From the Magazine
Toughest Decisions of Leaders, Part 6
We asked six influential ministry leaders to tell us their stories of the toughest leadership decision they’d ever made—and how they went about making the decision. We've already heard from Craig Groeschel, Nancy Ortberg, Glenn Packiam, Richard Stearns and Dr. Joel C. Hunter. This week we conclude this series with Dr. Kara E. Powell, the executive...
Toughest Decisions of Leaders—Part 2
We asked six influential ministry leaders to tell us their stories of the toughest leadership decision they’d ever made—and how they went about making the decision. Last week, Craig Groeschel shared his decision to give it all away. Now, Nancy Ortberg tells us about when she had to take two steps backward ...
Toughest Decisions of Leaders—Part 1
We asked six influential ministry leaders to tell us their stories of the toughest leadership decision they’d ever made—and how they went about making the decision. We were expecting stories of disagreements with elders, agonized debates of whether to build or not to build, or the emotional stress of firing a close friend. So we were surprised when the stories started to come in and they were so ... personal. Turns out the toughest leadership decisions are often also the toughest private decisions—that God challenges leaders in some of the same areas at work and at home.
Leading in All Seasons, Part 2
Last week, we looked at the organizational life cycles of churches, including two of those stages, Inception and Growth. This week, we're looking at two other key phases in church ministry and how to lead through them ... Maturity When churches move to a mature stage, they have high confidence in who the organization is and its focus. At the peak of their influence and size, churches are strongly results-oriented with a well-defined and less flexible structure, multiple strong ministries and established procedures.
Leading in All Seasons
"Why won’t the board embrace my plan to re-brand our church for the young immigrants moving into our area? I’ve been here 18 months, and I know this church has got to change radically if we want to reach our neighborhood.”
What Makes a Great Team
A lot has been written on the characteristics of a solid team. Honesty. Hard work. Having difficult conversations. Integrity. Collaboration. Fun. Shared vision and goals. Chemistry. Discipline. Accountability. And yet we are perpetually on a quest to find the magic bullet—to create that perfect team.
Entering Consumer Detox
"What I want," Lydia implored, "is for you to make me stop wanting the next summer fashion collection." She was a young—early 20s, maybe—serious-minded Christian desperate for freedom from the shopping-mad culture all around. I know how Lydia feels. "Buy me!" screams the book on Amazon. "Dive in!" calls the beach from paradise on the travel advert. And the more subtle stuff, too: I desire films to help me to relax; I desire a car so I'm not restricted in my options; I desire food because—well, because it's just food. And yet all the time the "holy" guilt inside my head screams, "Desire is bad."
Living with Questions
If you have ever followed a man named Jesus and found yourself in relationship with Him, you might have wrestled with a few questions. Even more challenging is what one might do who has been tasked with the responsibility of inviting others to follow them as they follow Christ. How do you live in the tension of being the one who has all of the answers when the truth is you stay up late every night with all of the questions?
Overcoming Sermon Writer's Block
I am a preacher, and though creativity comes in spurts, Sundays come with great regularity. Some call it writer’s block. I call it the sermon choke: attempting to come up again with yet another message that will inspire, encourage or challenge the loyal congregants who so faithfully fill the pews each weekend. Whether you are ready for it week after week or not, writing a sermon is just part of the job for a teaching pastor. There are plenty of people who think this job should come naturally—that it shouldn’t be work or shouldn’t require true creativity, research or innovation. You know, it should just be “God-breathed.” This and other myths I had to deal with early on. Here are three, in particular, I had to get over as I honed my skills and became stronger at crafting a weekly sermon.
How One Church Raised $5 Million for Homelessness
On March 6, 60 Minutes aired a report on “new homelessness”—a sudden wave of people without homes due to the economic downturn—in Orlando, Fla. Pastor David Uth of First Baptist Church of Orlando saw the report, as did author and speaker Bruce Wilkinson (The Prayer of Jabez). While speaking at First Baptist, Wilkinson challenged the congregation to meet the needs of the homeless in their community. And so, in one weekend, the church raised $5.6 million. We spoke with Uth about how it came about, how it will be used and what other churches can learn. Here are his tips:
Five Things Your Church Wishes You Knew
As a church leader, we know you do your best to be in tune with the needs of the people in your church community. You probably have programs to address the unique difficulties you’ve seen, you preach on topics that are relevant and insightful to people’s lives and you make every effort to really listen to the problems your congregation faces every day. But sometimes the culture gap between leadership and church community is wide enough—by no one’s fault—that it can become difficult to understand their needs. That’s why we went to five authors who love the Church, but who have also seen Her problems. We asked them to write to you as church members about the things they face that they’ve seen neglected by church leaders in the past. Their responses are difficult, impassioned and frank—but above all, are centered around a deep love for the Church and Her leaders.
