow through on your commitments (ummm....overcommitments) and we will start wishing that you had just been honest with us to begin with: "If you didn't have the time, I wish you just would have told me." Other people cannot read your mind, so when you say "Yes" they actually assume you mean "Yes," with all that attends that word.

I was once doing marriage counseling with a couple, and finding it very difficult to make any progress, until one session the wife turned to her husband and blurted out, "I don't love you. I haven't loved you for a long time." It was a difficult session, but in some ways it was a turning point. The husband, afterward, told me, "It was hard to hear that, but I needed to hear that." Up until her statement neither of us could figure out why the pieces were not coming together. She had said that she loved him, so we both took her word for it. The minute she got honest, the marriage had a chance at survival. Prior to that statement, we weren't even working on helping her to love him, because that had been assumed. Once we knew that she did not love him, we could go to work on that. And we did. And she did. And eventually that marriage came back together. But it required honesty to get there.

If we as leaders don't show a degree of care with our "Yes" and "No" we can unwittingly show our people how to become really good at being dishonest, and subsequently, unhealthy. After all, we are as sick as our secrets.

Hybrid

2010-01-11T15:23:00.001-08:00

When you encounter a CTK participant (we don’t have “members” but “active participants”), you will hear them tell different stories about what they appreciate about CTK. One might say, “This is the first church where I have really gotten to know people, and where people have gotten to know me. I have grown so much because of my small group.” Another might add, “I enjoy the weekend worship services. I feel the presence of God when we get together.” Still another might say, “I love the fact that we are reaching out and starting new Worship Centers in new communities.” The point being, we are not all one thing, or another. We are both intimate and impacting. We are Hybrid.

Intimacy…when the church is personal, relational and inclusive.

Impact…when the church is powerful, missional and transformative.

Hybrids are sometimes a transition between one methodology and another. In between epics, we often find transitional forms with one hand reaching into the past, and the other reaching forward to the future. This is likely true for the automotive industry, as refined fossil fuels become less plentiful, and new forms of power, like electric and hydrogen, become more useful. Some would see the Hybrid Church in this light, as a way station between the corporate church (viewed to be analogous to the combustion engine, a popular but endangered species) and smaller house fellowships they project will ultimately replace it.

I personally do not view the Hybrid Church as a transitional form. I view it as a preferred design. That is, we may prefer a hybrid because it brings together two things in a way that is synergistic. The peanut butter and jelly sandwich, for example, is a long-time favorite hybrid. We prefer the two together because the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. When the church combines intimacy and impact it gets the best of both worlds.

Both

2010-01-06T11:13:00.000-08:00

At a conference I attended, the facilitator said: "It's more important to be kind than to be right." At first blush the statement resonated with me. I’ve certainly seen rightness expressed at the expense of kindness. But upon further reflection I think it was unfortunate that the conversation was being framed as "kind" versus "right." Can’t we be both? I think a better statement for the facilitator of this meeting to make would have been, "It is important to be right. It is just as important to be kind."

It’s ok to be extreme, but it’s not ok to be imbalanced. It was said of Abraham Lincoln that he was "a man of steel and velvet," extremely strong at the core with a very gentle exterior. It was said of Christ that he was “full of grace and truth,” completely truthful, but clearly gracious. That is what I want to be when I grow up. Both. And that is God’s dream for all of us in His church, that when we grow up we will “speak the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:7-16). Greatness appears to be balanced extremes.

Balance is not very sexy, or cool. What is deemed newsworthy is often excessive in one direction or the other. The media tends to amplify the highly unlikely outliers, and tends to minimize the middler. This is true in Christianity, as well. The ministry that is extremely (and then fill-in-the-blank…large, evangelistic, Calvinistic, dogmatic, etc.) gets noticed. But for long-term effectiveness balance yields the best results, in your personal life and in your ministry.

A wise, older pastor advised me in my youth to “Lean against the prevailing wind.” He had used this phrase as a sextant for his personal life, leadership and teaching. He counseled, “If you find yourself preaching about grace all the time, maybe balance that with a message on holiness; if you’ve focused for a while on outreach, teach on discipleship.” So much of spirituality, he told me, is both/and, not either/or.

Pencil

2009-12-27T08:50:00.000-08:00

The Bible is written in ink. Everything else should be in pencil.

I say this because I found out something interesting on the way to the ball. People sometimes like to take what I say as gospel, as if it came off of Mount Sinai. For instance: Deliberate Simplicity. I wrote Deliberate Simplicity because I found the story of CTK to be virtuous and empowering. The priorities of CTK - Worship, Small Groups, Outreach - resonate with Jesus' prioritization: love the Lord with all your heart, and love your neighbor as yourself. I believe we have found great benefit in "keeping the main thing the main thing." But Deliberate Simplicity is an application of the word of God, not the word of God itself.

Jesus asked us to love each other. The primary way we have applied that principle is to organize into small groups for friendship, growth, encouragement and outreach. But small groups are not the only way in which we can love each other. They are "a" way, and a great way, but not the only way. It would be a mistake for us to make small groups out to be a command of Christ. They are an application of the command. I have a friend who is very well connected to other Christian friends. Her family and two to three other families regularly "hang out." They pray for each other. They encourage each other. They meet each other's needs. It is very practical and profound. They are carrying out the "one-anothers" of Scripture. It would be a mistake for me to require her to "get into a small group." In fact, it would miss the point entirely. The point of small groups is so that we do life together. They are doing that; perhaps so well that we all could learn something from them. Small groups are our primary method, but behind the emphasis on groups is a Biblical principle of relationships. It is the principle that is paramount, not the program.

The word of God is eternal. We run into problems when we try to make things that are not timeless, timeless. We run into problems when we take our program and try to make it the formula. Formulism is fundamentalism applied to practice. Remember, if we wrote it, it's in pencil.

Amnesia

2009-12-15T14:25:00.001-08:00

I have a low-cost solution to propose for our current health care crisis. A great awakening. Returning to God. Revival. That should solve it.

About 70% of health care costs deal with behavioral choices, from homosexuality to junk food. A physician might call it "lung cancer." Others might say it's reaping what cigarettes have sown. A doctor might diagnose it as diabetes. Another word that might work is "gluttony." A specialist might call it liver disease. A prophet would call it drunkenness. So much of what ails us physically has a deeper root. Unfortunately, our society has become sophisticatedly ignorant. We are experiencing moral amnesia. As I complain to my doctor about my aching knees, I conveniently overlook the fifty pound tummy that those knees are being asked to carry, and the late night bowls of ice cream that were penultimate. I am not the greatest example of taking care of myself. And I guess that's my point. We're asking our health care system to change, and do better. Maybe we should be the ones doing the changing. But first we have to wake up to what's really going on, and quit holding to the unscriptural idea that we can sow personal destructiveness, and somehow, someway have the corporate health care system get a different crop to come in (and by the way, we don't want to pay as much for this modern miracle).

When I told someone recently that I had a personal goal of taking better care of myself, they said something that was very politically incorrect. They said, "Food addiction is the only 'acceptable' addiction in the Christian community." Alcohol? Nope. Pornography? No way. Gambling? No go. Potato Chips? Now that's a tolerable sin! She went on to say that "it is only at a church potluck where a 350 pound person can go back for their fourth plate of food and no one will bat an eyelash." Ok, now you've stepped over the line! That is getting dangerously close to hurting my feelings. But all joking aside, the Old Testament prophets often scoffed at the futility of mankind trying to "perfume the pile" - to make sin smell better. In so many ways it is time for our country, but particularly God's people, to shake off our amnesia. Spiritual problems cannot be solved with political, medical, or psychological solutions. We simply can't come up with enough ingenuity to keep from reaping what we sow.

Atrophy

2009-12-07T09:59:00.000-08:00

Was meeting with an associate pastor recently, who had been in business for himself prior to entering vocational ministry. He expressed interested in becoming a senior or lead pastor. When I asked him why he wanted to take that step he said, "Because I have some entrepreneurial instincts, and I'm afraid that if I am not in a position to take risks that those instincts will atrophy and I will lose them." I found that to be a very insightful answer. Faith is a muscle that needs to be exercised or else you'll lose it.

The way to keep walking by faith is to keep walking by faith. If you succumb to fear, you will become more likely to succumb to fear. Harry Truman said, "The worst danger we face is being paralyzed by doubts and fears." If fear takes over, paralysis sets in. There is actually a "fear cycle": Fear leads to Inaction; Inaction leads to Inexperience; Inexperience leads to Inability; Inability leads to greater fear, and the cycle repeats and reinforces itself. If you feel this cycle setting in (as this associate pastor did) you need to take action. You need to take a step of faith.

Jim Collins has written a book called How the Mighty Fall. A few years ago he wrote a hugely popular book entitled Good to Great, about how good companies became great companies. This latest book is about how good companies have become bad companies, that have trended downward instead of upward. Why? Because they were unwilling to take risks. Why? Because they were afraid. The president and the board went into protective mode and were no longer willing to step out. In the process, they lost it. Reminds me of what Jesus said, "Those who save their lives will lose it. The one who loses his life for my sake will find it." Fortunately there are warning signs. Before you die, atrophy starts to set in.

Reactionary

2009-11-23T18:32:00.000-08:00

There is a difference between responding and reacting. When problems arise you want to respond, but you don't want to react. And you definitely don't want to be reactionary.

When organizations get reactionary they tend to solve an immediate problem, but create additional unforeseen difficulties in the process (which will be experienced by far more people down the road). The government has become great at this, but churches aren't too far behind. An example of reactionary governance? Our Worship Center in Burlington is applying for a Conditional Use Permit to renovate a warehouse into worship space. Simple enough, right? Not necessarily. When the building department looked at the auditorium size they were initially concerned that we could put too many people in it, especially if every one was standing (yes, I know that most people sit down in church, but I'll get to that in a minute). Where did the concern about standing room come from? A local tavern. Evidently on some Friday nights this local tavern is packed, beyond capacity, with everyone standing. Unfortunately for us, we put in our use application at the same time that the city was trying to deal with the "packed tavern problem." How are they thinking about solving it? A neighboring community solves the problem by having taverns bolt down their tables, so that they can't be pushed out of the way. So our city's recommendation to us? How about bolted-down pews! Their reasoning is if we have pews we cannot have a standing room crowd, thus eliminating the tavern concern, which has become their concern, and by extension now, our concern. Of course, we are not going to put in pews, and I think we're going to be able to negotiate this "problem," but I raise this story because this is the type of nonsensical stuff that many churches pull. And we as leaders in the church need to resist this type of creeping bureaucracy!

The past six months there has been a "pull" on me to put more regulation into the CTK story, particularly around the area of leadership qualifications. This has come from well-meaning people who have been hurt by leaders who have presented themselves to be one thing, but in actuality were another. I have personally been witness to the devastation that disingenuous leaders have caused. But this is where we want to respond and not to react. To respond means that we deal with our fallen brothers directly, and we bring them into a process of accountability and restoration. To react would mean reorganizing the entire church, or writing a policy manual, or instituting regulations, to "keep this from every happening again." Frankly, I've left heel marks behind resisting the impulse to kill a gnat with a cannon. I think we HAVE to resist this impulse unless we want to become like just about every other church - highly regulated, controlled and lifeless.

The fact of the matter is, problems will arise in the church and in its leadership. You show me a church, and I'll show you a church that has problems. The churches planted by Paul were messed up in just about any way a church could be messed up! Even Jesus had a rogue apostle or two. When we take risks on people, we take risks on people. You don't bat 1.000. There are some strikeouts. But we must not build the entire ministry to keep from striking out. We must build the ministry so that we keep hitting the ball!

Better

2009-11-05T10:30:00.000-08:00

I used to think that bigger was better. Over the years, the Lord has taught me just the opposite; that better is bigger. Actually, there have been three shifts in my thinking:

1. It's about church health instead of church growth. When I first start out as a pastor (22 years ago) I was enamored with "church growth." I remember asking a "successful" pastor of a large church about how his church had grown, and he told me bluntly, "Church growth principles." At the time, I did not have the experience to filter that comment. I just thought "OK" and then proceeded to buy every book I could, and attend every conference I could, on the subject of church growth. What I found is that there is a science to getting people to come to and stay in your church. Many churches have utilitized certain approaches that have resulted in increased attendance. Whether or not these people are committed to Christ and "on mission" is another question. With greater spiritual maturity I've come to appreciate church health more than church growth. Am I still interested in seeing large numbers of people come to Christ? Absolutely. I am praying for another Great Awakening. But I see this coming as the outgrowth of a vibrant, healthy, Spirit-filled church, not the result of any human efficacy.

2. It's about being the church instead of going to church. I used to see church as a place you went to. In the last several years I've come to see it as a place you go from. The real work, it has become clear to me, needs to be done in our neighborhoods, and schools, and workplaces. I get more and more excited seeing Christians engaging in ministries away from the church building, in their circle of influence. It is becoming less about how many people we can get to come, and more about how many people we can get to go.

3. It's about turning up the clarity, not the volume. Years ago I thought "If we could just find a bull horn loud enough, we could let everyone know what we know." I was a much bigger proponent, back then, of banners, crusades, billboards and mailers. All of this has its place. But there's a fine line between turning up the volume and crossing over into distortion. Nowadays I appreciate more those who have the ability to take eternal truths and make them lucid to the lost. As Jesus said, the light needs to be set on a hill, the salt needs to be salty. Instead of trying to cram truth down the throat of the culture, I think it's about sending a clearer signal, and whetting the appetite of the culture for the things of God.

Admit

2009-10-22T10:11:00.001-07:00

One of the hardest things for leaders to do is to own their mistakes. Humble pie is a pastry that is never tasty. But Winston Churchill said, "The price of greatness is responsibility." As leaders we are not always going to get it right. But when we get it wrong we need to know what was wrong, admit what was wrong, and remedy what was wrong. Admitting wrongdoing is a lost art that people are longing to see come into vogue. An episode of Seinfeld illustrates this beautifully. Jerry walks into a dry cleaners with a shirt that has obviously been shrunken:

Dry Cleaner: May I help you?
Jerry: Yeah, I picked up this shirt here yesterday. It's completely shrunk. There's absolutely no way I can wear it.

Dry Cleaner: When did you bring it in?
Jerry: What's the difference? Look at it! Do you see the size of this shirt?!

Dry Cleaner: You got a receipt?
Jerry: I can't find the receipt.

Dry Cleaner: You should get the receipt.
Jerry: Look, forget about the receipt, all right? Even if I had the receipt - look at it! It's a hand puppet. What am I going to do with this?!

Dry Cleaner: Yes, but how do I know we did the shirt?
Jerry: What do you think, this is a little scam I have? I take this tiny shirt all over the city conning dry cleaners out of money?! In fact, forget the money. I don't even want the money. Just once, I would like to hear a dry cleaner admit that something was their fault. That's what I want. I want an admission of guilt.

Dry Cleaner: Maybe you asked for it to be washed?
Jerry: No...Dry cleaned.

Dry Cleaner: Let me explain to you something. Okay? With certain types of fabrics, different chemicals can react, causing...
Jerry: (Interruping) You shrunk it! You know you shrunk it! Just tell me that you shrunk it!

Dry Cleaner: I shrunk it.

See, that wasn't hard, was it? Wrong. There is a line that is just short of taking full, clear responsibility, and many, many people, for whatever reason, can't get across that line. They try to minimize, defer, explain - do everything but admit that they were wrong. Meanwhile the angst only grows for those who desperately need to hear the eight words: "I'm sorry. I was wrong. Please forgive me."

I have been watching with peculiar interest the board of our local school district (where my son goes to school). The school board has been caught in a land boondoggle, purchasing property at too high a price, in an area not zoned for a school, with money that the district did not, and does not, have. It is a perfect storm of mistakes: a runaway superintendent, an incompetent appraiser, turncoat politicians, a lagging economy, a contract that was not carefully reviewed (in fact, the contract for the land cannot even be located). Now the board will be asking the community to pass a bail-out bond to help pay for the unusable land, and to keep the State from taking over the district in the next year to keep it from insolvency. (Cue Southwest Airlines' ad, "Want to get away?"). I personally think that the community might actually be inclined to bail the school district out, but I doubt it will happen unless the school board is willing to own their mistakes and take responsibility. A little bit of ownership for the mistakes would be like a paper towel on a spill. Instead, the board spread the mess around by sending out a four paragraph "message" to the community, and I quote:

"All school boards have an assortment of governance responsibilities and often face considerable challenges carrying them out..."
"(the purchase was) made after considerable evaluation..."
"the board was convinced at that time the acquisition of that property was in the best interest of the district..."
"we are committed to focusing on the future..."
"we are confident that together we will develop a plan..."

Do you notice something missing here? Yup. The closest the board got to saying, "We blew it" was use of the word "regrettable" (which still cloaks them in the role of victims, instead of protagonists).

I bring this episode to your attention, not because of the mistakes that were made in purchasing the property. I personally believe that mistakes WILL be made by leaders, and sometimes the mistakes will be quite significant. I bring this episode to your attention because of the lack of ownership for the mistake, which is a second mistake, that now puts salt in the wound. Wouldn't the school board be better served by saying, "Dear Community, We blew it. We meant well, but we kicked the can. We should have read the contract. We should have verified the information. We were the board. We were and are responsible. We didn't handle our responsibilities well and we're sorry that our mistakes have put the community in a bind." I think that might work. But truly one of the hardest things for politicians to do is ACCEPT RESPONSIBILITY. The response of the board on this reminds me of Arthur Fonzerelli ("The Fonz") of Happy Days struggling to say he was “w-r-rr....w-rr-rrrr....w-rr-rrr---rrrrong.” The Fonz was cool in so many ways, but his inability to admit wrongdoing was not cool.

I have admired Bill Hybels (founder of Willow Creek Community Church) for years. But my respect went to an all-time high when he recently admitted that their attempts at spiritual formation had largely failed. Listen to this, and learn to be a leader who takes responsibility: "Some of the stuff that we have put millions of dollars into thinking it would really help our people grow and develop spiritually, when the data actually came back it wasn’t helping people that much. Other things that we didn’t put that much money into and didn’t put much staff against is stuff our people are crying out for. We made a mistake. What we should have done when people crossed the line of faith and become Christians, we should have started telling people and teaching people that they have to take responsibility to become ‘self feeders.’ We should have gotten people, taught people, how to read their bible between services, how to do the spiritual practices much more aggressively on their own."

Wow. I know where Seinfeld would like to go to church!

Loyal

2009-10-19T13:13:00.001-07:00

There's something to be said for loyalty. I haven't said much about it because I've enjoyed so much of it over the course of my ministry career that I've probably taken it for granted. But if you follow Christ, you will get to experience what he experienced, and that includes knowing what betrayal feels like. You will be initiated into the "fellowship of Christ's sufferings." You will get to understand why Jesus kept asking Peter, "Do you love me?" (John 21:15-17). You will relate to Jesus asking the twelve, "You don't want to leave too, do you?" (John 6:67). You will get why Paul bemoaned the fact that Demas had deserted him (2 Timothy 4:10). You will have to wipe a traitor's kiss off your cheek (Matthew 26:49). Jesus would be the first to tell you it's hard to build a movement out of people who are fickle, finicky and flighty, but Jesus also warned that fickle, finicky and flighty are what we'll get to work with.

I find loyalty hard to talk about because there is such a narrow path between cavernous extremes. On the one side I am sensitive to the many abuses of loyalty that have been seen in Christian circles, where the domineering pastor or Christian leader has everyone running scared. He keeps everyone silent through grand proclamations of authority and submission. The sheep meekly stumble along. But that is not actually loyal behavior. It's cultish behavior (loyalty is for the overall good; cultishness is only good for the leader). On the other side, there is a drop-off into gluelessness (not cluelessness, although probably that too). People come and go randomly. No one has any idea who is going to show up. No one stands by their word. No one trusts anyone. No one has the other person's back. I'm not sure which is worse. Too much loyalty or too little of it.

I'm still learning on this subject, but here's what I've discovered so far about how to engender a healthy loyalty, and process disloyalty when it occurs.

1. Another word for loyalty is team. Loyal people are team players. They think constantly, "How do we win together?" Individualism, on the other hand, is at the heart of disloyalty. A disloyal person is unwilling to put others' interests above their own. Their personal agenda ends up trumping all others, and eventually, when they don't get what they want, they leave and take their toys with them.

2. In a Christian context loyalty must be aligned with Christ. Paul said, "Follow me inasmuch as I follow Christ." If a leader is not following Christ, then all bets of loyalty are off (this is not Enron, here). We are only signing up to follow someone, because they are following Someone. But provided that our leaders are pointed in the right direction (toward Christ) then loyalty is godly and good.

3. Good followership is as important as good leadership. Just as there can be bad leaders, there can also be bad followers. Bad followers have a tendency to blame leaders for their lack of loyalty. Bad leaders tend to blame followers for their lack of leadership. The only way out of this death spiral is for everyone to over-own their own stuff; leaders need to step up their leadership, and followers must step up their loyalty.

4. Loyalty can thrive in a context of disagreement. For us to be loyal to each other, we do not necessarily have to agree with each other on every point. In fact, until there is disagreement, you will not be able to tell whether or not someone is loyal or just following along because it's going their way. Christian unity is embracing diversity within the will of God. It is an awesome thing to be on a team where people don't have to necessarily agree on every point, but when they leave the room they are 100% united in their direction and efforts.

5. The closer people are to the center, the more loyalty cannot just be encouraged but demanded. Not all disloyalty is created equal. Cracks at the edge can be cosmetically concealed. Fissures at the center threaten the very existence of the organization (can you imagine if the Father, Son and Holy Spirit were not united?). Because of this, a pastor-friend of mine who is intent on this point tells staff when they are hired, "Disloyalty will get you fired." Some might see this as a self-serving threat. He views this as a protective measure against the Enemy.

6. When you are betrayed, keep in mind the bigger picture. A very small percentage of people are truly disloyal. In Jesus' case the ratio was one in twelve. The pain of such behavior can be so intense, however, that it can cause you to lose sight of the faithfulness of the majority. Going back to the garden of Eden, it has been one of Satan's strategies to get us focused on what we don't have and think we need, and get our eyes off of the abundant blessings we already have. Don't fall for this! Recognize and rejoice in the majority of folks who keep their commitments.

7. Talk is cheap...and a red flag. The more of it you hear, the more skeptical you should be. Peter was vociferous in his declarations that he would never deny Christ. Jesus smelled a rat. Even Judas tried to play off his traitorous ways at the Lord's Supper. Maybe this is why James (Jesus' half-brother) said, "Don't tell us, show us." I believe you will find that the most loyal people will not be the ones promising to be. They will be the ones who keep their eyes on the Lord and week after week show up and carry out their ministry with a smile on their face, and joy in their heart.

Initiative

2009-10-12T13:51:00.000-07:00

The easiest thing is to react. The second easiest thing is to respond. The hardest thing is to initiate. But CTK has become a phenomenal story because many people do the hardest thing and initiate ministry, in ways big and small. One of our values at CTK is empowerment. Empowerment, turned inside out, is initiative. I was struck recently by a story told in The Power of Small; Why Little Things Make All the Difference:

"When Linda first decided to open The Kaplan Thaler Group, she had once piece of Clairol's hair care business - Herbal Essences Shampoo, which she naively thought she could run from her Manhattan brownstone. Steve Sadove, her sole client and then-president of Clairol, tactfully suggested that Linda would at least need a business partner, since her expertise was in the creative side of advertising. Considering she had never run a company, or earned a business degree, Linda reluctantly agreed. Flipping through her Rolodex, she went on a frenzied search for the perfect partner. She wanted someone brilliant, assertive, collaborative, and challenging. The last person she was looking for was a 'yes' woman. She instinctively knew she needed someone with the moxie to tell her if the work was veering off track, or if her genius campaign idea would send a client's company into Chapter 11. She needed to hire an alter ego.

"After watching Linda eliminate more prospects than an American Idol audition, Steve stepped in again. He urged Linda to contact Robin Koval, who handled a number of other Clairol accounts at a large New York ad agency. Linda arranged to meet Robin at Michael's Muffins, a neighborhood coffee shop whose Formica decor was, to put it kindly, a far cry from the power-breakfast venues where Madison Avenue movers and shakers usually ordered their egg whites. Robin was intrigued. As fate would have it, she was also a tad hungry.

"When Linda walked in, there sat Robin at one of the wobbly tables with a giant bran muffin in front of her. The muffin had been perfectly sliced in two. She promptly introduced herself: 'Hi, I'm Robin Koval. It's great to meet you. I ordered a bran muffin, and it was huge, so I though we might share it. Of course, if you want your own muffin, or a different kind, I'll just save this for later.'

"It was business-partner love at first bite. Linda realized that this simple gesture revealed more about Robin than a resume or references could. She had shown herself to be proactive, frugal, collaborative and willing to take the initiative, even if the task was ordering breakfast. Within an hour, a partnership was taking root."

Those two ladies have gone on to create a powerhouse ad agency (they created the Aflac duck, for example), but it all started with a bran muffin, and a little bit of initiative.

Like never before, real people, average people, can take initiative. Seth Godin writes in Tribes, "In the old model things happened to you at work. Factories opened, people were hired. Bosses gave instructions. You got transferred. There were layoffs. You got promoted. Factories closed. Leaders, on the other hand, don't have things happen to them. They do things."

It used to be that people in the church waited for instructions from the pastor. In today's world, the ministry happens when and where people take initiative.

Credit

2009-10-04T20:16:00.001-07:00

Concerns about credit have stymied many great works of God. Ralph Waldo Emerson stated, “There is no limit to what can be accomplished if it doesn't matter who gets the credit.”

We cannot become an organic movement of ministers and ministries "here, there and everywhere" if we are overly concerned about who will get the credit. In fact, I believe that one of the subliminal reasons why church leaders resist the notion of organic ministry is that they intuitively know that they will not be able to take credit for it when it happens. Let me explain, using the illustration of a woman's desire to reach out to elementary-aged girls.

A mom, seeing the challenges that confront young ladies, and feeling a call from God, desires to have a ministry to girls who are the age of her daughter. She discusses this idea with her pastor, looking for coaching and support. Two ideas come up in the conversation: a) that she could start an after-school group in her home, and invite her daughter's friends to come over after school, or b) that she could join the Sunday School as a teacher in that age group. As the conversation unfolds, lurking in the back of the pastor's mind is the desire for credit. If this mom starts a group at her home, will he be able to take credit for it? The answer is, "Not as easily as if she is working in our Sunday School." Will he let this gremlin manipulate the conversation? If so, he will say to this ministry-mom, "I think the best thing for you to do is to plug into our Sunday School."

If you are concerned about credit you will have a preference for ministries that you can see, because ministries that you can see are ones that you can control, and for which you can take credit. This is not empowerment in the truest sense, it is manipulation for the sake of the pastor's ego.

Organic church leader Tony Dale has a slogan that he tries to live by: "No empire building, no control, and no glory." He is careful to build His kingdom, instead of his own. In Isaiah 42:8 God says this: I am the LORD; that is my name! I will not give my glory to another." Dale writes, "For humans, the temptation to take just a little bit of the credit is very strong! But it is an incredible privilege to be a part of a move of God, and we need to remember this and stay humble."

Dead

2009-09-22T09:56:00.000-07:00

There is a difference between what we experience with "woundedness and healing," and what we experience with "death and resurrection." Let me detail the differences:

Woundedness and healing...

- process is natural
- restoration is expected and gradual
- time is an ally
- treat it and work it out
- incremental turnaround
- friends can help you
- advice is called for

Death and resurrection...

- process is supernatural
- restoration is unexpected and sudden
- time is an enemy
- grieve it and let it go
- dramatic turnaround
- only God can help you
- miracle is called for

When looking at your own life, or the lives of others, it is helpful to keep in mind these distinctions. For matters of woundedness and healing, Christian counseling, a "how to" sermon series, or small group support can make a big difference. For matters of death and resurrection, there is not much that can be done, except to wait on God for a miracle. Many believers become frustrated waiting on God for healing and restoration, not understanding that the process they are going through is more likened to a resurrection from the dead. It's not that God won't be able to bring about restoration, it's that ONLY GOD will be able to do it, and He will do it in his way, and in his time, and sometimes as a complete surprise.

As I think back on the darkest period of my life, in which I left the ministry and was filled with anger and doubt, I can see that it was more than just a wounding that needed healing. It was a death. It was the death of "David, the pastor." It was the death of a vision. It was the death of life under my control. Years later God pulled me out of the miry clay and set my feet on a rock. As I look back now, I don't view my recovery as a healing, I view it as a resurrection. God sovereignly intervened in my story. As the nursery rhyme "Humpty Dumpty" says, "All the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty back together again." But while the king's men can't put the pieces together again, the King can!

Many Christian leaders want to "fix" problems when they see them. We want to view broken marriages, failed ministries and personal tragedies as challenges that need our coaching. But sometimes, what we're looking at cannot be solved with salve. It's deeper than that. There is nothing that we are going to be able to say or do to bring restoration. God is going to have to resurrect the story from the dead. At these times, we're better off to function more like the mortician than the physician. Issue the death certificate. Let them know that the marriage is dead. Let them know that their life, as they've known it, is over. Eulogize. Help them throw the dirt on the coffin. But here is the beautiful thing about the kingdom of God. Just when we think it's over, it's not. God loves to raise the dead.

Style

2009-09-14T12:47:00.001-07:00

We need to extend grace in matters of style, as well as sin. I would say that CTK has become noted for being a place of grace for sinners. We say without reservation that there is "Always a Place for You." We don't care where you've been, or what you've done, we know that love covers over a multitude of sins. We say, "God will take you where you are, He just won't leave you there." We believe there is forgiveness for the past, and hope for the future. There is no question about how we feel about sinners. We love them. The question is, "Will we extend the same kind of grace to someone who differs from us in their style?"

Thomas Jefferson put it so well when he said, "In matters of style, swim with the current, in matters of principle, stand like a rock." This has proved to be a difficult balance for Christians to maintain. We have tended to a) gravitate to certain styles (in preaching, worship, service order), then b) imagine that our preferred methodology must be "right," then c) become cynical, critical or judgmental of others for being different. We must resist this temptation. As Jefferson noted, style is an area where we want to see diversity, not unity. We want to be loyal to the master and mission, not the method and manner.

I have found that many believers have a wrong notion about Christian unity. They confuse unity with uniformity. Christian unity is not uniformity. Uniformity is the natural man's way of seeking unity and involves:
(1) looking for little things he has in common with others, then

(2) finding differences between his group and others, and finally

(3) increasingly insisting that those who are with him be like him.

That is not Christian unity. That is worldly uniformity. And, frankly, anyone can do it, which is why everyone is doing it. Christian unity is embracing diversity within the will of God (see 1 Corinthians 12). Did you catch the difference? Christian unity actually embraces diversity. Within God's will, there is grace for differences in personality and presentation.

Can you appreciate a sermon that is preached in a different style than you prefer? Can you worship with a song that isn't your favorite? Can you "talk up" a denomination that isn't yours? If not, you may need to take some of the grace that you have for sin, and apply some of it to style.

Multi-Site Church Road Trip

2009-09-09T22:12:00.000-07:00

Greg Ligon, co-author of Multi-Site Church Road Trip (which features a chapter about CTK) asked some follow up questions of me as part of a "blog tour" that includes a stop here today (Thursday, September 10th, 2009). (See www.multisitechurchroadtrip.com). Here are the questions and my answers....

1. Dave, you say in Multi-site Church Road Trip that you and the team at Christ the King have 120 campuses and many of those are actually International campuses. What does an international campus look like? How is the same/different from one of your state-side campuses?

Overseas our gatherings are often not in an owned or leased facilities. Some of our congregations meet in tents, or under trees, or town squares. Often the gatherings have children present, whereas in the US we offer children's programming simultaneous the worship service. In the US our services are typically an hour or less. Overseas, our services are often longer than two hours. In some cultures the leader has a more prominent role that we tend to see in the US.

2. I think it is interesting that you have a commitment to international campuses and a high value for use of technology in developing leaders but no Internet campuses? Any reason for that?

Our international reach is more of a "God-thing" than anything else. We had no plan to be outside of our own county, much less around the world. But once you define the church by relationship, instead of geography, you realize that relationships do not respect geographical boundaries. We say that we can go as far as relationships will take us. Our goal is to raise up people to do ministry, so we view technology as a tool, not a strategy.

3. We have talked recently about your discovery that there is a greater access to cell coverage than high speed internet in India and many of the countries you are serving in Africa and that this has prompted you to redesign your leadership development training to be delivered in text size messages. Can you give us an update on where you are in that process? What is working? What is not?

I send out a weekly email that gets resent as text by our international leaders. Some of our leaders follow me on Twitter as well. The cell phone is clearly the next laptop. More SMS texts are sent every day in the world than email messages. We are attempting to take our "teachable points of view" and distill them to 140 characters or less. We are also developing 60-second sermons that can be utilized on cell phones.

4. You are the author of Deliberate Simplicity, another title in the Leadership Network Innovation Series. How do the key principles of simplicity find application in the establishment and execution of International Campuses?

Simplicity resonates in the two-thirds world, because it really is the only option. There are not resources available in much of the world to support the attractional model.

5. What is new about the multi-site ministry at Christ the King since we last talked?

I believe that God is showing us some new things about worship. Many of our leaders are feeling that our corporate worship has been too much about us, and not enough about Him. We are also exploring more non-musical forms of worship that have great potential to reduce our dependence on musicians as key to expanding the church.

6. What have I not asked that I should have?

You ask great questions. One additional one might be, "What complicates overseas ministry?" The answer would be: money. There is such a huge resource disparity between our church in the US and our church in the two-thirds world that we are wrestling constantly with how much to support needs overseas. So far we have sent very nominal and sporadic support, and have placed an emphasis on being self-sustaining. But it is often difficult to say "no" when they need it and we have it.

Next stop? Robert Emmitt, Senior Pastor, Community Bible Church, San Antonio, Texas - communitybible.com

To get the latest updates be sure to sign up for the RSS feed at www.multisitechurchroadtrip.com

Class

2009-09-07T21:28:00.001-07:00

In the CTK story we see most small groups falling somewhere between being a Bible study, and being a social hang out. Some groups, of course, are Bible studies, and there is certainly nothing wrong with that. Other groups are purely social gatherings, and there is nothing wrong with that, either. But what we feel is "most right" for the "most people" is a group in the middle ground, that emphasizes biblical application in a social context. This type of gathering is what John Wesley called the "class."

One of the dictionary definitions for "class" is a "social group with similar opportunities." The "classes" that Wesley organized were not Bible study groups or the "sharing" groups we have come to know. They were weekly groups, led by a volunteer, in which participants gave a report to each other about their lives, their activities, their temptations, their failures, and their successes. The sharing was targeted to what it meant to be a Christ-follower. In the safety of friends, each one would be encouraged to follow after God and to do meet the needs of people in the larger community. The emphasis was on living out the Christian faith in all of life. The groups were powerful because there was an edge to the conversations - some might call it support or accountability - in every group meeting. Outsiders who would attend the meetings were struck by the spiritual authenticity and fervor. These were not ordinary people living ordinary lives. It was truly a special "class" of people.

To understand the Spirit of the "class," listen to Wesley's challenge: "Make every class meeting an exhilarating feast of divine love and holy joy and people will come no matter how tired and/or busy they are. Fire is kindled with fire and wind. Enthusiasm is kindled with enthusiasm and the Holy Spirit." Has your group become lifeless or boring? Pray for a fresh fire. Engage more deliberately. Ask daring spiritual questions. Expect transformation.

Proximity

2009-08-24T12:21:00.001-07:00

Proximity is prerequisite to community. You have to be around each other before you can listen to each other, know each other, share with each and carry out all the other "one-anothers."

Actually, From a description of the early church we read in Acts 2 there are four prerequisites to community: proximity, interaction, sharing and intimacy.
1. Proximity. Early on, the people who were part of the Christian community were around each other. They were with each other. They were with the apostles. There was a fellowship. "They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles." (Acts 2:42,43)

2. Interaction. As they started to be together, they started to do things together. They were sharing meals together. They started to “do life” together instead of separately.

3. Sharing. When you get around other people, and start doing things together, you find out what their needs are, and what you can do to help. You begin by sharing your story, and move to sharing your needs. "They had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need." (Acts 2:44,45)
4. Intimacy. Over time the early Christians began to share not just their money, but their hearts. "Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people." (Acts 2:46,47)

Intimacy happens when we share at a deep level, and receive sharing at a deep level. Intimacy rhymes with “into me see.” If we get together and all we talk about is the weather, we are not going to become intimate. But as we talk about our feelings, fears and faith we start to engage each other at a deeper, more intimate level. The four-step process to bonding as a group is 1) input, 2) feedback, 3) deeper input, 4) deeper feedback.

But it all starts with getting together.

By gathering in small groups, we don't insure that community will happen, but we at least give community a chance to happen. Ninety percent of it is "just showing up." In Christian community the percentage might be higher. Jesus said, "When two or three gather in my name I am there." Hebrews warns, "Don't stop getting together." Getting together is the beginning of everything.

Things

2009-07-29T17:12:00.001-07:00

There are now more licensed vehicles in America, than there are licensed drivers. The accumulation of more and more things (i.e. "the American way") has a corrosive effect - more than we might imagine. In addition to the resources that are tied up in owning, operating, repairing, running, storing, insuring and disposing things, there is an enormous "hidden" cost in diverted affection and focus. We don't have time for relationships, because we are too busy taking care of "things." Keeping stuff running takes undue management time.

A silver lining of the recession is that 32% of Americans have been spending less and intend to make their less costly lifestyle their "new normal." Nearly half of Americans say they already have what they need, up significantly from 2006. The hold of materialism is being broken. People are realizing that when you value objects less, you can value experiences and people more, and be richer for it. I have written about the church returning to deliberate simplicity. Frankly, it is much easier to make the challenge to the impersonal "church" (to a nameless, faceless organization) than it is to bring it right home to where you and I live. But I believe that is the next challenge. Are we prepared to strip away the extraneous, so that the essential can flourish?

One practical iteration of folks getting back to the "core" of life is the 100 Thing Challenge. The 100 Thing Challenge began as a blog, but now a number of individuals and groups have joined in and made it their modus operandi. The concept is simple. Pare your possessions to fewer than 100 items (a pair of shoes might count as one item, for example). A church in Minnesota took on this challenge as a group, and had so much to give to charity (boats, furniture, snowblowers) that it filled up a warehouse. The pastor went from five suits to one; from a dozen ties to two. The church enjoyed a return to basics, with less clutter and noise.

This is actually a very ancient Christian practice. The early church "sold their possessions and goods" and gave to anyone who had need. The biblical principal is this: We want to understate things so that we shout people. Last year my family went on a "rampage" and went through every closet and corner and pared "things" down significantly. It was a big step in the right direction. But Kristyn and I were just talking about new goals for this year, and seeing if we can get within the 100 Thing limit. My personal goal is to get rid of all my CDs, most of my books, and half of my clothes. I have nine pairs of shoes. I think I can get down to four. I have three watches. I only need one. Having less means less to worry about. Having less to worry about means more time for God and people.

Interested

2009-07-16T15:27:00.001-07:00

Jesus told us to be God-centered and others centered because it is the only way to fly. Not only does being self-absorbed not work for others, it doesn't even work for you. It is much more satisfying to perceive ourselves as an insignificant character in a huge story, and take genuine interest in the other characters. Listen to G.K. Chesterton:

Are there no other stories in the world except yours; and are all men busy with your business? Suppose we grant the details; perhaps when the man on the street did not seem to see you it was only his cunning; perhaps when the policeman asked you your name it was only because he knew it already. But how much happier you would be if you only knew that these people cared nothing about you! How much larger your life would be if your self could become smaller in it; if you could really look at other men with common curiosity and pleasure; if you could see them walking as they are in their sunny selfishness and their virile indifference! You would begin to be interested in them, because they were not interested in you. You would break out of this tiny and tawdry theatre in which your own little plot is always being played, and you would find yourself under a freer sky, in a street full of splendid strangers.

It seems to me that those in Christian leadership need to be especially reminded that "it's not about you." If you are wondering why it seems like people are not thinking about you, it's because they are not thinking about you (at least not very often). Now that you know that they are not interested in you, you can give your energy to being interested in them.

Review

2009-07-15T08:33:00.000-07:00

The progression from ministry being done by the pastor at the church to ministry being done by believers in the world (from "doing" church to "being" church) means that the small group is the new staff meeting.

In the traditional church, the most important meeting for ministry accountability was the board meeting. This was usually a monthly meeting between the church council (perhaps called deacons, elder or board members) and the pastor. The pastor, being the primary "minister" in the church, would come under review. What was happening in the ministry? Was anyone being reached? What more could be done? How can we pray? The accountability kept the pastor on his toes.

In the programmatic church, the most important meeting for ministry accountability was the staff meeting. This was usually a weekly or bi-monthly meeting between the senior pastor and the program staff (worship, kids, music, youth, etc.). The staff, being the primary "ministers" in the church, would come under review. What was happening in the ministry? Was anyone being reached? What more could be done? How can we pray? The accountability kept the staff on their toes.

In the missional church, the most important meeting for ministry accountability is the small group meeting. This is usually a weekly meeting consisting of various members of the body (a school teacher, a construction worker, an office worker, a stay at home mom, etc.). The small group members, being the primary "ministers" in the church, would come under review. What is happening in the ministry? Is anyone being reached? What more can be done? How can we pray? The accountability keeps the people on their toes.

Prostitution

2009-07-01T10:13:00.000-07:00

David Ryser was teaching at a school of ministry. He gave a short history of Christianity that went like this: "Christianity started in Palestine as a fellowship; it moved to Greece and became a philosophy; it moved to Italy and became an institution; it moved to Europe and became a culture; it came to America and became an enterprise." Ryser describes what happened next....

Some of the students were only 18 or 19 years old--barely out of diapers--and I wanted them to understand and appreciate the import of the last line, so I clarified it by adding, "An enterprise. That's a business." After a few moments Martha, the youngest student in the class, raised her hand. I could not imagine what her question might be. I thought the little vignette was self-explanatory, and that I had performed it brilliantly. Nevertheless, I acknowledged Martha's raised hand, "Yes, Martha." She asked such a simple question, "A business? But isn't it supposed to be a body?" I could not envision where this line of questioning was going, and the only response I could think of was, "Yes." She continued, "But when a body becomes a business, isn't that a prostitute?"

The room went dead silent. For several seconds no one moved or spoke. We were stunned, afraid to make a sound because the presence of God had flooded into the room, and we knew we were on holy ground. All I could think in those sacred moments was, "Wow, I wish I'd thought of that." I didn't dare express that thought aloud. God had taken over the class.

Martha's question changed my life. For six months, I thought about her question at least once every day. "When a body becomes a business, isn't that a prostitute?" There is only one answer to her question. The answer is "Yes." The American Church, tragically, is heavily populated by people who do not love God. How can we love Him? We don't even know Him; and I mean really know Him.

... I stand by my statement that most American Christians do not know God--much less love Him. The root of this condition originates in how we came to God. Most of us came to Him because of what we were told He would do for us. We were promised that He would bless us in life and take us to heaven after death. We married Him for His money, and we don't care if He lives or dies as long as we can get His stuff. We have made the Kingdom of God into a business, merchandising His anointing. This should not be. We are commanded to love God, and are called to be the Bride of Christ--that's pretty intimate stuff. We are supposed to be His lovers. How can we love someone we don't even know? And even if we do know someone, is that a guarantee that we truly love them? Are we lovers or prostitutes?

I was pondering Martha's question again one day, and considered the question, "What's the difference between a lover and a prostitute?" I realized that both do many of the same things, but a lover does what she does because she loves. A prostitute pretends to love, but only as long as you pay. Then I asked the question, "What would happen if God stopped paying me?"

For the next several months, I allowed God to search me to uncover my motives for loving and serving Him. Was I really a true lover of God? What would happen if He stopped blessing me? What if He never did another thing for me? Would I still love Him? Please understand, I believe in the promises and blessings of God. The issue here is not whether God blesses His children; the issue is
the condition of my heart. Why do I serve Him? Are His blessings in my life the gifts of a loving Father, or are they a wage that I have earned or a bribe/payment to love Him? Do I love God without any conditions? It took several months to work through these questions. Even now I wonder if my desire to love God is always matched by my attitude and behavior. I still catch myself being disappointed with God and angry that He has not met some perceived need in my life. I suspect this is something which is never fully resolved, but I want more than anything else to be a true lover of God.

So what is it going to be? Which are we, lovers or prostitutes?

Happen

2009-06-29T12:56:00.001-07:00

There are three questions that help us understand who the ministers are, and where the ministry happens. The three questions are:

1. What is the church? Answer: People. It is not a building, a program, or an institution, it is a people. It is the ekklesia - the "called out ones." Wherever two or three are gathered in Jesus' name, He is in the midst. It doesn't get more "church" than that!

2. Who are the ministers? Answer: People. The people are the ministers; the pastor is the ad-minister. Every person whom God has called, has been called for a purpose. There are good works which God has prepared in advance for us to do. Pastors are given to the church to prepare the saints for the work of ministry.

3. Where does the ministry happen? Answer: Wherever the people are. If the people are the church, and the people are the ministers, then wherever the people are is where the ministry happens. This theo-logical extension of questions 1. and 2. means that the ministry might happen in an office, a neighborhood, a restaurant, a home, a car, or wherever the body of Christ (regenerated people) are present.

The atomized church carries the greatest possibilities for transforming the spiritual landscape. In fact, the potential is staggering. A church of 100 people can either conduct a) a few centralized ministries (for example, a weeknight children's program "at" the "church"), b) a dozen decentralized ministries (for example, small groups), or c)....if everyone is clear that they are a minister....a hundred atomized personal ministries. The personal ministries will be as varied as the people who carry them out. We will no longer go to church. We will be the church.

Thus far, CTK represents the evolution of a) to b)....from centralized, attractional ministry to decentralized, relational, ministry. We have chosen small groups to be the point of emphasis instead of the Sunday service. We have said, "Every person needs to be in a small group, because every person in a small group has a ministry, and that is to every other person in the group." This is progress. The shift has helped us to break from three restrictive and limited ideas; 1) that the pastor is the minister, 2) that the church building is the place of ministry, and 3) that Sunday morning is the time for ministry. By convening groups of 2-10 people in homes and restaurants for friendship, growth, encouragement and outreach we have moved away from pastor-centrality, facility-centrality and Sunday-centrality. We have shifted from primary care (by a professional) to mutual care (by one another). In the process we have shifted our mentality about the weekend service, to be a convention of cells rather than congregation. Instead of trying to attract followers, we have been attempting to attract leaders. Our pastors have moved from working in the ministry to working on the ministry, in support of small group leaders.

The next step in our evolution is from b) to c), from a decentralized to atomized ministry. The small group has proven to be a great training ground for people to be the ministers. The danger, frankly, if we stay at b) is that the small group will become the new, albeit smaller, fortress, and that once again the arrows will turn in. The small group could become the new "place" where ministry happens. The small group leader will become the new "minister." Wednesday night (or Tuesday or Thursday) will be the new time. Instead of going to the people, we will ask the people to come to us, only now instead of asking people to come "to church" we will be asking them to come "to group." While we like the idea of them coming through the "side door" (group) better than the "front door" (weekend service) we like even better the idea of us going out through those doors and going to them.

To

2009-06-22T10:17:00.001-07:00

A truth that will keep you sane as a spiritual leader: We have responsibility to people, not for people. Mark Waltz, in his book Lasting Impressions, does a nice job describing the difference:

• When I'm responsible to people, I understand they have a choice. When I'm responsible for people, I think I should decide for them.

• When I'm responsible to people, I know they must figure out their next step. When I'm responsible for people, I try to tell them what their next step is.

• When I'm responsible to people, I allow them to bear the brunt of the consequences for their own chosen actions. When I'm responsible for people, I assume the guilt, or worse the shame, for them.

• When I'm responsible to people, I engage in their journey, offering encouragement and teaching. When I'm responsible for people I try to direct their journey, never allowing them to wrestle, mess up or make a wrong turn.

• When I'm responsible to people, I talk to God on their behalf. When I'm responsible for people, I talk to people a lot on God's behalf.

One of the most basic boundaries we can maintain is our skin. I am responsible for everything inside my skin. You are responsible for everything inside your skin. It is a fundamental demarcation between "me" and "you." Sometimes pastors feel like they have to have all the answers, solve all the problems and make everything right...for everyone. If you are one of these, my heart goes out to you today. It is a very frustrating thing to feel responsible for the thoughts and actions of other people. It is quite liberating to know that I only have a responsibility to other people - to love them, to be honest with them, to be a friend and support. What's going on inside them is "all theirs."

Lover

2009-06-12T16:08:00.001-07:00

I was in a meeting with pastors, talking about small groups. I made the statement that I thought small groups were all about love. A pastor asked, "Doesn't that say the wrong thing, asking people to be in a small group so that they will be loved?" I answered, "I'm not asking people to be in a small group so that they can be loved. I'm asking them to be in a small group so that they can love. The person in the small group is the lover, not the lovee." The mission of Christ the King Community Church is to create an authentic Christian community that effectively reaches out to unchurched people in love, acceptance and forgiveness, so that they may experience the joy of salvation and a purposeful life of discipleship. That mission applies as much or more to the small group as to the Worship Center. We are here to "reach out effectively in love."

Of course, people do need to be loved. And you, of course, are a person. I'm not sure there's anything necessarily wrong with putting yourself in a position where you can get what you need. Searching for love is perfectly natural. But searching TO love is perfectly supernatural. We are calling people to put themselves in a position to supernaturally fulfill the one-another commands of scripture. But this can only happen if group participants all come prepared to give themselves as a blessing to the others in the group. Giovanni Francesco Bernardone (St. Francis) offered up a prayer along these lines: "Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life."

Of course if everyone in a group comes prepared to be a lover, the likelihood is great that everyone in the group is going to end up being a lovee, as well. But the rationale is deeper than utilitarianism. Spiritual veterans like St. Francis will tell you that you can only get what you give. We're called to be a river, not a reservoir. As you arrive at your group meeting, your prayer should be, "Lord, help me to love the people in my group well." Undoubtedly you will have needs in your own life (for encouragement, for insight, for understanding), but if you fixate on those needs you will be having a natural group experience, not a supernatural one. Get the arrows pointed out. When the arrows are pointed out it aligns with the heart of God and he is pleased to bless that. If you will be a lover, instead of a lovee, you'll find that the more you are a blessing, the more you will be blessed. He'll get it to you if he can get it through you.

Year

2009-06-10T09:44:00.001-07:00

Church consultant Lyle Schaller says that one of the questions he likes to ask when he enters a church to observe is, "What year is it?" Is it 1958? It was in the church in which I grew up. Is it 1972? 1980? There is a tendency for churches to get stuck in a certain era, and not stay current with culture. We need new wineskins for the wine. So what year is it at CTK? I would say about 1995. At least that's my assessment of our overall musical scene. We are doing a mostly rock/pop style with a full band. It is a big sound, suited for big songs. Top worship songs from 1995 included Shout to the Lord and Blessed Be the Name of the Lord.

1995 was a memorable year for me, because it was the year that I began to attend CTK in Bellingham. In many ways that era defined the culture I exported to Skagit Valley in 1999, where CTK was new to many people. The early adopters have since handed the culture and music off to many other newbies in dozens of worship centers, and in some cases there are grandchildren and great-grandchildren now carrying the culture. While 1995 is not that far in the distant past, there has been a lot happen in our culture in the past 15 years (like the internet). There has been an explosion of media, as people who once were consumers of information have now become producers of information through vlogs, blogs and tweets. TV channels have gone from dozens to hundreds. Cell phones have become ubiquitous. The news cycle is 24 hours a day. The need to sort through the clutter has produced a new verb: Google ("Let me google that").

Modernity is giving rise to "alternative" approaches. Some call it post-modernism, but I prefer the word pre-modernism. There is a hunger for life "as it used to be," with less clutter and less noise. In the world of "now" less is more and better is bigger. Clarity has become the new creativity. The modern music scene has caught on. An indicator? The results of the recent American Idol competition. It came down to two contestants: Kris Allen, a funky, straight-ahead balladeer with a lot of "space" in his music, and Adam Lambert, a "glam" rocker with a big voice whose presentations were over the top. Clearly, Adam was the bigger talent. Kris won easily. It's not 1995 anymore.

The pendulum tends to swing when it comes to culture. Following loud eras, things get softer. Following softer eras, things get louder. Such may be the case in worship as well. Shout to the Lord followed I Love Your Lord. What will follow Shout to the Lord? I'm not sure yet, but I believe we are in a softer era. If you close your eyes during commercials, you will notice an obvious understatement in the music bed nowadays. Popular movie soundtracks are also employing a variety of independent, alternative and eclectic artists (my favorite example is the soundtrack for the movie Juno). There is not as much instrumentation in this music; maybe one or two instruments, maybe a harmonica or a mandolin. The chord structures are simple. Percussion is more an accent, than a driving force. It doesn't have to blow your hair back to be cool any more.

I don't get to a lot of concerts, but I recently went to a Third Day concert. Third Day is a classic band from the nineties, noted for songs like God of Wonders and Your Love Oh Lord. The best part of the concert? When lead singer Mac Powell showed up in the middle of the crowd, took requests, and played them "unplugged." It was real. It was informal. It was tasty. It was 2009. I walked out saying, "That was cool." I'm anxious to see our "next generation" of worship leaders take us into the present. I'll know we're current when an unchurched person walks out and says, "Wow, that was cool"....the same thing I said in 1995.

Known

2009-06-02T06:39:00.001-07:00

Why small groups? It all comes back to love.

I recently had small group leaders over to my house and I shared with them this equation:
1. We want everyone to be loved. God created us for this very purpose, to love and be loved. We want everyone to have this experience.

2. What this really means is that we want everyone to be known. A person feels unloved to the extent that they feel unknown. Until a person is fully known there is always a question in their mind, "I wonder if people would still love me, if they knew me?" We want people to find that the answer is, "Yes."

3. Being known means finding a place and time for being known. In our modern, impersonal world there are not as many ways that you can become known, or know others. There is an abundance of superficiality, even in relationships. This means we must be more intentional about seeing that such places and times exist.

4. The small group is a place and time for being known (loved). It may not be the only place where people can become known and loved, but it is a proven place. We have chosen small groups as our "Plan A" because they are scriptural, strategic and scalable.

5. This makes the small group meeting the most important meeting we have. I am convinced that for many people what they need is not a sermon, but a friend. If I have a choice to invite a lost person to a) our worship service, or b) our small group, I choose b). There is no more important convention of CTK than the small group that meets in Jesus' name. There are things that a person will get in a small group that they will never get by looking at the back of someone's head in a worship service.

6. Which makes the small group leader the most important leader we have. Our Ministry Directors are in place to support the small group leader. Our pastors are in place to support our ministry directors who support the small group leaders. There is no more important leader in our story than the leader who will convene 2-10 people in Jesus name for friendship, growth, encouragement and outreach.

7. Because the small group leader is taking responsibility to see that people are loved. It's easy to say "we want everyone to be loved." The small group leader takes responsibility to see that it happens. This is what leaders do: they see what needs to be done and they do what needs to be done.

When you break it down, the best groups are about love, bottom line. In fact, I regularly tell small group leaders, "If you don’t know what to do in your group, just love everyone." That sounds pretty simple, but it's actually hard to do consistently. For this reason we must pray, "God help me to love the people in my group.” That is a prayer that should be prayed throughout the week, but then intensified prior to and during the group meeting. God will answer that prayer. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Informational

2009-06-02T06:35:00.000-07:00

The worst groups I've ever been in have been informational. The best groups that I have ever been in have been relational. Let me explain.

In my experience, the best small groups I've ever been in were a heart trip, not a head trip. When a group becomes about information (what we're learning, what we're studying) it tends to be dry and impersonal. The participants, instead of relating to each other, relate to the material, as a third party. This is not community in the deepest sense. It is a shared experience, but not the experience of sharing. Instead of syncing up our lives around Christ, we are simply syncing up our thinking around the material we are studying. It's the difference between going on a trip, and staying at home and reading the map.

In an information group, the book being studied can actually get in the way of relationship. The book can even be the screen people hide behind. If at any point a participant feels they might have to reveal who they really are, they just point their nose back into the text and say, "I really like what the author says here." Then they just read the words from the text, smile glibly, and wait for the next person to talk...about what they like about the text. Presto. Off the hook. After a few months of being a group like this, unless you are a studious type (maybe 5% of the population), you are ready to quit. Your impulse toward community starts screaming inside, "Would somebody please get real!" Your head hurts as you walk out the door following one of these group meetings. But even worse, your heart hurts. You never get to open up the text of your life.

I met with a friend recently who attends another church. It just so happened that our meeting took place the same night as his small group Bible Study. He confessed, "I'm glad I didn't have to go to my Bible Study tonight." He told me about how the group he was in was supposed to spend 30 minutes in fellowship, 30 minutes in Bible Study, and 30 minutes in sharing and prayer. But over time the group had started to spend about 10 minutes in fellowship, over an hour in Bible Study, and about 10 minutes in sharing and prayer. He told me, "There are many weeks when Christ has been doing some awesome things in my life, and I never get to share that." There was a sadness on his face as he said that to me. I don't think you want to skimp on the relational aspects of your group. If you are going to skimp, skimp on the informational aspects. Informational is nice; relationship is needed.

One of the reason why we don't use the phrase Bible Study, and instead say Bible Discussion, is that we don't want to have groups be about the map. We want groups to be about the journey. The word of God is powerful and profitable, but as James makes clear, it's a mirror, and it's greatest value comes when we actually apply what we learn....when we put it into practice. Small groups work best when the emphasis is on application. For most people, the gap holding them back is not the gap between what they know and what they don't know, it's the gap between what they know and what they're living.

Some view small groups as an extension of the Christian Education department of the church. I do not. I view small groups as an extension of the Pastoral Care department of the church.

Proprietary

2009-05-11T15:28:00.000-07:00

Stephen Ambrose, noted author of Band of Brothers, Undaunted Courage and D-Day, was a historian with a Ph.D. Prior to his death from lung cancer in 2002, he served as a professor of history at several universities. But he was soundly panned by colleagues for his "pop" (short for popular or populist) approach to dispensing history. His books put history into the hands of the common people. Many history professors didn't like that.

It is often true for various disciplines (science, psychology, etc.) that the "experts" come up with their own language and protocol to insulate their high level information from the outsiders. They view their industry, and the attendant knowledge reservoir, as proprietary. They don't like it when someone comes along and puts the cookies on the lowest shelf. They don't want to make it easy on the followers, but hard. Shoot, they paid a price for this information! Everyone should have to pay the price (right?).

Religion is not only not immune from this urge toward exclusivity, but perhaps the most susceptible to it. Jesus fought the proprietary nature of the Pharisees, Sadducees and scribes. He ended up being crucified, and his loudest detractors were not secularists, but religious-types, who saw him as an affront to their industry. I would suggest that the Great Reformation was Martin Luther (and others) putting the scripture into the hands of the common people. I would suggest that the current Reformation is putting the ministry into the hands of the common people, and you can expect that the "religious elites" are not going to like the populist approach of groups like CTK and others.

Populism is the stuff of movements, like the Quickbooks craze. Here's what Clayton Christensen said about Quicken: "Quicken dominates its market because it is easy and convenient. Its makers pride themselves on the fact that the vast majority of Quicken customers simply buy the program, boot it up on their computers, and begin using it without having to read the instruction manual. Its developers made it so convenient to use, and continue to make it simpler and more convenient, by watching how customers use the product, not by listening to what they or the “experts” say they need. By watching for small hints of where the product might be difficult or confusing to use, the developers direct their energies toward a progressively simpler, more convenient product that provided adequate, rather than superior, functionality….Intuitʼs disruptive Quickbooks changed the basis of product competition from functionality to convenience and captured 70 percent of its market within two years of its introduction."

If you make your sermons understandable, you make it easy for someone to start their own ministry, and you make it simple to get into a small group, you are going to have a popular ministry. Many churches just flat out make it too hard. But I'm not suggesting you take a populist approach because it works. I'm suggesting you take a populist approach because Jesus did. Jesus did not call us servants, but friends. He said, "Everything the Father has revealed to me, I've revealed to you." He didn't play peek-a-boo with his vast insights. He didn't even make people enroll. He just gave Himself away. Like our leader, our goal is not to make it difficult for people to get into the kingdom of God. We must be people of the easy yoke, the light burden. Our goal is to put the cookies on the lowest shelf where everyone can get at them.

First

2009-05-06T06:57:00.001-07:00

The first and great commandment is the first and great commandment because it is the first and great commandment! "No other gods before me." God has to be first. When Jesus was asked about the greatest commandment he pointed to commandment #1, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, your soul, your mind, your strength." In other word, God first.

When God is first, the other commandments come easier. When God is #1, you don't want to take his name in vain. When God is #1, you want to take a weekly sabbatical with him. When God is #1 it radically affects how you relate to others. You don't want to lie, cheat, steal, covet or commit adultery or murder. When you counsel people, it almost doesn't matter the issue, the cure is commandment #1. When someone says, "Pastor, I'm having a challenge with my teenage son" the reply could be, "Let me ask you first, in your parenting, is God #1?" If someone asks me about how they can get along with their boss, I might reply, "As an employee, is God #1?" Interpersonal challenges can be symptomatic of a much more fundamental issue: God is not first.

Recently a young man asked me for prayer because he was having difficulty finding a job. I asked him if God was #1. He admitted that God has not been first. I told him that God had to be the first priority in his life. But his follow-up question was, "If God is first in my life, will I get a job?" That's a fair question, and one that many will ask. I told him that God needed to be #1 because God needs to be #1, period. No matter what our circumstances in life, God has to come first. I also told him about the story of Job, and how Job was dedicated and yet was brought through some challenging times. But all things being equal, there is an interplay between putting God first and our needs: "Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you." This is a principle of provision, that we can count on God for physical things, when he can count on us for spiritual things.

At CTK we have tried to narrow our focus to "Love God and Love people." But if you really want to narrow it down, just put God first.

Collapse

2009-04-27T12:07:00.000-07:00

Is our society on the brink of collapse? Could that be a good thing?

Ok, I know there's enough bad news out there. And I also know that it's a pretty cheap thrill to predict the demise of the world (Y2K anyone?). But it does appear that our present system is not sustainable. We cannot be great unless we're good, and the goodness is gone. Shortsightedness and greed have conspired to bring about an explosive cocktail. Those in control are apparently going to ride this horse until it drops. And drop it will. In James Kunstler's The Long Emergency he says, "(Those in control) will not surrender to circumstance until it is simply no longer possible to carry on...meaning there is not likely to be any planning or preparation for change." Abba Eban counseled, "History teaches that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives."

Once, when he was stuck in a cab in a traffic jam in London, G.K. Chesterton began musing on the breakdown of civilization. "Comunications may break down, and men may be forced to live where they are as best they can. I think how probable, after all, is the prospect of a relapse into barbarism." A sign that we might be getting closer? The rapid rise in gun sales. Gun shows are crowded. Gun prices are rising. Vigilante law may be lurking around the corner. Depressing, isn't it? Not in Chesterton's estimation. He suggests in The Outline of Sanity, "by this broken road simplicity may return." He is hopeful: "Man has before now broken down in the elaborate labors of empire and bureaucracy and big business and been content to fall to a simpler life. He has been content to picnic like a tramp in the ruin of his own palaces....We will not be downhearted. Our cities may also be deserted and our palaces in ruins; and there may be a chance yet for humanity to become more human."

A couple developments that may speed humanity becoming more human: the end of the age of cheap oil, and the escalating pricetag (either environmental impact if we let it go, or in cost if we don't) of coal-generated electricity. Just imagine in the next 20 years being priced out of these commodities. Bye-bye American way of life. Kunstler suggests that American suburbia be retrofitted "into the kind of mixed use, smaller scaled, more fine-grained walkable environments we will need to carry on daily life in the coming age of greatly reduced motoring." In Hope for the Coming Collapse, Robert Moore-Jumonville says, "Those places to which we can jog...may soon define the parameters of community." By the way, if CTK can continue to keep the main thing the main thing, and continue to break down into smaller communities of caring, we may be ideally positioned for what is about to come.

In any case, it's not if our civilization will collapse, but when. Kingdoms come and kingdoms go. Christ's kingdom is forever. It is the rock hewn out of the mountain that strikes at the feet of the statue, crumbles it to the ground, and then becomes the mountain that fills the earth. I'm glad it's not my job is not to prop up this world's system. As author James Baldwin remarked, "I'm optimistic about the future, but not the future of this civilization. I'm optimistic about the civilization which will replace this one."

2009-04-22T16:54:00.000-07:00

Communication isn't what it used to be. My mother kept my grandmother updated with letters (sent one of those lately?). My father used to complain about the length of our phone calls. Now we have Facebook, email, texting, blogs and Twitter (where you can send periodic "tweets" about your day). I contend that there is still nothing that beats a face to face conversation, when you get to enjoy one of those. But those conversations can actually be enhanced digitally. Here's how:

1. Speed. When you stay in touch digitally, you can more quickly catch up personally. Instead of having nothing to talk about, or fiddling around and wasting precious time with the "What's up?....Nothing much really" conversations, you can get right to the heart of life: "I saw that you are getting baptized this weekend" or "What's this about your kid getting a CT scan?" Now we're talking! Our friends have done us the favor of providing the topic. Now we can engage, share and pray with each other.

2. Depth. When you stay in touch digitally, you can take your personal conversations deeper. In an ironic twist, people are more apt to share something significant in a blog posting than they will across a coffee table. The sense of anonymity and safety that comes when you are hiding behind a computer screen can seduce you into a vulnerability that is unusual. How many times have you heard a concerning report about someone and thought, "I just saw them and they didn't say anything about that!" With digital, there's a greater likelihood that you'll know the skinny.

3. Constancy. When you stay in touch digitally you can avoid long intervals without any contact. With the various digital outlets, you can maintain at least a trickle of information between personal visits. This reduces the need to get "caught up" and allows you to both talk about the present more than the past when you see each other. My sister uses the phrase "ambient awareness" to describe the benefit she receives by being connected to others on Facebook.

The digital revolution is not a very good replacement for face to face community, but it is a pretty good enhancement to it.

Red

2009-04-21T16:15:00.000-07:00

Jesus not only came to save us from our sin, but to teach us how to live. Some have called their commitment to Jesus' teaching being a "red-letter Christian" (red-letter edition bibles highlight the words of Christ in red). The most extensive record of Jesus' teaching comes from the Sermon on the Mount. In that message Jesus said:

- You have to have the right spirit to make it into God’s kingdom.

- Even if you go through tough times here, you are going to be all right, because you’re looking forward to heaven anyway.

- To a certain extent you need to stick out in this world, like salt, or a light on a hill, so that other people can see the difference.

- God is mostly interested in what is going on inside of us…..that’s why the ante is going up, from not just murdering someone, to not even hating someone; and from not committing adultery, to not even looking lustfully at a woman.

- If you are wanting to do something religious, but remember that you have a conflict with someone else, go resolve the conflict first (this is first priority) – try to solve these conflicts without going to court.

- You may have to take drastic action to keep from succumbing to temptation….do what you need to do

- Divorce is sometimes the only thing that can be done, but if people are breaking up for reasons less than that, I’m not just going to hold them accountable, but anyone else who enters into that relationship and shouldn’t be there.

- Don’t get into swearing and oaths, just make sure your yes is a yes, and your no is a no.

- If people are going to take advantage of you, so be it. Go the extra mile, turn the other cheek (God’s keeping track).

- Don’t just love the people who are easy to love…anybody can do that. – love like God loves, regardless of how much they deserve it.

- Don’t be a performer with your good deeds….if that is your intent, you’ve already got your applause. The people who are going to get my applause are people who were willing to serve without recognition, and pray without anybody knowing.

- When you pray to me, address me as your father….then ask for what you need – everything from the food you need for that day, to forgiveness.

- Remember that the stuff of this world is temporal and temporary – it’s either going to rust, rot, or be stolen. The stuff that they can’t take away, is the stuff you should invest your life in.

- Don’t worry so much about physical things – I’m taking care of the birds with no worries….I’ll take care of you.

- If you are going to be the judge of others, be careful. I may just turn around and use the exact same standards to judge you.

- If you ask me for something, know that I’m going to give you my best. I’m not going to withhold what you need. You can count on that.

- If in doubt about how to treat others, ask yourself this question: “How would I want to be treated if I was them?”

- Not everyone is going to be able to stay on this path. It’s hard. It will be easier for people to go down the same path as everyone else. But the path I’m laying out actually leads you somewhere.

- You can tell a lot about what’s inside of people by what you see come out of them (kind of like fruit on a tree). Just keep watching….you’ll see.

- There are going to be some folks who in the end will stand before me and act like they were my buddies all along. I’ll wish they had been. I’m going to put it straight to them, and honor the choice they made to live their life without me.

- Be careful about what kind of life you are actually building. Some buildings don’t stand up when the storm comes. Make sure you build on the right foundation.

Cuts

2009-04-15T07:52:00.000-07:00

Resentments. Don't have any big ones. But lately the Lord has been revealing to me that I may have a thousand little ones.

With a men's group I've been going through the workbook "Twelve Steps - A Spiritual Journey." There is a section in that book that states "Resentment is an underlying cause of many forms of spiritual disease. our mental and physical ills are frequently the direct result of this unhealthy condition. No doubt others have harmed us, and we have a legitimate right to feel resentful. However, resentment doesn't punish anyone but ourselves. We can't hold resentments and find healing at the same time. It's best released by asking God for the strength to forgive the offender. Learning to deal with resentment in a healthy way is an important part of our recovery process." As I reflected on that statement, I was satisfied that I am not harboring any big resentments at this stage in my life. But I felt the Holy Spirit speak to me, "Little ones count too."

When we resent we may be feeling injured, violated, left out, angry or bitter. The ministry is filled with opportunities for these feelings to arise. Remember how Jesus asked us to "take up a cross" and follow Him? Yup. It's going to be painful. Remember how Paul spoke of "the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings"? Uh-huh. Some of us have the wounds to show for it.

In Iran they still do stonings for political dissidents and criminals. They bury the person so that only their shoulders, neck and head are above the ground. Then the government provides special-sized rocks for the public to throw. Not just any rock will do. If the rock is too big, it could kill the person immediately and ruin the stoning. If the rock were too small, it might not inflict sufficient damage and pain. I never really thought before about the art of stoning someone, but it makes sense when you think about it.

Sometimes ministry can feel like death by a thousand cuts. You might think back over the criticisms, the departures, the disappointments and find that they were just the right size. Not big enough to kill you. Not small enough to shrug off. The perfect size to cause you maximum pain short of death. Go ahead and feel it. Then let it go.

Leaderless

2009-04-01T12:15:00.000-07:00

Would groups be better off without a defined leader?

You hear sometimes about "leaderless organizations." I'm not buying it. Oh, I agree that there are leaderless organizations! I just don't buy that they are going anywhere, or that this is what we want. Everything rises and falls with leadership.

There is much being written these days about collaboration and teamwork. Truly, there is nothing more exciting than seeing a group of people come together to accomplish something extraordinary. But make no mistake. There are no great teams out there without great point guards, quarterbacks, coaches or captains. Leadership is to a group what a spark is to a flame.

One of my earliest memories helped me define leadership. The little Alaskan church I attended as a boy called a new pastor after a protracted vacancy. The church lacked morale and momentum. We were occupying a half-finished church building, having run out of funds to complete the project. The surroundings were crude – floors without carpets, unfinished walls, rudimentary furnishings. Our numbers were small. But the first action of the new pastor put in motion a virtuous cycle. He removed the makeshift communion table (a flimsy garage sale castoff) from the front of the church and raised money for a solid, wooden one. It was a symbolic act, but a powerful one. As a boy looking on, this made quite an impression on me. It was a microcosm of leadership. He saw what needed to be done and he did what needed to be done.

CTK takes a different approach to leadership in a couple respects. First, we see the role as more important than most. Second, we see the personality as less important than most. So we differ, not in regard to leadership's importance, but its implementation. We want to be a leaderful organization. We just don't want to be leader-dependent or leader-focused.

There is no question that leaders are sometimes self-absorbed, domineering jerks. But in an effort to avoid that distasteful possibility, we don't want to throw out the baby with the bath water. We still need leaders. They just have to be humble, servant leaders instead of pompous, selfish ones.

Realism

2009-03-23T13:34:00.000-07:00

The 11th commandment is "Keep it real." The Secret Life of the American Teenager (on ABC's Family Channel) keeps the commandment. Shailene Woodley (who stars as teen Amy) says, "A lot of teens respond to it because it's so true to life in so many ways." In it's first season the show has drawn up to 3.4 million viewers, the highest for viewers age 12 to 34. An example of the realism: Amy gives birth to a boy in the last show of the season, about nine months after the premiere. She got pregnant through a one-time tryst. The show explores the unplanned pregnancy, and all the attendant relational challenges that presents, with parents, friends and extended family. It's a raw take on life, that has opened up avenues for parents to talk with their teens about hot topics like sex, drugs and alcohol.
Can we, as church leaders, get a clue? Reality is where it's at. There is a great opportunity here for leaders and churches who will apply real faith to real life in real ways. And if you stay in reality, there is always material. As I thought back on this past week, here is some of the reality going on for people in my congregation:

- an expectant mom had a miscarriage

- a young man was overwhelmed trying to process the fourth step (getting ready for forgive) of the twelve steps

- an expanding family is finding it difficult to find a bigger home

- a banker was faced with the dilemma of reworking a loan for a friend, even though the loan was processed originally by a different loan officer

- a woman was looking for a $1000 car that would run well

- a man led worship for the first time in a couple years

- a father and grown son had a significant argument about politics

- a couple decided that they needed to get back into marriage counseling

- a military wife was trying to make a decision about divorce

The one charge that has never been leveled against the Bible is that its characters are not real people. Even its greatest heroes, like David, are presented so unvarnished, so “warts and all,” that the Book of Samuel has been called the most honest historical writing of the ancient world. We've got reality in the text, and we've got reality in the world, can we get reality in the church?

Whisker

2009-03-17T18:02:00.000-07:00

Some times big steps are in order. At other times you advance by a whisker. Tough circumstances call for smaller goals.

In Dr. Robert Mauer's book One Small Step Can Change Your Life he writes about a patient of his named Julie who was 30 pounds overweight. She was suffering from depression and fatigue. The doctor did not ask her to "lose 30 pounds." His prescription was much less rigorous. He said, "How about if you march in place in front of the television for one minute every day." It was the kick start she needed. By taking that one step, she got moving again. And once she got moving, she kept moving. And over time, the weight came off.

There is an organizational guru called the Fly Lady, who offers a 5-minute remedy to home cleaning. She suggests setting the alarm for five minutes, and then go into the messiest room in the house and start clearing it. When the timer goes off, you can stop with a clear conscience. What happens, of course, is that most people don't stop. They keep going. Because now they have momentum on their side.

Ken Blanchard gave managers a powerful tool when he wrote the classic One-Minute Manager. Knowing that managers dread giving employees feedback, he proscribed a smaller dose. He gave managers a whisker goal he call "one-minute praisings." Just catch them doing something right and give them an atta-boy. See, that's not that hard! He knew, of course, that once managers start talking to employees about the work that is being done, these conversations are likely to continue, and that's a good thing.

Whisker goals are particularly helpful when the challenge seems monumental. For instance, some folks are looking at overwhelming financial challenges - huge debts and hostile creditors. Financial guru Dave Ramsey speaks about creating a "snowball" by combining small amounts of money that are spent on frivolities like coffee and candy bars (the "snowflakes") to address these creditors. Start with the little things, and let the little things build up.

Glorify

2009-03-10T08:57:00.000-07:00

It is in the heart of a Christian to glorify God. How do we do that? What Paul indicates is that glorifying God is more of a why than a what. In 1 Corinthians 10:31 he writes that whether we eat or drink or whatever we do, we should do it for the glory of God. The what can vary. The why (who we're doing it "for") remains the same. Glorifying God is not so much our actions as our motivations.

In the background of the first letter to Corinthians is an issue around eating and drinking. Meat that was offered to idols would show up in the local market. There was a disagreement among believers whether or not such meat should be purchased. Eventually Paul weighed in and said, "Whatever you do, do it for the glory of God."
Some people have some very particular ideas about what you should be doing or not doing to please God. Glorifying God is a heart matter. No matter what situation, there are five ways we can glorify God:

Trust

Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose confidence is in him. (Jeremiah 17:7) In any situation we can bring God glory by trusting him. In our current political and economic conditions, we have a great opportunity to express our trust in God. As the Psalmist said (20:7): Some trust in chariots and some in horses,
but we trust in the name of the LORD our God.

Obey

Love the LORD your God and keep his requirements, his decrees, his laws and his commands always. (Deuteronomy 11:1) We glorify God by obeying him. At the marriage in Cana, where Jesus performed his first miracle, Mary's instruction to the servants was worth the price of admission: "Whatever he tells you to do, do it." We can go a long way toward glorifying God by simply saying to him, "Whatever you ask me to do, the answer is 'Yes.'"

Imitate

To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. (1 Peter 2:21) Someone was recently describing a conflict they were having with someone, and said to me, "I am not going to back down from telling this person the truth!" I reminded them that it was said of Jesus that he was full of both grace and truth. As a Christ-follower you could just as easily say, "I am not going to back down from showing this person grace!" It is hard to do both. But in any and every situation we can glorify God by imitating him.

Acknowledge

In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight. (Proverbs 3:6) When I officiate basketball games I have a little ritual I go through during the pledge of allegiance. I look up at the ceiling and God and me have a little conversation. I say, "God, help me in this game to represent you well. In all of my interactions with coaches, players and fans, may you give me grace." Some might look at a basketball game as a secular activity, but I make it spiritual by invoking Christ's presence.

Praise

Praise the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. (Psalm 103:2) No matter “what,” you can praise him. There is a lot of goodness in the world, and we have a chance to glorify God for it. This, as the Westminster Catechism says, is the chief end of man.

Along that line, I want to share something that I read, but I’m not sure where (I hate it when I can't give credit where credit is due). But it speaks to the immense role that we play in the grander story:

We live in a far more dramatic, more dangerous story than we imagined. The reason we love The Chronicles of Narnia or Star Wars or The Matrix or The Lord of the Rings is that they are telling us something about our lives that we never, ever get on the evening news…Without this (truth) burning in our hearts, we lose the meaning of our days. It all withers down to fast food and bills and voice mail and who really cares anyway? Do you see what has happened? The essence of our faith has been stripped away. The very thing that was to give our lives meaning – this way of seeing – has been lost. Or stolen from us. Notice that those who have tried to wake us up to this reality were usually killed for it: the prophets, Jesus, Stephen, Paul, most of the disciples, in fact….

Every mythic story shouts to us that in this desperate hour we have a crucial role to play….For most of life, Neo [from the Matrix] sees himself only as Thomas Anderson, a computer programmer for a large software corporation. As the drama really begins to heat up and the enemy hunts him down, he says to himself, “This is insane. Why is this happening to me? What did I do? I’m nobody. I didn’t do anything.” A very dangerous conviction…though one shared by most…What he later comes to realize – and not a moment too soon – is that he is “the One” who will break the power of the Matrix.

Frodo, the little Halfling from the Shire, young and naïve is so many ways, “the most unlikely person imaginable,” is the Ring Bearer. He, too, must learn through dangerous paths and fierce battle that a task has been appointed to him, and if he does not find a way, no one will. Dorothy is just a farm girl from Kansa, who stumbled into Oz not because she was looking for adventure but because someone had hurt her feelings and she decided to run away from home. Yet she’s the one to bring down the Wicked Witch of the West. Joan of Arc was also a farm girl, illiterate, the youngest in her family, when she received her first vision from God. Just about everyone doubted her; the commander of the French army said she should be taken home and given a good whipping. Yet she ends up leading the armies to war.

You see this throughout Scripture: a little boy will slay the giant, a loudmouthed fisherman who can’t hold down a job will lead the church….things are not as they seem. We are not what we seem.

Of all the eternal truths we don’t believe, this is the one we doubt most of all. Our days are not extraordinary. They are filled with the mundane, with hassles mostly. And we? We are….a dime a dozen. Nothing special really. Probably a disappointment to God. But as C.S. Lewis wrote, “The value of myth is that it takes all the things we know and restores to them the rich significance which has been hidden by ‘the veil of familiarity.’” You are not what you think you are. There is a glory to your life that your Enemy fears, and he is hell-bent on destroying that glory before you act on it.

There

2009-03-03T15:09:00.000-08:00

The place to go from here is there. Of course, we'd love to see the kingdom advance everywhere. But we don't get to go everywhere, unless we first go there.

In Matthew Jesus said we’re to be like a city on a hill. If you expand on that analogy, our immediate impact is to be regional. The rays of light are going to be seen in the cities all around. We, his followers, are going to be like shafts of light going out, first to the surrounding area. In this respect CTK has a distinctive missiology: We see Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the ends of the earth as sequential. That is different than the traditional church. The traditional Church has done near and far missions and little in between. We have gone from Bellingham to Whatcom County to Skagit County to various surrounding counties, states and countries.

The little church I grew up in had the "missions" board in the hall, with the world map, and pictures of far-away missionaries surrounding the map. Little ribbons went from the pin on the map to the pictures. We had an annual missions conference with the slides of Africa, or some other far off locale. But we didn’t talk about our neighbors in the next town or county. There is a sexiness to getting on the ship, and putting your belongings in trunks and shipping them a world away. But lately I’ve been committing missiological heresy and asking, "What if Hudson Taylor had gone to Canada instead of China? What if Adonirum Judson had gone to Mexico instead of Burma?"

In Acts 1:8 Jesus said, “Here’s what I have in mind for you: circles going out, starting with where you are, going to the surrounding region, extending to adjacent regions, and ultimately taking this message everywhere.” We expand through adjacencies. We reach out to those who are geographically and relationally close, then to those who are geographically close and relationally distant, before we reach out to those who are geographically and relationally distant. That is smart missiology when you think about it; to make those who are next door our priority.

There can be both a near-sightedness and a far-sightedness that can distort the church’s mission. Farsightedness occurs when all we see is the foreign...the ends of the earth...those who are geographically and relationally distant. There is both a resource and a relational challenge to farsightedness. The resource challenge is that the needs at the end of the earth are staggering. And resources back at Jerusalem are quickly depleted. The relational challenge is that we get these real long loops going, and money ends up being about all we can provide. We’re not close enough to provide friendship, support or accountability. Because of the distance we can’t be relationally connected like we’d like to be. So far-sightedness can be a problem for the Christ’s body.

But for every church that is farsighted, there have to be a hundred that are nearsighted. The arrows are pointed in. They can’t see beyond the horizon of those who are geographically and relationally close. They forget that church is not a place you go to, it’s a place you go from. I don’t know if you travel much by plane, but I can tell you a time you don’t want to try: Friday night. On a Friday night the terminal mobbed with people. Lines everywhere; at check in, security, bathrooms, restaurants. It’s a huge mess, and exactly how we define a successful church. Wouldn't it be awesome to have lines like that at church? But the purpose of the terminal is to send you out. Not to keep you in. The purpose is to get people out as quickly as possible so that they can get on with the real mission. It’s not a destination. It’s a connector.

What Jesus says is, "You don’t have to go far to go. The frontier is nearby." Let me suggest five questions we can ask so that we don’t miss the frontier nearby.

1. Who is next door to you relationally?

We sometimes talk about church as if it’s a what. We support it. Staff it. We fund it. The church is not a what. It’s a who. I am the church. Everywhere I go, the church is. Every believer, every small group, every worship center should be expanding their relational influence. They say that everyone on earth is connected in not more than seven steps. Are we working those steps?

2. Who is next door to you demographically?

One of our leaders in Africa sent me an email that said, “Our group has now moved into the super-rich part of town and we are starting to reach those who are harder to get into heaven than a camel through the eye of a needle.” In their case, they are taking the mission to adjacent demographics above them. I think there’s a lot of room for us to expand demographically. Demographically, who is adjacent to you? Up, down or sideways.

3. Who is next door to you ethnically?

This week more people will convene in a CTK group that are non-English speaking and non-white. This is the new normal. But what about the ethnicities that are within driving distance? Hispanic communities. Native American communities. African American communities. Asian communities. That’s the frontier nearby.

4. Who is next door to you culturally?

People talk about “the culture” as if there’s one, but there are so many cultures. And some of these culture are not going to be coming to church. I don’t care how cool we make it. How inviting. How warm our coffee is. They are not coming. We are going to have to figure out how to “be there” with certain people groups that aren’t going to be “coming here.” (And both of those words are critical: Be, and There.)

5. Who is next door to you geographically? What nearby community needs a fresh expression of Christ? We’ve gotten some help here. People have organized into villages, towns, and cities. They have created counties and countries. And they have plotted it out on a map for us. Start praying over the map. I’m not sure how big your map should be, but I know that what God is asking from us is availability more than ability.

I love Ian Thomas’ comments about Moses and the burning bush, particularly about the bush: "God was looking for a bush that was nearby, available and that would burn." He still is.

Validate

2009-02-26T09:57:00.001-08:00

A few weeks ago I went to a meeting with mega-church leaders and micro-church leaders. There were about 50 key leaders in attendance; some were from the largest churches in America (all over 5000 in attendance), and some from the smallest churches in America – house churches, small groups and cells. And then there was me. As a network, CTK is small and large at the same time. The meeting lasted two days, talking about how big churches can support little churches, and vice-versa. But the conversation was largely superficial, until the very last hour, when something really significant happened.

One of the micro church pastors turned to one of the mega-church pastors and asked, “What do you need from us? What do you want from the house church?” Without skipping a beat, this mega church pastor said, “Grace....We need grace. Quit throwing stones at the mega church. Quit launching grenades. We need grace. We love people and want to see them become followers of Christ. We just do it in a different way than you. We need grace.” Up until that point there was an elephant in the room. We were talking about how to work together, but we did’t much like each other.

Let’s be clear: before we can get the work done with our hands, we need to get the work done in our hearts. We are here to experience and express the grace of God. There is no question that we have experienced grace. The question is, "Will we express it?" As I was thinking about what happened in that room between those two pastors the word that came into my mind – maybe a synonym for grace - was validation. It is incumbent upon members of the body to validate other members of the body. What that large church pastor was saying, in essence, was, "I need you to validate my ministry." And if the shoe would have been put on the different foot it would have fit. Small church pastors are longing to be validated by large church pastors.

We sometimes try to do city-wide events with other churches, some in hopes that the world will see that we are united. But the world does not see us as divided because we don't do events together. The world sees us as divided because we talk smack about each other. There’s a need for us to look at what others are doing and say, “Isn’t that great!” As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 12:21: The eye cannot say to the hand, "I don't need you!" And the head cannot say to the feet, "I don't need you!" God works in different ways at different times and places. In fact it's not way, it's ways. All the time we spend trying to figure out which one "way" God is at work is dissipated waste. God is the head of the body. He is at work in various ways in people’s lives.

One of the long-standing challenges with Christianity is that however God is at work in our story, we imagine that that is the only way God could be at work in another story. We need to fall in love with the master and the mission, not the model or the method. Let me suggest 3 steps we can take to validate those whose ministry is different than yours:

1. Rejoice...in your heart about what God is doing throughout the world. His work is much bigger than us.

2. Recognize...what God is doing throughout the world. Validate the thing that is different than you, maybe opposite of you. For those of us in a church like CTK that is not programmatic, or institutional or traditional, it might mean expressing thanks to the ministries that are programmatic, or institutional or traditional. When was the last time you said, "Thanks."

3. Report...give a good report to others about ministries of other styles in other places. Spread some good gossip. As Ben Franklin said, "Speak ill of no man, but speak all the good you know about everybody."

Leave

2009-02-17T13:33:00.000-08:00

A pastor was telling me about a new group that was forming in his Worship Center. The group was going to be led by Chris (not his real name), who is a former pot-smoker. Some of those coming to the group are going to be people from his old pot circle. The pastor said to me, "There's a part of me that wants to be at these group meetings." He was concerned that he these young adults might slip into their old behaviors if he wasn't present. I told him that I understood his concern but that he should not give into the temptation to baby sit.

Carefully consider the implications to your long-term ministry if you "need to be there" to keep bad things from happening:

First, if you need to be there, you are not displaying a very high level of trust in God's spirit. Before Jesus left earth he told us that he would send his spirit "to be with us forever" and "to guide us into all truth." We need to take God up on his promise. There needs to only be one Holy Spirit. You are not it.

Second, if you need to be there, you are not displaying a very high level of trust in your people. You are saying, "I can't trust you to be outside my sight." Do you want them to lead from inner integrity, or outward compulsion?

Third, if you need to be there, after awhile your volunteer leader will realize that he doesn't need to be there. This is the same challenge foreign missionaries face. When the chips are down, the natives all look at the "white face" in the room. As a pastor your authority and influence will eclipse that of the volunteer. Get out of his way so he can execute his ministry.

Fourth, if you need to be there, you are limiting the scope of your ministry to the places where and times when you can be there. Do you really want to do that? I didn't think so. Most churches in America or less than 75 people, and one of the reasons is that is the number of people that a person can pastor directly. Greater effectiveness is found when a pastor spends more time working on the ministry than in the ministry.

This does not mean that this pastor should not spend time with Chris, mentoring him and supporting him in his ministry. In fact, I would say that there is not a more important meeting on that pastor's calendar. Equipping Chris to do the work of the ministry is precisely what God has called that pastor to do. Just be careful to not cross the line into co-dependency. As a father in the faith you have to let your children go. You have to trust God to keep them from falling.

When you think about it, what was really impressive about the serial-planting ministries of the Apostle Paul or John Wesley is not how may places they went, but how many places they left.

Sprint

2009-02-10T14:02:00.000-08:00

This from Seth Godin (I like how this guy's mind works!):

The best way to overcome your fear of creativity, brainstorming, intelligent risk taking or navigating a tricky situation might be to sprint.

When we sprint, all the internal dialogue falls away and we just go as fast as we possibly can. When you're sprinting you don't feel that sore knee and you don't worry that the ground isn't perfectly level. You just run.

You can't sprint forever. That's what makes it sprinting. The brevity of the event is a key part of why it works.

"Quick, you have thirty minutes to come up with ten business ideas."

"Hurry, we need to write a new script for our commercial... we have fifteen minutes."

My first huge project was launching a major brand of science-fiction computer adventure games (Ray Bradbury, Michael Crichton, etc.). I stopped going to business school classes in order to do the launch.

One day, right after a red eye flight, the president of the company told me that the company had canceled the project. They didn't have enough resources to launch all the products we had, our progress was too slow and the packaging wasn't ready yet.

I went to my office spent the next 20 hours rewriting every word of text, redesigning every package, rebuilding every schedule and inventing a new promotional strategy. It was probably 6 weeks of work for a motivated committee, and I did it in one swoop. Like lifting a car off an infant, it was impossible, and I have no recollection at all of the project now.

The board reconsidered and the project was back on again. I didn't get scared untilafter the sprint. You can't sprint every day but it's probably a good idea to sprint regularly.

Inside

2009-02-04T08:59:00.000-08:00

We all want people who are not currently involved to become involved. There are some sophisticated words, like assimilation, to describe the process. But it basically comes down to getting "outsiders" to become "insiders." There are some very particular things you need to do to help people transition from outside to inside:

1. Roster. If you do not have a roster, there is no way to know who is "part" of your program to begin with, so it will be impossible to have someone who is not part of it become part of it. A roster is elementary, but necessary. Who is a part of your ministry, or your small group? Put the names on a list. Distribute the list to the participants so that they know they are "officially" participating. Post the list so that others can see who is already involved. This now creates the possibility that you can add more names to the list and move them from outside to inside.

2. Meetings. Meetings are critical to assimilation as a point of reinforcement for those involved, and a point of entry for those who are not. Everyone should know when the next meeting is going to happen, so if they encounter someone who would like to "join" they can invite them to the next meeting. By attending the meeting the newbie gets put on the list, and becomes an insider.

3. Introductions. A key leadership role is the role of introducing new participants to existing participants. "Tie" people together by giving both sides some basic information. You may want to subjugate your agenda and just let everyone share their story when you have a new person in attendance. This will fast-track the relationships and make people feel that they are being known by others and knowing others, which is the essence of community.

4. Acknowledgment. Participants need to be acknowledged. If someone is a part of your ministry, but is never highlighted for what they are doing, they can start to feel invisible and wonder, "Am I really a part of something, or am I just imagining that I am." Send out congratulations for a job well done. Post a hall of fame. Give away awards. Even newcomers should be celebrated in some way. Acknowlegment can't help but create tighter connections.

5. Communication. Between meetings there needs to be regular correspondence. It could be a newsletter. It could be an email. It could be a blog. But people want to know that you care about them, and not just for what they can do for you or the group. Build the relationships offline.

6. Prayer. At every gathering pray for others to join your group. In a small group setting we sometimes call this "praying over the empty chair." The empty chair represents someone that we want to love in Jesus' name. Praying for newcomers accomplishes a couple things: a) It keeps the priority of outreach foremost in participants minds, and helps them to hold the ministry loosely, b) it helps newcomers to know that they are loved and wanted, and not unwelcome intruders.

With

2009-01-08T11:52:00.001-08:00

"With" may be the most important preposition for a Christian leader. Will you do ministry "with"? Who will you do it "with"? Who will do it "with" you?

Many leaders feel alone. I have to admit, I had a serious bout with aloneness at the end of last year. For the most part, I have not dealt with aloneness in ministry, so I probably don't know how to deal with it very well. When it hit, it hit hard. As I have run to the Lord, I have received comfort, and I have also gained some insights:

1. If I choose to do ministry by myself, the Lord will let me. He, of course, promised to be with us to the end of the age. He knows better than we do that we cannot do ministry on our own. He said, "Apart from me you can do nothing." But on the other hand, God is a gentleman, and he does not go where he is not wanted or invited. So if you do not regularly invoke the Lord's presence in your life and take time to be with Him, He will leave you...alone.

There are some things I used to do to be with Him. I am coming back to these things. I used to take Monday's as a "personal work day." On that day I would not schedule meetings or try to "produce" stuff. I would simply take that day to do what I needed to do to be spiritually healthy. I would pray. I would meditate. I would read from the word. I would be "with" Him. During this past year I found it difficult to keep Mondays set aside for Him. This coming year I will find it difficult again, but this year I intend to overcome those difficulties. Being with Him is priority. I simply cannot do ministry without Him. In previous years I used to take one day a month as a day of prayer and fasting. I am going to do that again this year. I have already set aside the days in which I will get away from phones and email and be in solitude with God. I used to take some weekends off from teaching, not to teach somewhere else, but to not teach at all. Every quarter this year I'm going to do it again. Jesus modeled this behavior for us. As the crowds were coming, He was exiting stage left. He knew something that I've known before and am relearning all over again: It's pretty great when we are connected to the vine, and it's pretty lame when we're not.

2. If I choose to do ministry by myself, people will let me. I think I have done a great job of "releasing" people for ministry. But in an ironic twist, when I send them out as lone rangers, when they have a problem, they only have my number to call. All the strings come back to me. Who else could they come back to? I'm the only one they know. It gets lonely when you are dealing constantly with the problems coming back to you, and dealing with them all alone. I was resentful for a awhile, and then I realized that people were just doing the best they could with the scenario I created for them.

I believe that people actually want to do ministry "with" you. In fact, there are not a lot of rewards for serving, but one of the biggest is community - of being part of something important with others. For the most part, I've had a team around me as I've ministered, and that has been very rewarding. I'm coming back to the importance of doing ministry out of community, with others. Our mission statement actually gets this sequence correct: "an authentic Christian community that effectively reaches out."

To get this order better established in my own life I am taking action. I've decided to reinstitute a weekly staff meeting. I understand that time is precious, but there are some things that we cannot not do. Being together is one of them. I am also going to institute a monthly Ministry Pow Wow for anyone in the Burlington Worship Center to come together and talk about leadership and ministry. This is going to be a time of challenge and training. I believe we can find great strength from each other...with each other. I also am going to be having lunch once a month with a group of colleagues, an iron sharpens iron time with fellow pastors. God has clearly surrounded me with brothers who can help to hold my arms up in the battle. The question comes back to whether I will let them do that for me.

Jesus asked us to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. It's not either/or, it's both/and. It is as we are loving ourselves that we are loving others. A friend in ministry recently asked me, "Why don't you feel the need to take care of yourself?" I think that's a good question. The answer is probably too complicated for me to figure out right now, so I'm just going to go back to caring for myself, like I should have been all along.

Baby

2009-01-08T11:51:00.001-08:00

Healthy spiritual leadership is akin to parenting. You could say that the ministry is your "baby." As your baby, you'll want to play close attention to its care and feeding.

An example of someone taking care of "their baby" is Howard Schultz of Starbucks Coffee. The founder, he has recently returned to run the company when it floundered. He found that there was no one who cared for the organization and the people in it like he did. You have a different level of passion and attention to detail when it's "your baby." No one cares for a kid like their parent. David Lubars says of Schultz, "He wants to be involved in how that child is being taken care of."

When it comes to caring, just as there are discernible differences among parents, there are also differences when it comes to pastors and Christian leaders. Jesus spoke of the difference between the shepherd/owner and the hireling. The hireling really doesn't care about the sheep, he just cares about his job.

I sometimes wonder how many people in ministry are hirelings. I think it's good for us to look at our own hearts in this regard. Are we marking time, or making a difference? Are we operating from a place of gifting and passion, or just going through the motions. If you are going through the motions, everything about your ministry will begin to sag: the prayers you pray, the teaching you give, the meetings you lead.

Of course, if you become parental in your ministry (read: emotionally involved) you also run the same risk as any parent, of getting hurt. Someone has said that "to be a mom is to forever wear your heart outside your body." Paul said some things that were very similar to that about his ministry. It's a great blessing and a great pain to be a parent. As a pastor you just have to multiply that by hundreds.

Along this line, read this excerpt from Captain Michael Abrashoff's book, It's Your Ship.

MY FIRST INKLING OF THE SIZE OF THE JOB CAME AT 1:21 in the afternoon of June 20, 1997, after I formally assumed command of USS Benfold.

When a Navy ship changes hands, all routine work stops two weeks prior to the event. The crew paints the ship from top to bottom, sets up a big tent on the flight deck, arranges chairs for dignitaries, and unrolls a red carpet for the obligatory admiral, who delivers a speech on the outstanding performance of the ship's departing skipper. A reception follows. Waves of good feeling saturate the event as the former commanding officer is piped ashore.
My predecessor was accompanied by his family as he left the ship. And when the public-address system announced his final departure, much of the crew was not disappointed to see him go. I can still feel my face flushing with embarrassment when I remember how some didn't give him a respectful send-off.
Truthfully, my first thought as I watched this spectacle was about myself. How could I ensure that my eventual departure wouldn't be met with relief when I left the ship in two years? I was taking over a very tough crew who didn't exactly adore their captain.
The crew would probably dislike me, I thought, if for no other reason than that I represented old-fashioned and perhaps obsolete authority. That was okay; being likable is not high among a ship captain's job requirements. What is essential is to be respected, trusted, and effective. Listening to those raucous jeers, I realized that I had a long way to go before I really took command ofBenfold.
I knew that I would have to come up with a new leadership model, geared to a new era. And this awkward reception underlined for me just how much the workplace had changed in military as well as in civilian life.
Never before had employees felt so free to tell their bosses what they thought of them. In the long economic boom, people were not afraid of losing their jobs. Other jobs awaited them; even modestly qualified people moved from one company to another in a quest for the perfect position they believed they richly deserved.
However the economy is doing, a challenge for leaders in the twenty-first century is attracting and retaining not just employees, but the best employees—and more important, how to motivate them so that they work with passion, energy, and enthusiasm. But very few people with brains, skills, and initiative appear. The timeless challenge in the real world is to help less-talented people transcend their limitations.
Pondering all this in the context of my post as the new captain ofBenfold, I read some exit surveys, interviews conducted by the military to find out why people are leaving. I assumed that low pay would be the first reason, but in fact it was fifth. The top reason was not being treated with respect or dignity; second was being prevented from making an impact on the organization; third, not being listened to; and fourth, not being rewarded with more responsibility. Talk about an eye-opener.
Further research disclosed an unexpected parallel with civilian life. According to a recent survey, low pay is also number five on the list of reasons why private employees jump from one company to another. And the top four reasons are virtually the same as in the military. The inescapable conclusion is that, as leaders, we are all doing the same wrong things.
Since a ship's captain can't hand out pay raises, much less stock options, I decided that during my two years commanding Benfold, I would concentrate on dealing with the unhappy sailors' top four gripes. My organizing principle was simple: The key to being a successful skipper is to see the ship through the eyes of the crew. Only then can you find out what's really wrong and, in so doing, help the sailors empower themselves to fix it.

