Are You Being Followed?

1Th 1:6  “And ye became followers of us, and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost:”

A young upstart in the ministry once asked an elder more seasoned minister, "When will I know that I am leader in the Church?"  With that the seasoned minister responded simply, “When you are being followed.”

Leadership in God’s church is not position.  It is not having or being in an office.  Being elected by a group of people neither actually causes you to become their leader.  They may have elected or chosen you to do a job, but that does not mean that you are their leader.  Leadership only happens in the church when you are being followed. 

Jesus’ followers literally followed him through deserts, mountains, and stormy seas.  No obstacle was too great for the opportunity to be near to the master.  Here is where many church leaders find out if they’ve made the grade or not.  One statistic tells us that very often after a building program, many pastors too often leave a church to find another pastorate.  Why is that?  Could it be that the parishioners didn’t like the color of the paint the pastor chose?  Did they not like the way he conducted the business of the project?  Was too much money spent?  Too little accomplished?  Wrong decisions?  Bad decisions?  A leader will know if he is truly a leader if he followed even after a storm.

When Jesus’ followers were in the ship that was being tossed by the waves, they cried out to their leader and he healed the situation they were in.  Here is where an elected person becomes a leader of people.  Knowing what to do in the storm will validate your leadership.  Knowing how to act in a crisis elevates you above your fellow.  Not everybody is capable of making tough decisions.   Only a leader worth following knows when and how to step to the forefront and take charge of a chaotic situation.

Communicator Keys

American society is in the midst of a communications explosion. All sorts of electronic and print media vie for people’s attention. Amid this cultural revolution, there you are, trying to communicate the most important message of all time – the good news of Jesus Christ. How can you possibly compete? Following these 10 principles will ensure greater impact for your preaching.

1. Believe in what you say. Ferdinand Foch said, “The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul on fire.” All the crafting in the world can’t save a message that has no passion in it. If you can’t get excited about a subject, don’t preach on it.
   
2. Believe that people can change. Keep in mind that all great communicators have one thing in common: They expect their message to change lives.
   
3. Live what you say. Unless you have credibility, even the best content will get you nowhere. If you don’t live it, your listeners won’t either.
   
4. Know when to say it. Be observant of people’s reactions to your message. When you sense that people are receptive, it is time to ask for a response.
   
5. Know how to say it. Creativity greatly enhances communication. Use all the tools you can to make the message interesting and memorable: plays on words, acrostics, humor, stories, skits, music – all can help increase your impact. Avoid being too predictable. If people always know what you are about to say or how you will say it, they will tune you out.

The Dark Side of Spiritual Abuse - Part 4

Leadership seems to be the buzzword of our times. Bookstores now have multiple rows upon rows of books concerning this particular subject. Some of the content is very good and can help a person to hone their management skills and work toward becoming self-disciplined in a manner that will prove good for the organization that they are serving. I personally have benefited from some of the secular leadership books that I have read over the years. Despite all of these necessary and good resources only a small, in fact, microscopic amount of these books address spiritual issues in the life of the leader.

There aren’t any spiritual leadership concepts given in the books that Jim Collins has written. Patrick Lencioni does not address the spiritual side of a man who wants to build a Fortune 500 company. Peter Drucker’s works have almost elevated him posthumously to an exalted messiah among the leadership gurus of the last century. If we are not careful, there can be a tendency to think that we can build a church the same way that Steve Jobs made Apple successful. Once a spiritual leader buys into that particular idea that he can build a spiritual church with the same techniques that a profit-driven company is built, he deceives himself and he will create spiritual mayhem with the sheep he is meant to feed.

Spiritually abusive leaders are often very ambitious and driven toward success. It is important to understand the motives that drive men in spiritual leadership because our motives say much about our true intentions. Gary McIntosh in his book, Overcoming the Dark Side of Leadership, identifies five types of leadership styles that lead toward tendencies to be spiritually abusive. The compulsive leader is characterized by being status conscious, looking for reassurance and approval from those in authority. He will have a tendency to try to control activities and keep order at all times doing this by being an extreme workaholic. They can be excessively moralistic, conscientious, and judgmental. He may have an angry and rebellious attitude but will repress his true feelings and hold in the anger and resentment. When these dark emotions turn on the church, the atmosphere immediately turns into one of control and extreme authoritarianism.

There are certain traits that usually show up in the preaching style of a compulsive leader. He will frequently be a gifted and charismatic speaker but has the tendency to minimize any impact of the Scriptures unless they are going to serve his own agenda. He will also be the hero of all of his stories and listeners will be “amazed” at his feats in personal outreach/evangelism, prayer schedule, and devotion to the Scriptures. He may even say something like this; “I am God’s appointed authority in your life. If you oppose me you’re opposing God.” He will almost have the capacity to turn himself into a rock star for a lack of a better description. He leads people to follow him instead of the Lord.

Are You Taking Care Of Your Home?

There is truth in the saying that you live life in forward motion but you understand it looking backward. I know for myself I would certainly have done many things differently had I the opportunity to do things all over again. However, like everyone else, you only get one chance at this circle of life.

Those who have a teaching father or mentor have an inside edge on doing things right the first time . . . if they have the willingness to listen and apply Godly advice to their life and decisions. Unfortunately, such is not the case for most individuals.

Leaders are a unique breed. They are fueled by passion. They feed off the energy of accomplishment. The adrenaline can be addictive. It is not uncommon for leaders to be so enraptured by the doing that they lose track of their state of being. Many people who succeed at leadership therefore fail at the more important things in life such as family and personal development.

The scripture asks, "And what shall a man profit if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?"

The best time to consider the impact of leadership upon you and your family is now. It cannot wait any longer. Today needs to be the day that you do what is best for those you love the most.

Ponder this sobering thought. At the end of your days who will be there to weep over you? Who will carry you to your final resting place? Who will bury you and weep afterward over regrets and missed opportunities? The answer is your family. It won't be those you neglected your family for.

Ponder another sobering thought. If your spouse or one of your children died today would you bury them with regrets over missed opportunities? If you are like most leaders the answer probably is yes. Please don't say this can't happen to you. It can.

A few years ago I landed at a large airport. Soon after deboarding I noticed multiple ministry colleagues in the area. As I spoke to them they informed me they were there to meet another colleague who had been on an overseas mission trip. He was to land soon and they had to give him the sad news. His wife was killed in a tragic automobile accident on her way to the airport that day to pick her husband up from his missions trip.

Putting People First - 10 attributes of a Leader

What attributes qualify us for leadership? Here is a few suggestions on how these qualities might be put to use.

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1. Integrity – Where integrity is at stake, the leader works publicly. Behavior is the only score that’s kept. Lose integrity, and a leader will find himself in a directionless organization going nowhere.

2. Vulnerability – Vulnerable leaders trust in the abilities of other people and allow those who follow them to do their best. An invulnerable leader can be only as good as his own performance.

3. Discernment – This attribute lies somewhere between wisdom and judgement. Leaders are required to see many things (pain, beauty, anxiety, loneliness, and heartbreak). Two elements to keep your eye on: the detection of nuance and the perception of changing realities. What kind of antennae do you have?

4. Empathy – Without understanding the cares, yearnings, and struggles of the human spirit, how could anyone presume to lead a group of people? Person skills always precede professional skills.

5. Courage – When conflict must be resolved, when justice must be defined and carried out, when promises need to be kept, when the organization needs to hear who counts – these are the times when leaders act with ruthless honesty and live up to their covenant with the people they lead.

6. Humor – A compassionate sense of humor requires a broad perspective on the human condition and an accounting for many points of view. You’ll find a sense of humor essential to living with ambiguity.

Smile, You're on the Platform!

"...happy is that people, whose God is the LORD."  (Psalm 144:15)

Allen Funt, creator and original host of the landmark television series Candid Camera, perfected an art that has entertained people for over 60 years. From a humble start on radio in 1947, he used hidden microphones and cameras to catch unsuspecting people worldwide—all in the spirit of fun.  The show's famous tag line—"Smile! You're on Candid Camera!"—is universally known. 

Somebody is always watching you, so why not smile. All too often, we’ve all been in church services where the people who were on the platform, hardly ever smiled.  In some of these instances,  I personally knew these people and knew that they had a great sense of humor and personality, but watching them from the audience I realized that they hardly ever smiled while on the platform.  I know that there are times of deep worship when there is crying and weeping before the Lord.  I'm not talking about these instances.  What I am referring to are all of the other times while on the platform.  Most of the time our musicians and singers are on the platform for most, if not all, of the service.  Pastors and other spiritual leaders usually sit on the platform for all of the service also.  Spending all of this time in front of the congregation becomes second nature to us and we develop the bad habit of not smiling. Sometimes while leading worship service, preaching or even singing, we scrunch up our face and it looks like we are mad at something or that we are in a bad mood.  All the while, we may be in the best mood ever but it comes across to the audience in a different way.

A smile is an inexpensive way to change your looks.  ~Charles Gordy

"If you're happy and you know it then your face will surely show it."  In fact, all of the leadership of the church represents who the church is to the congregation and also to the guests.  If you are the greeter who stands at the front of the church and welcomes everyone into the sanctuary, you definitely should be smiling.  You are the first face that members and guests see and it should be a happy, welcoming face.  If you are a Sunday School teacher, make a conscious effort to smile, whether you are teaching that Sunday or not.  If you are a musician in the church who is normally on the platform but maybe you have the service off and are sitting in the congregation, make sure you are still smiling.  You would be surprised who is watching you to see who you are whenever you aren't in front of everyone. 

The Solution To Your Problem

Problems. If you're going to work with or minister to people, you are going to have problems. Sometimes big problems. Moses was one person in the scripture who had people problems. Millions of them. Everywhere he looked - people problems. How to feed them. How to water their livestock. How to settle their petty problems. How to settle their big problems. Where do the tents go? How about the toilets. Everywhere problems.

Surely with all these problems, the solution must be complex. Big problems should mean big, intricate, thoroughly researched and analyzed solutions - right? Not necessarily. In fact, very often, the solution to one's problem is asymmetric to the problem itself. Big problem, small solution.