7 Ways Pastors Fail at Social Media
Want to know where the people we lead are during the week? Online—Facebook and Twitter, specifically. These two social media platforms are larger than anyone could have imagined only a few years ago. Consider these facts about Facebook: Facebook currently boasts more than 600 million users. More than half of all American adults use the site regularly. The average Facebook user spends 20 hours a month on the site. While Twitter’s numbers are lower, its influence is still massive: Twitter has more than 200 million users. In an average week, 1 billion tweets are posted. Twitter has been cited as inciting protests and revolutions in Egypt, Iran and other places around the world. It’s clear these platforms are some of the world’s biggest. So why are Christian leaders sometimes so bad at using these powerful tools?
Eugene Peterson on Being a Real Pastor
Eugene Peterson knows what it means to be a pastor. He has spent most of his life serving the Church—whether that was from the pulpit at the church he founded in Bel Air, Md., as a professor at Regent College or as the author of more than 30 books, including his memoir, The Pastor, and The Message, a paraphrase translation of the Bible that is widely used today. Here, Peterson talks about church culture, how to be a pastor for life and why it’s possible for a church to get too big.
Sprinting a Marathon
I found out this year what makes a pastor jealous. Tell a pastor about a vacation you just had, a sabbatical you have coming up or how you’ve taken time to rediscover the weekend, and you’ll find another pastor wrought with envy. It’s more than just the usual person mildly amused that someone they know has some vacation days ahead. The pastors and leaders I am meeting are desperate for someone around them to call timeout so they can finally catch their breath. Some are aware of the condition of their mind, body and soul. The ones who are aware they need a break of some kind seem to make incremental, as well as intentional, steps in healthier directions. The question is whether that slow change will happen in time to keep them from developing high blood pressure. I don’t know what it says that most pastors I know have suffered from physical heart pains of some kind. Have you ever wondered if a more radical shift of rest is necessary so you can stay the course, or...
Andy Stanley on Preaching Grace
Andy Stanley is the senior pastor of North Point Community Church, Browns Bridge Community Church, Buckhead Church and Watermarke Church in and around Atlanta. As separate campuses of the same church, they comprise the second largest church in America. Stanley is also the author of more than 20 books, including last fall’s The Grace of God. We sat down with him to discuss grace, legalism, holiness and why Christians can never figure out the balance. Why do you think we have a tendency to consider grace and law as opposites? I think in the church world we contrast grace and law because Paul did in the book of Romans, and he presents them as two different approaches to life. But I think his attempt to reconcile the two oftentimes gets confused and we see them as polar opposites when in fact there’s really not an actual tension between the two.* I think one of the most overlooked sequences of events is the order in which God...
The Branding of the Body
I once went to a savagely countercultural Christian festival, in which mohawks abounded and the tattoos were so abundant that the ink in people’s skin could have filled an Olympic swimming pool. The branding, slogans and logos of this event radiated an ethos of revolution and status-quo-stomping. And I found myself wondering: What is it that tempts people—even the most visually insurgent—to seek out an identifying brand, a label to define them? Though it’s often hard to put it into words, something just doesn’t feel right about the persistent flow of imagery, branding and logos into our minds—especially when this has become a regular practice of our churches. But if branding, websites and logos all seem necessary and inescapable rules of the church-marketing game, how can one even begin to think about branding in light of Christian faith?
What is Revival?
When you think of revival, what comes to mind? Hot, dusty tents filled with thousands of attentive listeners keen on every word spoken by the magnetic leader up front? Spontaneous baptisms in open fields? A football stadium filled with worshippers, a stream of them moving forward for the altar call? Billy Graham? Jonathan Edwards? Do you think of the past or the present?
Jon Tyson Q&A
Jon Tyson, lead pastor of Trinity Grace Church, and his team had a vision for planting a church in New York City. The only problem? They didn’t know New York. Their strategy was based on a model that worked in Orlando—and they soon found taking church out of context doesn’t work. After five years in NYC, their approach has changed considerably, and they’ve learned a lot about what it means to be a church with a sense of place.
Service as Lifestyle, Not Obligation
After studying workers at two high-tech firms for more than 1,000 hours, Gloria Mark, an “interruption scientist,” reported that knowledge workers today spend an average of just 11 minutes on a project before switching to another. While focusing on a single project, they typically change tasks every three minutes. You probably know the feeling. We are living through an explosion of access to information and communication technologies. But Mark’s research suggests there’s a downside. Once distracted, workers take an average of 25 minutes to return to their interrupted task. In an eight-hour day, more than a fourth of their work time is consumed by interruptions. Business efficiency experts are beginning to pay attention to how this affects their bottom line. Pastors are noticing the shift, too.
The Numbers That Matter
The question of impact is one that never really goes away. Are our churches effective? Are our ministries making a difference? How does one measure such things? Attendance numbers? Offering dollars? While it’s natural to define success in numerical terms, we must also make sure we’re counting the right things. It’s challenging to observe that when Jesus commissioned His followers into the world, He didn’t prioritize finances or church buildings; He called them to make disciples of all nations. The obedient response of those first disciples would change the face of their communities, cities, region and, ultimately, the world. They actually accomplished the same things we’re praying for, serving for, laying down our lives for today. Knowing the Great Commission is our calling, too, means we need to ask ourselves some questions:
