Growing Up

Growing Up and taking responsibility are huge in my house right now. Bowen and Kendall are two and half and this morning they decided to go to the bathroom themselves and dress themselves without any help. None! I was a little scared about what disaster I would find when I found the diapers. No mess. No tears. No bite marks! I thought, "My wife has to be home somewhere around here." What did I miss? When did this happen? For weeks now we have been potty training and all that entails. For weeks we have be letting the kids pick their clothes for the day and showing them how to put them on.
And then I was sad. My babies are growing up. They don't need me as much as they once did. Part of me longed for them to need my guidance, my help, my touch.

And then I was proud. Even though they are two they are becoming independent. Making their own choices. The clothes they picked out even matched!

As I drove to work today, I thought how much of this is like what we do in ministry. Many parents try to keep their kids dependent on them for as long as possible and then complain when they act like babies. At church, we treat the people in our churches like spiritual babies and then complain when they act like it. We whine and we complain that they won't "grow up", but in reality, are we training them up? If we're honest, isn't it our pride that says, "I want these people dependent on me and my gifts"? If I give them the tools, they might leave. Yeah they might. That's what Jesus did (Luke 9:1-10 and 10:1-10).

We're not in the business of building our own kingdom but the Kingdom.

As I write recommendation letters for colleges this year, I struggle with this. My seniors are all grown up. I want them to stay here ... hang out with me ... help my ministry. That would be me building my kingdom, not the Kingdom. I've got to be satisfied with the small part I have had in shaping their amazing lives and now, it is time to watch them change the world.

Empty

Today I went to a restaurant with no one in it.  It was me and two workers.  The food was awesome.  the decorations were hip and inviting.  Parking was easy.  Why then was no one there?  I was at the restaurant for 45 minutes and outside of taking my order I was never talked to.  Not engaged...at all.  If you know me you know that I am fiercely loyal to the restaurant I pick.  I like to be on a first name basis with mangers and waiters.   

This place sold the same food as Panera Bread, one of my favorite places in the world.  The only thing I don't like about it is it is a chain.  However, at Panera two of the clerks know my name, at Panera one of the clerks asked me about a youth conference that she attended (I was the speaker).  I get great service along with my amazing Asiago Bread and broccoli and cheese soup.  They know to take the onion off of my sandwich and grill it a little longer cause they know I hate a cold center.  I am in love with Panera and its product.

What's the point?  What do our churches resemble?  If we look at ourselves our "product" is awesome (Jesus).  We may have a awesome building, decorations, media presentation, or worship but if we are not connecting with people we will be empty. This restaurant cared about their product, it was delicious.  What they didn't care about was their customer.  When the whole point is attracting customers to experience the food. If we are honest how many of our churches could say the same thing.

Character in leadership

Recently I have been thinking a lot about character and what it has to do with leadership, specifically leadership in the Church context .  The role of character in a leader is incredibly important.  Many are the leaders who have had character issues which has resulted in huge harm to the Kingdom of God.  Character seems to be one of those things that is most often noticed when it is lacking.  A leader who has character leads from who he or she is, not from charisma.  Charisma finds away to get leaders in compromising situations.  Whereas character moves past the hero worship or Messiah complexes to lead out of a place of integrity.  Character is when a leaders says, "I will only lead you where I am willing to go." When character is present it can be a huge motivating factor for the people who he or she leads, especially in the case of chasing the Great Commission.  Leading people to Jesus is an incredibly hard thing to do on many levels.  There are the fears of rejection, looking inept or silly, pushing people away, or feeling fanatical.  The care and sheperding of a leader can play a huge role in overcoming those fears.  The character of a leader earns the of trust of their folowers to believe and act on the challenges issued.  In the case of  personal evangelism the leader has to model evangelism if they want it repeated. For that matter, if a leader wants any behavior repeated they need to model it.  If they want their people to pray then they must pray, worship they must worship, evangelize they must evangelize.  This is practiced by truly evangelizing, letting people see the conversation around a dinner tables or in a coffee shops.  Leaders with character allow people to see behind the curtain.  People today are tired of the flash and the show. If they are to buy into our faith they want to know that it is more than just a Sunday thing.  They want to know that is is for real and it is lived out.  