When our problem is large or complex, we too often feel that the solution has to be the same. Because of this we usually miss the obvious, simple answer. In Moses' case, it took his shepherd father-in-law's simple mind to figure it out. A shepherd understands that a flock can get too big. When it does, it can begin to overgraze the fields and ruin the good pastures. This simple sheepherder was not educated by the most learned teachers of Egypt as Moses was, but he did understand something about having too many sheep in one place. He knew that when you have more sheep in a field than what that field can contain, you have to hire an under-shepherd to take part of the flock to another field. With that elementary laymen's thinking Moses was able to correct very simply, the extremely complex dilemma the nation of Israel had found herself in. Jethro told Moses to break the number of people down into smaller segments and then place leaders over these small segments. How simple.

The biggest problems that your ministry is facing today probably could very well be corrected with a simple solution. Too often however, we go shopping for the big answer: The complex answer. The expensive answer. The time consuming answer. Here's why: We focus on the negative instead of the positive. Seriously, nearly everyone does. Did you know that in the English language, 62 percent of the "emotion" words are negative, vs 38 percent that are positive. A group of psychologists once reviewed over two hundred articles and concluded that for a wide range of human behavior and perception, a general principle holds true: "Bad is stronger than good." Ask yourself, do you remember more of the bad that you hear about others or do you remember more of the good. A vastly larger audience of people remembers the bad instead of the good.

What If Everyone Tithed

The following was a excerpt from chapter 2 of the EBook intitled Where Your Treasure Is...

You can find out more about this incredible tool and related resources to help your church increase it's tithe and giving at http://www.pastoralhelps.com/training/where-your-treasure-is-teaching-set-edownload-w/cd

What are the possibilities if every Christian in America tithed ten percent of their increase to the Kingdom?

We can imagine those possibilities through a recent CNN article about tithing....

The churches of the U.S. last year received about $4 billion in donations. If the 112 million Americans who claim a religious affiliation had given one tenth— the traditional tithe—of their personal income to churches, that total could have topped $25 billion.

It takes money to advance the Kingdom of God in this world yet, according to this article, the average Christian in America gives only $35.71 to God’s work each year. And we wonder why America is straying so far from God.

Jesus said in...

Matthew 6:21 KJV

21 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

Notice this verse reads the opposite of the way we think. We think that wherever our heart is, our treasure will be also. Or whatever our passion is, that is what we will support.

That is not what Jesus said...and His ways are above our ways.

Jesus said that our heart is the follower, not the leader.

For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

Our heart will follow our treasure...What a revelation!

This is what commitment is all about…

I Need help!

I Need Help!
 
I am a pastor just like you. It’s Monday morning again and we had a great Sunday service yesterday. The Lord moved in a special way; people's lives were touched and changed. We even baptized someone this week, yet it already seems so long ago and so far away.
 
There are so many things going through my mind today. I feel like the enemy is trying to sift me like wheat. I don't know where to start. I have meetings to organize; leaders to train; sermons to prepare; Bible studies to teach; sick saints to visit; visitors to follow up on; letters to write; calendars to schedule; calls to return; counseling to conduct; a baptismal to fix, along with many other things--not to mention my own personal prayer and devotion time. Needless to say, I am feeling overwhelmed.
 
Wait…maybe I can postpone some of these things until next week? Then again, I know that hell hasn’t postponed her plans; in fact, hell is enlarging her borders today. If I delay, hell is gaining ground in my city and my city still needs to hear the Gospel message. I need help in a bad way!
 
Do you feel under-accomplished and overwhelmed with your calling? You’re not alone. Most, if not all, pastors and leaders feel this way on a regular basis.
 
Now before going any further, let me clarify. This is not an article about organization and restructuring; nor is it about adjusting priorities or time management. Although all of these issues are important, you have probably already been there and done that. The kind of help that I am suggesting in this article is “people” help. We need our people to help us but we must reveal our needs to them first. We need help!
 
As pastors and leaders, that is our heart’s cry. We look at our brethren with larger churches and think: Our church would be just as successful as theirs if only I had the kind of help that they have.  Sound familiar? I hear that kind of talk often and, in all honesty, it’s beginning to bother me. After all, is this not God's church? Are we not all laborers together? The large church needs help just as much as the small church and vice versa. The needs and challenges vary from congregation to congregation, yet we all need assistance.
 
 
Luke 10:2
 
2 Therefore said he unto them, The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labourers into his harvest.
 
No one is going to find help for you; you must find it yourself. It is the pastor's obligation to train up workers to assist. Most of the time, our help is already in our pews; yet, the reason the laborers are few is because we fail to make disciples of our people. The least likely helper to you might be the most likely helper in God’s eyes.  “God uses the foolish things of this world to confound the wise.”
 
Every person in our pews can do something for the Kingdom. One thing more that they do is one thing less that you have to do. The challenge sometimes is just seeing people in a different light. I have tried to put blinders on my eyes when it comes to seeking help. God sees things that we can't see, and if we would simply trust God to transform the lives that He has already given us, we could accomplish a lot more for His Kingdom.