Embody

2008-11-26T12:30:00.000-08:00

CTK is a populist movement. The DNA is being carried by real people in real places. This is precisely what we want to see. We want EVERYBODY to embody the values that mean so much to us. But make no mistake. The values will not be carried by EVERYBODY unless SOMEBODY carries them first. If SOMEBODY doesn't embody the values, NOBODY will. Great ministries are always a team effort. But at the point of the spear is one person, the embodiment of what that ministry is about. For instance.

Focus on the Family...James Dobson, the founder, immediately comes to mind when you think of this ministry. But not just because he's the founder. You think of him because he personally represents conservative family values. He embodies what the ministry is about.

Campus Crusade...Well, you can't think about Crusade without thinking about Bill Bright. Bill was the outgoing personality who would go anywhere to anyone to share Christ. Guess what? Crusade is still doing that.

The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association...Ok. This one's too easy. But certainly, Billy Graham personally embodies evangelism.

If you show me a group with a strong culture of sacrifice and service, I'll show you someone - a leader - who represents those values, who embodies them, if you will. If you show me a team on a mission, I'll show you a captain or coach on a mission. He doesn't just talk about the mission, he exemplifies missional behavior in what he does, and who he is. We have to hemorrhage if we want our people to bleed.

In the CTK story, the pastor is charged with being the SOMEBODY who embodies the mission, so that EVERYBODY can. If he doesn't, don't expect the body to go beyond their leader. The pace of the leader is the pace of the team. Everything rises and falls with leadership.

As a leader in the CTK story, what should you embody?

1. A life of community. Small groups are the basic building block of our church. Everyone in leadership should be in one, not just so that they can say they are in one, but so that they can be fully immersed in community, just like everyone else. It does us no good to have a leader in our story talk about relationships, and then have none.

2. A life of devotion. We say that we want to have worship be our lifestyle. Are you the person who regularly calls the group to prayer, or redirects folks back to the word? Do you spend time in solitude with Jesus? If you behave like Martha, you won't inspire very many Marys, no matter how hard you preach.

3. A life of mission. Do lost people matter to you? Deeply? People can tell if you are content with "us four, no more." When was the last time you reached out personally to someone who needed Jesus? You can't spend all your time with Christians and have people believe that you are all about lost people. It just won't work.

Vision leaks. The second law of thermodynamics states that things tend to go from order to disorder. This is a tendency that can be bucked, however. It doesn't have to go this way. It just usually does. And it definitely does without the intervention of a leader who says, "No, we're not going there....we're going here." And then (and this is critical) he himself takes off in the stated direction, looks over his shoulder and says, "You guys are coming, right?"

Ways

2008-11-18T07:38:00.000-08:00

How does the kingdom expand? How does a church grow? How do you conduct a staff meeting? How do you share your faith? How do you do youth ministry? The questions are straightforward. The answers not so much. As near as I can tell, the answer is: "It depends."

I was recently at a conference where I and two other pastors of "multi-site" churches told our stories. We were each chosen because we represented slightly different approaches to being one church in many locations. Backstage, prior to one of the sessions, someone commented on how cool it was that three different churches, with three different styles, could come together in one conference. I jokingly quipped, "But aren't we really here to find out which approach is right?" There was nervous laughter because we all knew that much of sordid church history has been in the quest "to find the one right way."

It's about time we realize that there is not "a right way," there are just "right ways." In order to reach people that no one is reaching you may have to do things that no one is doing. In order to do things that no one else is doing, you can’t do what everyone else is doing. God is not formulaic in his approach. One of the reasons we have so many differences in the body of Christ is that God's ways (plural, remember?) are personal and profound, mysterious and multi-faceted. Just when we think we have Him figured out, the pillar of fire and cloud moves. The sooner we get our heads around ways instead of way, the more enjoyment we will find in the way that God is at work in our ministry, and others'.

Just because God is at work in a certain way in someone's story doesn't mean He wants to work that way in yours. Both Joseph and Moses had very similar experiences, with very different conclusions. They both were raised in Egyptian royal households. Both rose to positions of prominence, and had potential for significant power. In Joseph's case, the power was part of the plan that God had for him. In Moses' case, he needed to shun that power to follow God's script. It's a good thing they followed what God had in mind for them, and didn't copy what they had read in a Christian magazine.

Other

2008-11-14T06:41:00.000-08:00

A lot of lines are being blurred in our culture today. During the last election cycle in the USA we saw that people were a lot less interested in voting along party lines, for instance. Convenient categories like "Democrat" and "Republican" are giving way to "Independent." When people are asked their ethnicity(Caucasian, Black, Hispanic, Asian, etc.), over 30% now check "other." Even our president is not so easily defined. This has implications for ministry.

1. Scrub your stereotypes. Depending on your upbringing, you may be bringing slight to extreme stereotypes with you into ministry. Check them at the door. If you feel that certain people groups are a certain way, you need to realize the magnificent spectrum that is presented to us in the real world. You cannot tell a book by its cover. Get to know people and their unique stories. Jesus showed us how with the Samaritan woman.

2. Make it personal. It used to be that a pastor spoke primarily to families, and then secondarily to single people. Today, relationships are much more complicated. People have blended families, multiple families, broken families, no family. And single may mean "divorced," or "cohabitating" or "gay." Consequently, effective communicators do not assume that they are talking to Ward, June and Beaver Cleaver. Narrow your focus to the individual.

3. Expand your categories. When we are speaking you need to present a broader and more inclusive list of categories. For instance, you are probably talking in front of people who are suicidal, trapped in drug abuse, white collar criminals, etc. So if you say, "You might be here and be discouraged" you lose credibility, because people are thinking "That's the least of it!" If you don't get a broader list of categories, folks will put you in one: "Out of touch with reality."

4. Diversify your team. Do you have minorities on your leadership team? On your worship team? In your ministry? If not, you won't look very inclusive, even if you are. Do your best to think outside the box, particularly if the box is "people who are a lot like me."

5. Target new audiences. Are you reaching out to the people in your community, or just one variety of people in your community? Strategize about reaching other people groups. As a result of prayer God may place a burden on your heart for people of differing geography, ethnicity or socio-economic status. If you don't know how to reach them, maybe invite them for dinner and go from there.

With spiritual eyes we see that there are not classes of people, there are only people, like you and like me. People who are in need of a savior.

Infiltrate

2008-11-10T11:04:00.001-08:00

We have a choice. We can either dominate the culture or infiltrate the culture. Over the centuries the church has tried both approaches, with very different results.

After periods in which the church has tried to dominate the culture, the world has experienced dark ages. After periods in which the church has tried to infiltrate the culture, the world has experienced great awakenings.

One of the reasons the church in America has struggled spiritually in the past generation is that we have been the home team, dominating the culture. We haven't transformed the spiritual landscape, we've just gotten our way. We have depended on the government to protect our ability to exist. We may have passed the legislation, or gotten the courts to rule on "our side," but we haven't changed people's hearts on the matter. We have used power to control the culture, instead of influence to create a culture. Meanwhile evil has been seething underneath the surface, and as the old saying goes, "Payback is a bummer."

In all likelihood, American culture is about to get outright hostile toward matters of faith and Christianity. This is only a problem to us if we are trying to maintain our power position. This is only disconcerting if we perceive this to be a game with a winner and a loser. If, on the other hand, our goal is to infiltrate it won't be bad for us to be "underground." Not bad at all.

In the darkest of night even the smallest of lights shines bright. Many modern-day movements of God are taking place in hostile environments. The church in China, for instance, now numbers hundreds of millions. Could it be that the church thrives under persecution precisely because the hostility makes only infiltration possible?

So....we can dominate or infiltrate. I wonder which Jesus wants us to do?

Thinking

2008-11-06T06:41:00.000-08:00

A friend of mine asked me if I had noticed the difference between the television ads for Macintosh and Microsoft. I told him I hadn't really paid attention, except that I'm a Mac fan and have found their "I'm a Mac....I'm a PC" ads pretty clever. He agreed with me that the Mac ads are killing the PC ads in popularity, and then he asked me a pretty good question. "Which ad is substance, and which ad is style?" I had to admit that the Mac ad is really all about style. A cool looking and acting actor (Mac guy) is pitted against a backward looking and acting actor (PC guy). The Mac guy seems totally relaxed and helpful. The PC guy is never quite at ease, seems scattered, self-absorbed and stupid. But there really isn't much in these ads about the actual difference between using a Macintosh computer or a PC. From watching these Mac ads you just come away with a feeling (not really much in the way of facts) that points you to the Mac as the "better" choice. What does this say about the culture we're in?

Prior to the presidential election a high school teacher I know gave his class a paper with the political positions of the two candidates presented side by side. At the top of the page was simply "Candidate A" and "Candidate B." Based on the positions the men took, the class favored Candidate A. The teacher then asked whether the class was voting for Senator Obama or McCain. This particular group of High Schoolers was overwhelmingly for Obama. Why? They said he was "young" and "has fresh ideas" and they "liked him better." They were shocked to find out that he was Candidate B. They were "for" him, not based on substance, but style.

Also, be aware that if you present a substantive idea, and expect people to get it "based on the merits," you'll be seriously disappointed. As a Christian leader, don't assume the people you're leading are thinking deeply about what really matters. They probably aren't. So for the time being, unless you are politically savvy enough to run a good campaign, you can expect defeat. Most pastors I know have ideas that are good to great. Many times those great ideas are dead on arrival because the pastor has assumed that people will think as deeply about the issue as s/he has, and they have not learned the importance of building a coalition, selling the sizzle, and answering the question that people keep asking (even if we wish they weren't): "What's in it for me?" This is not a Jesus question, of course, and never will be. But who's job is it to get people asking better, more noble, questions? Yup.

There is no question that people today lack critical thinking skills. This can either be extremely discouraging to you (it often is for me), or it can challenge you "get after it" and to teach people to think. Not what to think. How to think.

Big

2008-10-31T08:52:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure that bigger is better. But I'm not convinced it's all bad, either. As I've thought about size, particularly the size of congregations, my thoughts have evolved in the following progression.

1. Big is wrong. This was what I thought when I was a kid growing up in a (small) fundamentalist church. I was pretty certain that if it was big it must not be gospel-preaching. They must be watering it down. Because if they were preaching the fire and brimstone we were they would be small like us.

2. Big is amazing. This was what I though as a teenager when I encountered the Anchorage Baptist Temple. My first exposure to the mega church left me with my jaw dropped. This was a church that didn't have hundreds of people attending each week, but thousands. They had the biggest choir I had ever seen. They brought people in on buses from around the city. Something seemed wrong about it, but I couldn't figure out what it was. They were preaching the gospel, even throwing in some occasional fire and brimstone, but they were drawing a crowd.

3. Big is the goal. As I made my way through seminary I decided that there was really no point in pastoring unless I was going to do it in a big way, with a big church. As a youth pastor in a dying denominational church, I chafed under the short-sitedness of the leadership. As a young (too young really) senior pastor I got my hands on every book I could find about church growth. I attended every seminar I could find. I made my pilgrimage to Willow Creek. I enrolled in a Doctoral Program at Overlake Christian Church, the largest church in the Northwest at the time. I started to work the angles to "grow my church." My church did indeed grew, but I didn't, and I left that church, and the ministry for that matter, fairly disillusioned. The church had never been bigger. I had never been smaller. My pursuit of big was about me, not Him.

4. Big is easier. When I returned to church (as a wounded soul on the back row of Christ the King Church in Laurel, Washington), CTK was clustering in two campuses and five services. The vibe was cool and chaotic, but meeting in two different places was obviously hard on the staff. Shortly after I joined the staff we consolidated everything and everybody into a larger building. This wasn't my idea necessarily, but I was a team player. The consolidation made things easier, but not necessarily better. We lost something in the transition that we could never get back. Our sense of community and widespread personal involvement gave way to professionalism and crowd management. This seemed like a bad trade to me.

5. Big is bad. When I launched out on my own, and started CTK in Mount Vernon, I spoke highly of meeting in smaller congregations. I told the story of CTK meeting in multiple locations and services. I said, "We're not going to ask everyone to come to us, we are going to ask us to go to them." I had come to the conclusion that more was better than bigger. In an effort to make my case, I probably overstated the badness of bigness, probably because I was questioning bigness as the accepted measure of success. I started asking questions like "Isn't the goal to reach a community, instead of build a church? At times when it seemed like no one was listening, I turned up the volume, and then backed that up with some action. As CTK in Mount Vernon grew we "spun off" groups of people in six neighboring towns. But at the same time, Mount Vernon continued to grow bigger as well, and to this day is our biggest Worship Center.

6. Big is big...and that can be both good and bad. Lately, I've come to a more tempered view of bigness. I don't think bigness is as great as people have made it out to be, but I think there are worse things happening in the world, as well. I've been thinking that the relative merits of bigness depend on the answer to some questions:

Are people being treated personally, or like cattle? Call me old-fashioned, but is it possible for a person to actually meet the pastor? I've encountered staff members of large churches who have never met the pastor there. Modernity has given us these constructs and called it good. It seems to me that the church of Jesus Christ should be a little more personal than that.

Are people becoming passive? Crowds tend toward people sitting around, listening, taking notes and going home. We don't want this, and we don't get as much of it in smaller congregations. But it is possible for a larger congregation to have high participation in small groups and mitigate this tendency. The key word is "possible" since most mega churches don't quite get there - it's just too hard to get people from sitting on their hands.

Are we staying or going? Are the arrows pointing in or out? Jesus' instructions were clear: Go. There is a tendency, as groups become more established, to just start another staff-driven program and try to get more people to come to us. This is not a good development, for the community or us. Bigness tends to squash or slow the entrepreneurial spirit. Smallness keeps you nimble. On the other hand, the resources that you need to launch often come out of bigness. Maybe there's a sweet spot here, where we can be big enough to spawn, but small enough to do it quickly.

How do small and big relate to each other? Is small in service to the big, or is big in service to the small? This may end up being the most fundamental philosophical question to discern whether bigness is virtuous or not. What we have tended to see in evangelicalism is the small in service to the big. What is more virtuous is for the big to be in service to the small. In an organic system you will see bigness. For instance, in a forest you might find some extremely large trees. And there are some smaller flora and fauna that can only survive in the shade of that tree. So maybe its not whether it's big or small, but what is ultimately valued and protected.

God bless you,

Startup

2008-10-21T10:11:00.000-07:00

You can do a lot worse than follow Jesus. This applies not just to our beliefs but our practices. Like, how do you startup a new ministry? How about the answer, "Like Jesus told us to!" Here's Mark 6:7-10: Calling the Twelve to him, he sent them out two by two and gave them authority over evil spirits. These were his instructions: "Take nothing for the journey except a staff-no bread, no bag, no money in your belts. Wear sandals but not an extra tunic. Whenever you enter a house, stay there until you leave that town. And if any place will not welcome you or listen to you, shake the dust off your feet when you leave, as a testimony against them." Embedded in His instructions are some key ideas about starting a new ministry: 1. Build a Team. Notice that Jesus never asked anyone to "go it alone." If He had, there could have been 12 ministries, instead of 6. But Jesus knew that it would be better to have 6 strong and steady ministries, than 12 anemic discouraged ones. 2. Go with Empty Hands. While Jesus encouraged us to take people with us, he discouraged (demanded, really) that we not take stuff, not even essentials like food or a change of clothes. Why? He wants us to be in a position of vulnerability with people, not strength, where we need them as much or more than they need us. This is contrary to many church planters who want to be "fully prepared" before deploying. 3. Establish a Base of Operations. Jesus said, once you find a place of operational support, stop there, and instead of you continuing on, let that be a place from which the mission can be propagated. 4. Move out from there. How long do you stay at the base? Jesus said, "Until you leave that town." It's not if you'll leave, but when. The commission is not to stay, but to go. Jesus made the sequence clear: Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the ends of the earth. Going means leaving behind a place of comfort for a place of challenge. But leaving behind a legacy as well - the presence of Christ, and fewer evil spirits.

Happy

2008-10-21T10:10:00.000-07:00

Happy is found somewhere between not enough and too much. There's a sweet spot in life - a place where you find flow in your life and ministry. It's not a place of extreme. It's a place of balance. It's a place of health and proportion. It's "the comfort zone" between too cold and too hot.

This principle might apply to:

Your communication. The ideal message has enough content to satisfy, but not so much as to leave the listener feeling stuffed. Are your memos too long? Are your messages portion-controlled? Less is sometimes more when it comes to getting a message across, but you need enough illustration to make the message clear.

Your creativity. Are you feeling harried? Are you on the go constantly? You can only borrow from tomorrow's energy for awhile before you have to pay it back. The sabbath rhythm of six parts work, one part rest should be followed religiously. There's a balance there. Too little time away can leave you feeling worn out, negatively impacting creativity. Too much time away can leave you feeling lethargic instead of relaxed, negatively impacting creativity. What is the balance that leaves you happy?

Your work. Are your colleagues getting enough time with you? Too much? There's a balance here. Too many meetings and the work suffers from a lack of time to do it. Too few meetings and the work suffers from a lack of answers to the questions that predictably arise. Groups that are happy have the right balance between time together and time apart.

One way to find out whether you are in a "happy place" is to ask. People around you (like your spouse) will probably be able to see your lack of balance before you do.

Goals

2008-10-21T10:09:00.000-07:00

Goals are a tricky thing. It is easy to succumb to extremes, and in either direction. You can become goal-driven, or goal- deprived. Neither is ideal or healthy.

I spent the first third of my life being goal-driven. This was reinforced for me in a private school system where every day I began by filling out my "goal chart." A goal chart is not a bad thing, in and of itself. But the way my brokenness "used" the chart (I know this is the language of addiction) was I became very driven to achieve and accomplish. Indeed, by setting and reaching goals I graduated from high school a year early, and from college at the top of my class. The driveness didn't cease until the wheels fell off my life in my early 30s. My excessive goal orientation was an accomplice in my demise.

On the other extreme, the extreme lack of goals is not particularly virtuous either. God has created us with capacity to look into the future, set goals for ourselves, and organize our lives in such a way to achieve them. The Apostle Paul was "pressing toward the mark." To never put this capacity in motion is just as problematic as the overuse of this capacity.

Goals are necessary, but should be balanced with a clear reliance upon God. Jesus prayed, "Not my will, but yours be done." Solomon wrote, "In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps." There is a balance here. We plan, but we also submit. We plan, but we also bend the knee.

How can you make goals a healthy part of your life? First, I would say, "Have some." If you don't have any goals for yourself, or your ministry, I would take out a piece of paper and write "Goals for myself and my ministry." Then I would get away with God and ask him to help you write some goals.

Second, I would take the list and put it in a place where you'll see it. Maybe place the list on your computer desktop, or on the wall near your desk.

Third, I would break your goals down into actionable steps, and put the steps on your to-do list. How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. Even a very large goal can be accomplished if you break it down sufficiently.

Fourth, I would transfer the steps from your to-do list to your calendar. Start putting actionable items in your schedule that get you taking steps your toward your goals.

Fifth, review your progress regularly. Put on your calendar times of self-review, where you can take readings on where you are at, and where you need to go.

Behave

2008-10-21T10:07:00.000-07:00

How is the church supposed to behave? Different people may answer that in different ways, but I like to take my cues from what I read about the church in Acts 2....

Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

While this passage is more descriptive than proscriptive, there are nevertheless some takeaways for us. Looking back to the first century, you see how the early church behaved:

1. Daily. The early church was a not a weekend or Sunday event, but an every day adventure. The gatherings were "every day" and the outreach was "daily."

2. Relationally. The church was growing rapidly and people were getting their needs met. How? Was the church developing a program or a department to meet the needs? No, believers simply noticed that their brother had a need and responded to it. Organically. Relationally.

3. Informally. The church did not meet in church buildings or auditoriums, but in living rooms, dining rooms and outdoor public spaces. One of the key things you see them doing is eating together. Meals are a great vehicle for fellowship and community.

4. Cellularly. The first century church met in different places, at different times. There is actually not a clear indication that everyone ever gathered in the same place at the same time. In all likelihood, the Jerusalem church grew to over 10,000 people in the first week, and we know that the temple courts could not accommodate that big of a crowd. So the early church was one church meeting in multiple locations, with multiple teachers (apostles, plural).

5. Joyfully. The first church was a happy experience. Words like glad, sincere, praying, enjoying speak to the fact that they were a happy group.

So, just to review. How does the church behave? Daily, Relationally, Informally, Cellularly, Joyfully. Who doesn't want to be a part of something like that?

Badly

2008-10-21T10:06:00.000-07:00

If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.

Have you seen some things being done badly in your ministry lately? If so, it might be a good sign! Not everyone would agree with me, of course. And that's not something you hear in seminary every day, for sure! But listen to G.K. Chesterton's explanation: "It is a good sign in a nation when things are done badly. It shows that all the people are doing them. And it is bad sign in a nation when such things are done very well, for it shows that only a few experts and eccentrics are doing them, and that the nation is merely looking on." Now read that quote again and substitute the word "church" for "nation":

"It is a good sign in a church when things are done badly. It shows that all the people are doing them. And it is a bad sign in a church when such things are done very well, for it shows that only a few experts and eccentrics are doing them, and that the church is merely looking on."

In most growing and going churches things are not done badly, that's for sure. The emphasis of the attractional church model has been on professional excellence. There is a hired staff doing the ministry, ensuring that it is done right (by "experts and eccentrics"). Professionalism has left the church "merely looking on," instead of as engaged participants. The church growth maxim that quality is the means to quality has ruled out the contributions of millions of believers (that is, except their contribution of money to support the professionals).

I believe that the church is on the front edge of a second reformation. The first reformation placed the word of God into the hands of the people; the second reformation is placing the ministry into the hands of the people. This shift parallels shifts in the culture, where quality is being exchanged for broader participation and diversity.

A good example of this is YouTube. YouTube is not professionally produced television. It is of the people, by the people, for the people. There are hundreds of thousands of contributions coming from average people. Is the quality at the level of Steven Spielberg? Not exactly. YouTube videos are in "the steep part of the curve" in terms of cost and time. But don't underestimate how revolutionary this shift to the amateur is. Ten years ago only professionals could produce a video that could distributed worldwide. Now anyone can do it. Because anyone can do it, anyone does, which leads to exponential growth. When you think about it, everything in our world that is growing exponentially (YouTube, Facebook, Google, etc.) is based on the architecture of participation, not professionalism.

There's a new day coming, where things worth doing are going to be done badly. The first reformation followed the invention of the printing press. The second reformation will follow the invention of the internet.

Wild

2008-10-21T10:04:00.000-07:00

Is your ministry domesticated? Is it docile, easy to control, and unlikely to cause trouble? Passive, quiet, unassuming, compliant? Have you tamed it?

I hope not.

G.K. Chesterton in his book Orthodoxy, saw Christianity as the wild kingdom: "The more I considered Christianity, the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild."

Can we have "good things run wild" in the CTK story?

I hope so.

But it won't happen unless, as Chesterton notes, we "give room." Things don't run wild without room. If we cage people, we can't expect them to run. If we control everything, we don't get wildness, we get compliance.

A church, it seems to me, should provide generous fairways on which people can play the game. I have used the phrase "freedom with handrails" to describe the organizational philosophy of CTK. The handrails are our beliefs (doctrinal statement) and our brand (mission, vision, values). As Chesterton noted, there has to be "rule and order." But the chief aim of boundaries is "to give room for good things to run wild."

How do we as leaders give room for good things to run wild? One of the key ways is to repeat four words: "Yes, Sure, You Bet" to people and their "wild" ideas. Caution is acceptable, but you can't lead with it. Caution needs to come later, in the shaping of things. In a wild kingdom our predisposition needs to be "Yes." Then, we come alongside to train and support.

A second key is to highlight ministries that have been started "in the wild." If you constantly promote the "church sponsored" ministries, you send a signal about what you value. If you constantly promote the idea that everyone is a minister and there are a myriad of ways to reach out, you will be amazed at how creative people can be.

A third thing that I think is key is to validate the craziness that ensues when people go wild doing good. Not everyone is going to know what everyone is doing. There may be small groups forming that you don't even know about! Is this good, or bad? It's good! Stand up and say, "The most awesome thing happened this week! Somebody started a ministry without permission! Yahoo!"

If people can't use the word "wild" to describe your ministry, you might need to change that. At the Burlington Worship Center I sensed a little too much domestication setting in, so in a few weeks we are canceling our Sunday morning services and renting the local roller rink for "Roller Church." I think it will send a clear message that we are not here to "do church." We are here to see that good things run wild.

Neutrality

2008-10-21T10:01:00.000-07:00

Good leaders pick their battles. In this respect, the founding fathers of America can teach us important lessons.

During their presidencies, both George Washington and John Adams took a path of neutrality in the conflicts between France and England. In fact, the foundation of Washington's foreign policy was the Proclamation of Neutrality (1793) which said that America was going to stay out of the ongoing, hundred year conflict in Europe. Washington declared, "Every true friend to this Country must see and feel that the policy of it is not to embroil ourselves with any nation whatsoever; but to avoid their disputes and politics; and if they will harass one another, to avail ourselves of the neutral conduct we have adopted. Twenty years peace with such an increase in population and resources as we have a right to expect; added to our remote situation from the jarring powers, will in all probability enable us in a just cause to bid defiance to any nation on earth." Clearly, Washington's approach was calculated to allow our fledgling country to become better established, and to keep from squandering precious resources of time and money overseas.

Some have referred to Washington's approach as "the strategy of enlightened procrastination." Sometimes, by not doing anything, you are doing the best thing you can do as a leader.

It is not by accident that CTK is a non-denominational, generic, vanilla evangelical church. It is not by accident that we do not "take a position" on many secondary issues. We have deliberately not entered into many theological skirmishes and debates. We have kept the main thing the main thing. Our only allegiance is to Christ. Our focus is on loving God and people. Neutrality has freed up our time to pursue worship, small groups and outreach as priorities.

There is always a battle of words being fought somewhere in the church world. Be careful to not get sucked in, unless we are talking about an essential doctrine. The energy and time that it will take to engage in a war of words does not give you a return on investment. Remember Augustine's council: "In essential matters unity, in non- essential matters diversity, in all matters charity."

You will occasionally be invited to "join the fray." You will receive letters from organizations that are picking fights with various parts of the body. You will get some emails that tempt you to engage. Remain clear about the ultimate mission. Don't be distracted by lesser concerns.

Filing

2008-10-21T10:00:00.000-07:00

I was talking with a potential young pastor recently, and the subject turned to teaching. He asked me if I would mind sharing with him how I put a message together. He approached his request very cautiously, almost as if it were a trade secret. Of course I told him about the process I go through each week (which, by the way, I explain in detail in a course through CTK called Connecting the Dots). But one of his key follow-up questions was how I was able to recall various analogies, quotes or illustrations I might use in a message, what I call (TPOV - teachable points of view). I told him, "I don't. " It's all in a file somewhere," and I encouraged him strongly to begin his own filing system.

We are all exposed to plenty of TPOV on a daily basis. They key is capturing this material and filing it in a way that you can access it when you need it. You hear a funny remark on the radio and you think, "I'll have to try to remember that." You hear someone share something from their life and you think "I should probably right that down." You read something in a magazine and you think "Wow, that would work well in a message some day." But unless you write it down and file it, all of these great TPOVs are lost. If, however, you become disciplined about writing and filing these TPOV, you will be richly endowed with plenty of colorful material when you need it.

I have an alphabetical file system by topic. If I read an article about raising difficult kids, I might file that under "Children" or "Parents." I simply write the topic in the margin and pull the page (if a magazine) or photocopy it (if a book). If I don't already have a file by that name, I create one. If I want to cross reference a file, I simple put a 3x5 card in the other file (for example, if I filed the article under Children, I might put a 3x5 card that says "Children" in the Parenting file). Pretty simple really. Over the years, I have built this system to where I know have 16 full file drawer cabinets, A-Z. You can do the same thing. Start now.

Everyone knows Alan Lakein's classic mantra, "Handle each piece of paper only once." Good advice, although if you were to see my desk right now you'd be asking me to practice what I preach. Instead of letting things pile up there are four things that you can do with a piece of paper, that spell FART (this should be memorable):

File it

Act on it

Refer it (give it to someone else)

Toss it

Once you begin to FART you will feel so much better. (If you've read this far and think this is funny, please reply. This will be a good test to see how many people are actually reading this stuff.)

Filing well can give you a big advantage over those who don't. After all, success is not usually found in doing something that no one else can do. It is usually found in doing something anyone can do, but doesn't.

Church

2008-10-21T09:59:00.000-07:00

One of the words that I hate to hear in reference to CTK is "church." I wish they wouldn't call us that! I don't want to be a church. I don't want act like a church. And, mostly, I don't want to be associated with what most people think when they hear the word. Church is a bad to many other people in America. The less we act like a church, the better. The less people think of us as a church, the better.

Now, I know that is all pretty weird considering that we are, in fact, a church. And I guess I need to clarify. I'm certainly not afraid of the word as it has been defined by Scripture. But I am down on it as it has been defined by culture. And guess what? The cultural definition is the de facto definition we're working with, or against.

What do people think when they hear church? Here's a few words that come to mind: hypocritical, judgmental, money- oriented, boring - precisely what we are trying hard not to be! Which is why it is music to my ears whenever someone contrasts CTK with a church, and it scares me whenever anyone compares CTK to a church.

Do we have to be called a church to be the church? I don't think so. The early believers were known as "the way" or "the people of the way." The greek ecclesia (translated church) literally means "the called out ones." In Antioch they began to be called "Christians" or "Christ-ones." It wouldn't hurt my feelings if people referred to CTK as "called out ones" or "Christ ones." Just don't call us a church.

If you are a church leader in the CTK story please be on guard for "church creep." Church creep is when we slowly but surely start to behave like any church would. We start using words that churches use. We start developing programs that churches have. We start "acting" like churches act. Remember, if it walks like a dog, talks like a dog, looks like a dog, it's a dog. So to keep from being a church, don't act like one, don't talk like one, and don't look like one.

Basics

2008-10-21T09:58:00.002-07:00

I love the NCAA basketball tournament. To me, it is the best sporting event in the world. There are typically "Cinderella stories" and unexpected upsets. But if the tournament teaches us anything it is that you must master the basics before you step out and do the unusual. This is a great lesson for us in the church as well.

We often have dreams of "the big moment" where revival breaks out and dozens, if not hundreds, of people accept Christ and are swept into the kingdom. These visions are akin to the kid in the driveway shooting baskets, imagining that he's hitting the game-winning shot with time running out. But one thing is certain: that kid will never get to take that shot unless he masters the fundamentals of dribbling, passing and rebounding. You must master the basics before you step out and do the unusual.

We'd probably all love to have ten new families visiting our Worship Center every week. How are we doing now at following up on the one family that God occasionally sends our way? There's no sense in dreaming of ten until we follow up effectively on one. You must master the basics before you step out and do the unusual.

How well are you handling the basics? Jesus said that we'll get increasing responsibilities when we handle our current responsibilities well. "To him who is faithful in little things, I will give bigger things." Is it possible that God is not giving you a bigger increase in your ministry until you steward better what you've already have been given? You must master the basics before you step out and do the unusual.

In football, championship teams focus on "blocking and tackling." That is, they know they must take care of the fundamental aspects of the game before they get the right to make the big play. There's no sense really in drawing up the big play unless you can be relatively assured that your quarterback will have enough time to make a pass. Likewise, you can come up with the best sermon in the world, but if you don't have some of the basics handled, it won't matter. You must master the basics before you step out and do the unusual.

On the other hand, the team that consistently blocks well now has a foundation on which they can build. When the core is solid, you can take risks. If you do throw a long pass that's incomplete, it's not the end of the world. You can regroup and try again, because you've got a solid foundation. You must master the basics before you step out and do the unusual.

Staffing

2008-10-21T09:58:00.001-07:00

A common concern for church leaders is staff. Just think of how much could get done if we had the staff to do it! There is no question that staffing is important. Everything rises and falls with leadership. As you are building your ministry up, you want to keep expanding the base of leadership that supports it.

Before you begin your quest to build your staff, get clear about the role that staff will play in your ministry. A staff will join you not to do the ministry but to see that the ministry gets done. You want to develop leaders who will develop leaders, not followers. The role of staff in the CTK story is to create and sustain an environment where people can carry out their ministries with minimal obstacles and maximum fulfillment.

Now is the time to start building your staff, before the people arrive who will be served by that staff person. It is common in church circles to think that you need a full-time-equivalent staff person for every 100-150 people. I don't look at it that way. I look at it through the lens of group life. I believe you want a staff person who is going to help develop the next 10 to 15 small groups. That is, they will be working directly with 10 to 15 leaders.

The best place to start in developing a staff is on your knees. This was Jesus' encouragement when he looked out at the ripe harvest, "Pray." What I have found, when I have prayed for staff, is that God has not always brought me the person I thought I needed, but He has always brought me the person I needed.

Pray, then start to identify volunteer directors of small groups, worship, operations, children, youth. I consider these to be "bread and butter" areas that deserve dedicated leadership. (Other directors might include: men, women, recovery, singles, discipleship, etc.). When the time is right for paid staff you will often find candidates from this pool of directors. As the ministry grows, you can graduate volunteers to stipend support (maybe $50-200 per month), then part- time status, and full-time status.

As a rule of thumb, at least 50% of income should go to personnel. Studies have shown that ministries in decline often spend 40-50% on staff, whereas growing ministries spend 50-60%. As a local ministry approaches $100,000 per year income there should be 1-2 stipend staff added to the team. By $150,000 there should be at least one part-time staff person and a couple stipend staff, and by $200,000 a Worship Center should be ready for a second full-time staff person.

There are various ways to support paid staff. Budget growth is the most stable way, but you can also build your staff through special offerings, personal fundraising and bi-vocational ministry. Don't be afraid to sit down with someone that God seems to have given the gifts and graces for ministry and ask, "Is there some way I can get you on my staff?" Where there's a will, there is often a way. leadership and development.

Always be on the lookout for ministry talent. I keep a "little black book" of people that I consider to have promise. I maintain a "wish list" of leadership roles that I would fill if I could. The size of the dream determines the size of the team.

Relevance

2008-10-21T09:54:00.000-07:00

I prefer relevance. I certainly prefer it over irrelevance. Relevance is important. But as important as relevance may be, it is not supremely important. Some churches act like it is the only thing that matters.

A friend of mine who is a pastor was telling me about a new "fast- growing" church that, to some degree, is organized around alcohol. The pastor often wears a shirt advertising an alcohol purveyor. Groups are organized around drinking (some of their groups are called "Beer, food and God" groups). The church offers (and sells out) tours of area breweries and wineries. My friend has a close friend on the staff of the "drinking church" who told him, "I am so excited to be a part of a church that finally gets it!" He's not excited about alcohol, per se, but the fact that the church is so free and relevant.

Having grown up in a very legalistic environment, I can understand longings for freedom and relevance. But freedom for what? Relevant in what ways? To me, the "drinking church" (or cussing church, smoking church, porn church or other attempts at relevance) is a bad idea for several reasons.

1. It is either extremely naive or arrogant to not be in touch with the pain being caused by alcohol in today's society. There are millions of people in America who are waging a life and death struggle with alcohol addiction. They are at risk of losing everything to this disease. In my way of thinking these are precisely the people that Christ would want us to reach. The "drinking church" is unfortunately hostile to them and their recovery. True, folks with drinking issues could go somewhere else, but that leads me to objection number 2.

2. If you make alcohol a litmus test for your ministry you are not going to be "open" for more people, but "closed." You are holding up a "Not Welcome" sign to anyone who is an alcoholic, the child of an alcoholic, the spouse of an alcoholic, or those who love them. That is a fair number of people. Ironic, huh? In an attempt to be friendly you push folks away. If alcohol is lifted up it will draw some men to it, it will push others away. I want the cross only to be an offense...which leads me to objection number 3.

3. Christ has called us to be "other-worldly." We are to be in the world, but not of the world. I am not here to promote the artificial joys of this world. They get enough promotion. I am here to hold up eternal joys. My job is to let people know that there is a transcendent life. When people find the living water, they never thirst again.

4. If you are truly grace-based, you don't need to wear it on your sleeve because it will become obvious in the course of your dealings. In a grace-based environment, lifestyle issues should not get in the way of folks coming to Christ, for sure. But we don't need to be promotional on those issues, either. It is sufficient to say, "Only Christ matters." An analogy I might draw is the sequence of competence :

Unconsciously incompetent
Consciously incompetent
Consciously competent
Unconsciously competent

According to this sequence, you start out being unaware of your incompetence, and you end up being unaware of your competence. When you are in transition from incompetence to competence, you are "consciously" in transition. Here's how this applies: substitute the word relevant for competent. To be consciously relevant is not the highest form of relevance. The highest form is unconscious. When you are working too hard at being relevant, you are working too hard at being relevant.

For centuries the church has struggled with relevance. Now that there is willingness and opportunity to be relevant, let's not swing to the other extreme, and become irrelevant, by having relevance become our message.

Isolation

2008-10-21T09:53:00.000-07:00

Christian leaders fail at an alarming rate. Some studies suggest that 50-63% of all Christian leaders will fall off the rails, and not reach the destination for which they set out. Extensive studies have been done on why this is true. The number one reason: Isolation. Many leaders end up on an island by themselves.

How do we end up so isolated? We get to a point where no one is speaking into our lives - where our relationships are not reciprocal. I read some research on fame that suggested that fame is really just "a disproportionality of outbound to inbound messages." That is, people who are famous send out signals, but don't get pings coming back in their direction. Many, many people know them, but they don't not know very many people. Oprah, for instance, is famous. She is sending out messages to us, but she is not getting many messages back. You've heard from her, but she hasn't heard from you.

Pastors experience this isolating dynamic regularly, even if on a smaller scale. It truly can be lonely at the top. Pastors are known by many people, but often on a surface level. Many times they lack people in their lives with whom they can share on a deeper level, who will respond with grace to what they come to know. Yet people who are not affirmed do not know who they are. Or maybe better, they have a false idea about who they are. In the absence of other's feedback they are left with their own opinion, which is usually, "I'm a jerk."

Now for a story that explains an underlying dynamic that exacerbates the loneliness of leadership. Bill Thrall (author of The Ascent of a Leader) tells a story from the early years of his marriage.

Bill came home one day and could tell from her body language that his wife was not in a good space. She said, "We need to go for a drive, because we need to talk." Bill, who had some active secret-life issues immediately, began to fear that she had somehow found out the truth about him. He quickly began to think through possible alibis and excuses so that he could protect his secret life.

Bill and his wife got in the car and drove quietly to a remote place. When the car was turned off, his wife turned to him and said, "Bill, you need to know that I am not happy. I haven't been happy for awhile. Do you want to know why I'm not happy?" Bill swallowed hard and slowly nodded "Yes." She continued, "Bill, I'm not happy because in this marriage you get to love me, but I don't get to love you. I want to love you but you won't let me. Why won't you let me love you?" Bill reflected on her question, initially relieved that she had not brought to light into specific character defects, until he realized that she had actually pointed out a much deeper issue. Why wasn't he allowing her to love him?