Changing Culture

This week our staff was able to attend the leadership event Catalyst One Day.  This was a wonderful experience, I actually enjoyed it more that the large gathering in October.  One of the major things that they hit in during the day was Culture.  Meaning the culture of your specific church and context.  The take away for me was that everything that you do as leader and do not do effects the culture.  If you speak a certain way it communicates something, if you put money somewhere it says that its important.  Conversely of you do not advertise or spend money on something it also says that it is not important.  Even if it is, Even if it core of you church.  This is all very interesting in that it means that in leadership everything matters.  Does this intensify the pressure on church leaders?  Does it inflate our self importance?  If we want to change the culture in which we are in, we need to realize that we are leading always even if we are not speaking.  Maybe, just maybe it is refreshing.  For me it is exciting to know that I have a chance to change culture outside the hour a week I am teaching.

Across platforms

I recently received an Ipad for my Birthday.  No I'm not bragging.  Okay maybe a little, but that's not the point.  The point is I have a problem, I have both pc and mac devices.  A pc at home, mac at work, android phone and an Ipad.   The last thing I want is to limit what I can do because all my platforms are different.  What I want is to maximise my effectiveness while using any of the devices.  I found a popular and wonderful app called Evernote.  With this app I can work on a thought on any of my devices ant the thought is synced to each of them.  So if I have an idea in a meeting I can write it in my phone and once I get back to the office pull it up on Evernote and finish it.  This is awesome.

Now for the leadership application.  If your anything like me you spend a lot of time in different roles.  This week I was an tech support, graphic designer, teacher, and mentor.  It's Tuesday morning!  To be an effective leader I need to be able to streamline all that data into one place.  This is done by having a strong vision for the kind of leader you want to be.  For me it is wanting to have a teachers heart in all that I do.  So if I am designing, I want to teach through it and teach someone how to do it, if I am fixing a tech issue then I will be teaching someone else how to fix it, if it is teaching in a service I want to show someone how I am crafting that service.  The baseline or the syncing of my information is to Teach.  If I can do that I don't loose sight of who I am and what I am supposed to be about.  If I am not able to teach through it than it's not worth doing.  As well as having tremendous personal impact on how I do things.  I think this mentality can have profound impact on how organizations do things.

Maybe you feel like you wear to many hats or are stretched to thin.  I would encourage you to find the central point of who you are and operate from there.  From that point you can work across all platforms and devices.  No matter how crazy your job description is.

What is your "main thing"?

How can you "snyc"?

Can your church reach across platforms?

What needs to happen to instill this process?

Volunteer

I have the privilege of working with some great volunteers.  Today one of them can't do there role because silly enough, they have to do their day job.  Honestly the gall of some people.  Trying to make a living...  Anyway I am getting to see how much they mean to me and how much they do because of the vacum they leave.  This is scary I depend on this person every week to help mtake our ministry to the next level.  In that dependance I give up something.  Control.  By giving up control of his area of expertise.  I have to trust that it will be done right and with excellence.  At first it was a little ruff sometimes.  But now he routinely exceeds my expectations and does things better than I ever could.  A few things made this possible.

1.  I was desperate for help.  I'll admit it.  (This is when I should act spiritual and say I was continuously praying for the right volunteer)  In reality, I was way over my head and just trying to survive the weekly grind of ministry.  He came along to help and I was more than happy to give him things to do just so I could catch my breath.  I believe God saw my need and filled it.  And yes prayer was involved!

2.  I was willing to give things away.  I gave graphics away.  So much so that I hardly use Photoshop anymore.  I used to use it at least 8 hours a week.  Now its isn't even on my desktop.

3.  I want my volunteers to be better than me.  I want them to do things better than I can.  If they do, it builds the Kingdom and it makes me look like a genius :)

What just happened

What just happened?" Was it amazing, terrible, great, life-changing or just dumb?

The ability to take what we experience and put it through a filter to produce a better product, service, or whatever you do is incredibly important.  Aren't there those times when you look around and think well that happened.  But do you want a repeat? "This" happened last week and nobody changed anything, so it's going to happen again this week.  "This" can be either great or terrible, depending on what the "thing" was.  

Bottom line is this.  When asking the question, "What just happened?" ask yourself some questions.  Do I want that to repeat?  Is it in my power to change or capitalize on?  Don't waste a "what just happened" moment.  If it is either positive or negative you can get something out of it.