What followed in the conversation was Bill's first foray into honesty and vulnerability. He told her about his extreme need to be liked. He shared his insecurities about his job (he was trained as a CPA but did not feel that he was good with numbers). He disclosed his longstanding addiction to pornography. He took off the mask.

What Bill's story points out so vividly is how basic trust is to love. We cannot experience being loved unless we entrust ourselves to another person. The degree to which we trust another person is the degree to which they can love you.

Here's the challenge for many pastors: we are better at loving than being loved. We want to be the one who loves. It is harder for us to be the one who receives love. But love is not something we do. It's something we experience. Together. This is where we miss something. We need somebody to love AND we need to be loved by somebody.

Strictly speaking, God did not call us to love. He called us to love one another. That's different. The love that God calls us to involves give and take, not just give. It involves entrusting ourselves to EACH OTHER. In order to love well you have to receive love as well as share it.

1 Thessalonians 4:9
"Now about brotherly love we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other."

1 John 3:11
"This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another."

1 John 4:7
"Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Love is the direct response of God's grace in us."

John 13:35
"By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

So to summarize the sequence: Christian leaders fall because of isolation; isolation comes because no one is speaking into the leader's life; no one is speaking into the leader's life because the leader is not trusting anyone with who they are.

The next time you are thinking, "No one loves me," answer this question, "Who are you letting love you?" Have you entrusted yourself (been vulnerable with) God and others?

Oh, and here's the rest of the story for Bill Thrall. He expected, after he shared his dark side with his wife, that she would get out of the car and leave him there. But she didn't. She actually moved toward him. When we are humble it tends to have that effect. God certainly has said that he gives grace to the humble. His invite is, "Draw near to me and I will draw near to you." Vulnerability draws God closer to us, and it tends to have that effect on people too.

Core

2008-10-21T09:52:00.000-07:00

Core and Chore. Anyone who works anywhere will experience both.

Core is the stuff that gets you excited about the work. It is the part of the job that resonates deeply with whom you are and how God has wired you (Psalm 139, Ephesians 2). Core is the reason you are doing this! Core is the reason you are alive! It is your calling, your passion, your gifting, and your aptitude.

Chore, on the other hand, is the stuff that needs to get done but doesn't necessarily excite you. It is the part of the job that "needs to get done." Chore is the price you pay for Core. Chore is the paperwork that needs to be filled out, or the mess that needs to be cleaned, or the fundraising that needs to be done (assuming you are not gifted as an administrator, or a servant, or an exhorter, respectively).

One man's Chore is another man's Core. Administration may be a Chore to you if you are not an administrator; but to an administrator administration is Core. This is why we emphasize spiritual gifting and team-building. By surrounding yourself with people who are strong where you are weak, you can focus on your Core, the stuff that gives you energy instead of taking it.

In your work you want to spend more of your time on Core than on Chore. A 60/40 split is a reasonable goal. Sometimes Chore will demand more - something "just needs to get done." But part of self-management is to not allow these times to persist too long.

Everyone needs to get an A on their Core. If you do not spend time developing and working on your core you will soon find any job to be unsavory. With Chore you need to get at least a C. If you do not get a passing grade on Chore, you will end up losing credibility on Core.

In planning your week it is sometimes helpful to "knock the chores out." The strong desire to get to your Core as quickly as possible can be a good motivator to deal efficiently with your Chore. However, if you pursue Core first, it is sometimes hard to enjoy your Core, knowing that Chore awaits you.

It is unrealistic to think that there is a job out there that is all Core and no Chore. Sadly, since the Fall of Man, we have to pull the weeds, not just smell the roses.

Journey

2008-10-21T09:51:00.000-07:00

The Bible is full of stories of redemption, but there is probably no bigger turnaround in scripture than the one that happened in Saul's life: He went from being the leading antagonist to God and His work to being the leading advocate for God and His work. He went from being the hunter to being the hunted. How did he get there? One step at a time.

Paul's life was turned around in dramatic fashion, but also in steps. The Christian life is a journey, not a single event. Paul's turnaround went through various phases. Acts 9 is a time-elapsed picture of the spiritual journey.

Alienation Stage: Paul starts out going down the road, going about his business, but he doesn't know that God is there, and that God is going to ambush him.

Attention Stage: Something happens that gets Paul's attention. A light flashes around him. He sees what he has never seen before.

Listening Stage: God starts to speak to him (the others with him don't hear it, but Saul does). The message is personal, from God to Him. He hears what he has never heard before.

Searching Stage: Paul realizes he's blind. He is led by the hand for several days, and God reveals more of His plan.

Acceptance Stage: By God's grace and through the ministry of others God touches Saul, fills his heart with His spirit, and transforms him. The scales fall off his eyes. He's radically saved.

For Paul, a turnaround that at first glance appears instantaneous, involved days of searching, and months of discovery. It takes time to come to the end of an old belief system, and embraced a new one. In their book, "What's gone wrong with the harvest?" James Engel and William Norton developed a scale that charts a person's progress through the decision making process to faith in Christ.

10. Awareness of the supernatural
9. No effective knowledge of Christianity
8. Initial awareness of Christianity
7. Interest in Christianity
6. Awareness of basic facts of the Gospel
5. Grasp of implications of the Gospel
4. Positive attitude to the Gospel
3. Awareness of personal need
2. Challenge and decision to act
1. Repentance and faith
NEW BIRTH

We all start at the same place. We might have an awareness that God is there, but we do not know Him personally. We all go through the same stages to get to faith in Christ. There's a temptation to think that with salvation you flip the switch and the lights come on. Many times it is more like the old vapor lights used in gymnasiums.

Christian growth is simply taking the next step, which makes ministry helping people take the next step. Ministry is "meeting people where they are with what they need to get them where they need to go." We have to take people where they are. We don't get to have them where we want them to be. We give them what they need, and that is love, acceptance and forgiveness. We take them where they need to go, toward Jesus.

Oh, and one more thing. We need to pray people through each step. Every step toward God is a minor miracle.

Labels

2008-10-21T09:49:00.000-07:00

Labels are a shortcut. Instead of saying, "Those smaller, practical Japanese cars that aren't particularly stylish, but run pretty well and get pretty decent gas mileage" we just say "Honda." Because people like to be efficient with their time, they will tend to take these shortcuts if they are provided, or else make them up on their own. Have you noticed that Federal Express just has "FedEx" on their trucks? This is because people were using "FedEx" as shorthand, and the company decided it was better to just "go with it" than fight it. We see this same thing happening with "CTK" instead of the longer "Christ the King Community Church."

Labels can be an efficient time-saver, but not necessarily an effective way of relating to people and organizations. Sometimes labels foster laziness. Instead of taking the time to get to know someone, you just stereotype them as a "conservative" or a "fundamentalist" or a "charismatic." There. Now that we have a label on them, we know everything we need to know about them, right? Wrong.

In some ways Christ the King has benefitted by being like the can on the shelf that doesn't have a label on it. You have to open it up to see what's inside. Steve Mason, the pastor of the first Christ the King Church once wrote, "I am frequently asked, 'What kind~ of church is this?' Sometimes visiting people are unsure how to categorize us. Are we Pentecostals? No. Are we Charismatics? Not exactly. Are we Evangelicals? In doctrine, yes, but we are open to the ministries associated with the gifts of the Spirit, though not in the emotionally based manner usually associated with Pentecostalism."

If all this sounds confusing, it's because the label game breaks down after awhile. There is no one label that accurately describes what is going on in the CTK story. We are "theological mutts."

When it comes to the authority of the Bible, we are Baptists. When it comes to the methodology of small groups, we are Methodists. When it comes to plurality of leadership, we are Presbyterians. When it comes to reliance on the Holy Spirit, we are Charismatics. When it comes to salvation by grace, we are Lutherans. When it comes to passionate corporate worship, we are Vineyard. When it comes to authenticity in relationships, we are Calvary Chapel.

Who are we? Check two boxes. "All of the above" and "None of the above." Labels just don't work that well for us. Sorry. I guess you'll just have to get to know us.

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

An analogy that comes to mind is the piece of luggage that has been stamped from all over the world. If you were to ask the question, "Where has that luggage been?" there is no one answer to that question. There are many answers to the question. It's not that there are many pieces of luggage. There is only one piece of luggage. But many labels have been applied.

Variation

2008-10-21T09:41:00.001-07:00

At CTK we are trying to become an organic, relational movement, instead an institutional, attractional ministry. Functioning organically means taking a different approach on various issues, but none more noticeable than how you approach variation. Organizations eliminate variation. Organisms embrace it.

By variation, I mean differences. Differences in look and feel. Differences in style and shape. In an organization, everything needs to look the same. An organization punches out widgets on an assembly line, and variations are tossed aside. But in organic life, variation is characteristic, expected and welcomed.

From generation to generation in organic life there is both repetition and revelation. In some ways things will look the same. In other respects there will be differences. Take, for instance, your children. In some ways they "look like you." There are certain characteristics that are passed down from generation to generation. In other ways, they will "look different than you." As a parent you sometimes even wonder, "Where did that come from?"

At CTK we should not expect every small group or Worship Center to look exactly the same. There will be similarity in mission, vision and values, but differences in style and personality. This is normal and natural. "There are no two snowflakes alike." It behooves us to appreciate the remarkable variety that can be found in offspring.

I have often said, "If you've seen one CTK Worship Center, you've seen one CTK Worship Center." As I have visited CTK Centers around the world, I always come away with two feelings: 1. This is CTK. 2. I've never seen anything quite like this before. But I think the same thing about each of my children, too. Each of them has two arms, two legs and one nose. It is even clear that they share the same parents. But that is where the similarities end and differences begin. Each of them is very individual, a real revelation.

At CTK we are not attempting cloning. We are trying to build an ever-expanding family of relationships. We want to be more like a family than a factory, more like a forest than a tree farm. In a tree farm, trees are planted in rows, and groomed so they look self- similar. In a forest, a remarkable variety exists, of big, small, straight and crooked. When you get back from a forest you see a pattern. But upon closer inspection you observe immense variation.

In the CTK story our mission, vision, values (our core DNA) gets worked out with varied emphasis. I saw this clearly when I took recent trips to Africa and India. Both are third world countries, and CTK has expanded rapidly in both of these places, with hundreds of new leaders. Both movements manifest CTK's commitment to the priorities of worship, small groups, and outreach. But they do so in varying ratios.

In Africa, the dominant trait is small groups. We have always contended that small groups are the primary convention for the people of CTK, but in Africa they have taken this ideal to another level. As best as we can tell, there are 862 house fellowships throughout the continent. In some communities there are 5-10 small groups meeting, and they have yet to have a public (temple courts) meeting, because they are so intensely focused on the value of community, and small groups as the basic building block.

In India, the dominant trait is outreach. We have always contended that we need to keep the arrows pointed out - that it is not our goal to get everyone to come to us, but to get us to go to them. In India CTK evangelists have visited over 1000 villages, many where the gospel of Christ has never been preached before. Circuit riding is common. From district to district, they are establishing Worship Centers. They are taking "arrows out" to a new level.

A great mistake, in my opinion, would be to try to get the African groups to behave more like the Indian groups, or vice versa. That would be a typical, top-down, organizational response. By being a part of organizations, we have been trained to look for differences and eliminate them. But in the CTK story we have to think family, instead of factory. I wouldn't advise you as a parent to remove all variation you see in your kids. And the same advise applies to spiritual parents, with spiritual offspring.

Neutrality

2008-10-21T09:40:00.000-07:00

One

2007-12-31T18:48:00.000-08:00

A few years ago, when it began to be clear that CTK was shaping up differently than any church I'd ever seen before, I was moaning in my office about how I didn't have mentors to show me the way. "I can't think of any other church that is behaving like we are - one church in multiple locations!" A wise staff person (can't remember who it was, actually) said, "Well, aren't we basically doing what Paul did in the New Testament?" (rim shot followed by dead silence here)

I went home that afternoon and got out my Bible and started reading Acts and the Epistles of Paul with new eyes. What if what Paul was doing back then was actually planting one church, the church of Jesus Christ, in multiple locations? Previously, I had always viewed Paul's ministry through a western-independent-church-planting lens (that Paul was planting multiple, separate churches). Now I started to see Paul's ministry through an eastern-interdependent-relationship-expansion lens (that Paul was adding nodes to a network in an ever-expanding circle of relationships), and the world looked very different to me. But the new lenses also explained a lot to me. Why was it that believers in Macedonia sent funds to believers in Jerusalem? Maybe because they were all part of the same story. Why is it that Paul is writing letters and still exerting influence in various congregations long after he's been gone? Maybe because they are all part of the same story. Why is it that a council is convening in Jerusalem and sending a theological statement to believers in Antioch? Maybe because they were all part of the same story. Why is it that the church in various cities is referenced in the singular, "church" instead of "churches"? Maybe because they are all part of the same story. Maybe there's really only one church in the first century, and it meets in various places.

I say "maybe" because we should always let our dogmatism rise and fall with the clarify found in scripture. Church organization is one of the areas where there is less clarity than we might like. The lack of clarity has given rise to many different church organization models, all of which can in some way find validation from scripture. But I have to say, as I have looked at the scriptures, the "apostolic organizational model" is better than any I've seen to describe what was actually happening in the early church. It appears to me that the early church was one church that convened cellularly and congregationally in a variety of locations. It was a network tied together by meaningful relationships and meaningful responsibilities.

The first few chapters of Acts tell us that within a few weeks well over 10,000 people had come to Christ and that more people were being added "every day." So the church in Jerusalem went from 120 to over 10,000 in one week! Three times in Acts a reference is made to the church in Jerusalem, and each time it is referred to in the singular. Acts 8:1: "There arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem." Acts 11:22: "The report of this came to the ears of the church in Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas to Antioch." Acts 15:4, Luke describes Paul and Barnabas' return to Jerusalem: "When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and the elders." There is reference to multiple leaders, but not multiple congregations. So what we have in Jerusalem is one church with at least 10,000 adherents, lead by a team of apostles and elders.

Because of its size it is unlikely that the Jerusalem church gathered as one large group. There was simply no facility that could hold them. Acts 2 tells us they were meeting to hear the Apostles' teaching daily "house to house and in the temple courts." The church appears to be convening in multiple, smaller meetings, with multiple teachers. This would mean that every day some portion of the group was meeting, but not the entire group. At the same time there appears to be some system-wide solutions that were provided, for meeting the special needs of particular groups (Acts 6), and for theological direction (Acts 15). While Jerusalem was the epicenter, the rings of the church continued out as predicted from Jerusalem, to Judea, to Samaria, to the uttermost parts of the earth. The expansion was facilitated by apostolic missions, Christians transferring from one region to another (often because of persecution) and circular letters.

Compared with the western church of the past couple centuries, CTK's organization appears unconventional. But it actually resonates with the story of the first century church that we read in the bible. I guess we have somewhere to go for guidance after all!

Doubling

2007-12-31T18:47:00.000-08:00

An expectation for a staff person at CTK is "that you will be growth oriented and plan on serving twice as many people as your presently do. Organize with growth in mind. Plan for the future." This statement is included in the "General Expectations" section of our job descriptions. This expectation implies:

1. That we are pulled by vision, instead of pushed by need. We start behaving like a church of 100 when we are a church of 50, like a church of 1000 when we are 500. This proactivity positions the ministry toward the future and keeps us from accepting the status quo, or getting stuck in a rut. An exercise that every pastor should engage in regularly is to take out a piece of paper and write at the top "My ministry at double the size." Then start to bullet out what that would look like. Would it require an additional service? Additional staff? Reorganization? A different meeting place? Once you know what it would look like you have ideas about what it will take to get there from here.

2. That we plan for growth before it happens. The time to plan for the next wave of people is before they come, not after they've come. If you don't have the classes, teachers, parking or seats to double, you won't probably need to worry about it. The 80% rule has said that a room feels "full" at 80%, but my experience is that the pressure will build in the parking lot or bathrooms long before that. By thinking "double" you can get ahead of the growth curve (and the challenges that always attend growth).

3. The next horizon is always clearly before us: doubling. A key question to always be asking is “How can I serve twice as many people as I presently do in the coming year?” Start by assessing your current ministry. For instance, if you currently have responsibility for a worship center that has an attendance of 75 people, the next horizon would be 150. Would serving 150 people require a second service? Start now to plan for that second service, and take some first steps. If you serve in a clerical role and create 10 documents a week, how could you get to 20? Could you recruit a volunteer? Could you standardize some processes? What are your first steps? Identify the key areas you oversee and come up with a plan and first steps toward doubling.

The story that Jesus told of the talents implied doubling as an expectation: The man who had received the five talents brought the other five. “Master,” he said, “you entrusted me with five talents. See, I have gained five more.” (Matthew 25:20) Results certainly may vary from the story. We plant and water, and God gives the increase. But in our planning and preparation, we should be getting ready for a 100% return on investment.

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The General Expectations section of the job description was something that I wrote over the years to describe some of the things that I hope to see from everyone in the CTK story, regardless of job title. When expectations are "general" there is a tendency to think they are "unimportant." In actuality, I consider these to be some of the most important things we could expect from each other:

That you will maintain a growing relationship with God. 10+10. Read. Meditate. Pray. Share.

That you will be highly committed to the mission of CTK. Willing to sacrifice for it. Willing to endure hardship for the cause of Christ.

That you will develop open, honest, protective, and supportive relationships with other team members. Talk with colleagues, not about them. Clear the air. Be positive. Work through problems.

That you will be confidential about sensitive matters. Don’t share confidences. No gossip. No talking with people who are not part of the problem or the solution.

That you will take responsibility for your area of ministry. Own it. Have a vision for it. Develop it. Take initiative. Take care of it.

That you will be personally organized to keep track of important dates, phone numbers, assignments and instructions. Have a day timer. Set up a filing system.

That you will strive for excellence in everything you do. Pay attention to details. Ongoing improvement.

That you will be growth oriented and plan on serving twice as many people as your presently do. Organize with growth in mind. Plan for the future.

That you will limit your span of care to not more than five to seven people for yourself and those you supervise. Develop leaders. Redistribute the work. Keep it manageable. Break it down.

That you will promptly follow-up on contacts with 48 hours. Assignments from Sunday morning completed by Tuesday morning.

That you will develop systems that give people clear ownership of the ministry. Schedules. Job descriptions. Procedures. Phone #s. Team leaders. Team rosters. Team meetings. Organizational charts.

That you will recruit people for your area, with strong leaders and administrators being placed in strategic places. Identify, recruit, deploy, train, and support volunteers.

That you will create redundancy in your area of ministry. Supervisors, emerging leaders in place to easily substitute. At least two people who know every job and are empowered to carry it out.

That you will think ahead and anticipate concerns and areas of need before they become a crisis. Know what the problems are. Address them. Be proactive.

That you will help to create and maintain a positive working environment for the people who serve under you. High morale. Lots of encouragement. Thanks for a job well done.

That you will promote your ministry area to the rest of the church. Newsletter articles, classified ads, program announcements, word of mouth.

That you will innovate and take advantage of opportunities as they present themselves. Take us to places we’ve never been before.

That you will communicate weekly with your supervisor and report areas of concern, success, progress. Notify about absences, vacation time, etc.

Deliberate Simplicity

Uprising

Surprise

Seasons

Words

Educationalism

Oar

Peaks

Pace

Reasons

Noose

Coach

Anxiety

What

Positivity

Sweet

Private

Why

Super

Radical

Differ

Trots

Underconfident

Row

Strong

Possibility

Principles

Emulate

Collectivism

Affirmation

Sampling

Honest

Hybrid

Both

Pencil

Amnesia

Atrophy

Reactionary

Better

Admit

Loyal

Initiative

Credit

Dead

Style

Multi-Site Church Road Trip

Class

Proximity

Things

Interested

Review

Prostitution

Happen

To

Lover

Year

Known

Informational

Proprietary

First

Collapse

Tweet

Red

Cuts

Leaderless

Realism

Whisker

Glorify

There

Validate

Leave

Sprint

Inside

With

Baby

Embody

Ways

Other

Infiltrate

Thinking