Category Archives: Healthy Church

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How to Make Your Next Sermon Great

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sermon

When it comes to anything in life, whether it is marriage, parenting, leadership, or work, someone pays the price.

In marriage you can either pay the price at the beginning, working through all the junk you brought into your marriage; or you can pay it later when you are unhappy and married or divorced.

As a single you can pay the price to stay pure and wait until you get married to have sex. Or you can pay the price after you get married as you work through what it meant to give your body away before you got married. Or your spouse will have to deal with that thought.

The same is true for preaching.

Either the pastor pays the price in preparation, studying, praying, planning, reading, and listening to God; or his church pays the price when they have to listen to him stand up there completely unprepared, unsure of what his big idea is, as he wanders through his sermon aimlessly like the nation of Israel did on their way to the Promised Land.

Too many pastors make their church pay the price.

I was talking with a few pastors the other day who told me, “It’s Wednesday, I’ve got a title.” If all you have on Wednesday is a title, you are not paying the price for your sermon.

In preaching, someone pays a price, the church for listening or the pastor in prep.

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Paying the price means you plan a preaching calendar, you think through where you are going as a church. You study, you pray through the text asking God to reveal to you what it is about, what your church needs to hear. You read commentaries and other books, you look into the context to better communicate the text.

Preaching every week is easily the biggest weight I carry and the biggest joy I experience.

On Saturday night I lie in bed thinking through my talk and the text for Sunday. At this point in my preparation I almost have the text I’m preaching on memorized and have thought through the ins and outs. I am now thinking more about who will be there, how I will communicate it. I begin praying for those I think of and those whom I don’t know, those who are coming to Revolution as a last ditch effort on God. This is the weight of preaching. If you do not feel this, I don’t think you should preach. Why? When you stand up to preach you are literally reaching into Hell and pulling people who are on the path to Hell (Matthew 7:13 – 14). I realize that is a paraphrase, but that is the spiritual battle of preaching. That is what’s at stake.

Sunday night I lie awake worrying if I said everything I should’ve said. Did God want me to say something else? Was I clear? I pray for those who made decisions, whether to get baptized, start following Jesus, or any number of next steps we talk through on a Sunday. I pray for the spiritual protection of those who made decisions. I know that night will be a very difficult night as Satan and his angels will be going to work on those individuals.

Pastors, do you pray for those who are coming and for those who make decisions? This is the price of preaching. This is the price of pastoring.

If you are not willing to pay it, then do something else. Lives are at stake. Souls are at stake. Marriages are at stake. Families are at stake. Eternities are at stake.

Pay the price.

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Seasons in Life, Leadership & Church

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leadership

I grew up in a farming community, so everyone was very aware of the seasons and what those seasons meant for life. Certain things happened during certain times of the year. You planted, watered, prepped the dirt and harvested plants at certain times. If you did it at the wrong time (too early or too late), you could harm the crops and miss what could be.

Life, leadership and church are the same. There are times when things are high (harvesting the crops) and times when you are prepping the dirt (getting ready) or pulling out weeds, and it feels like nothing is happening.

Then, like a farm, you start over.

When you start a church (or a new chapter in life), you are clearing the field, getting the seed ready, tilling the ground. Things like building a team, building in that team, getting the word out, working through logistics and schedules to get a church off the ground. This is hard work. There is no shortcut through this, although I meet plenty of church planters who want to skip this. It’s easy to see why; it is hard. Long hours, you see very little fruit because you are planting, you are weeding, you are watering. Some younger leaders can relate to this season as they work under a pastor, waiting for the time to plant a church. Many guys see this as “biding their time” but need to see it as the time of pruning, the Spirit of God working in and on them for what lies ahead. This season is mostly behind the scenes. The work that is being done is often being done in hearts, lives and in meetings as people work to shore up systems and how things are done.

In our lives this is trying to get a career off the ground, trying to finish school, pay your dues at a company, working to get your marriage off the ground, trying to figure out kids, how that all works as you parent. This is the beginning of things. This is hard work. In this season most dreams, most goals stop because of the difficulties.

Don’t miss this: this is not a wasted season. If you don’t do this hard work, preparing, studying, reading, getting ready, you can’t actually plant a crop. You can’t start a business, you are unprepared to start a family. We too often rush into things we are not ready for.

Don’t rush to the next thing in life. You may not be ready for it.

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Then you water, you clear the weeds away, making sure the crop gets sunlight, plenty of fertilizer and water.

This is the time that you start to see life. The first person to become a follower of Jesus, the first baptism, first marriage saved, you launch something in your church. This is exciting, this is what you hoped for. For many guys, though, this can be depressing because it is slow. You will see plants come up that just die. You will see weeds that overtake plants. Or plants that don’t grow to what they should be. Leaders you poured into who walk away, marriages you counseled only to have them quit. Moments of betrayal and feeling stabbed in the back, feelings of God abandoning you. At this point you will probably hear of how God is working in the church down the street. Don’t despair; they are in a different season.

You are in your season, they are in their season.

Your marriage starts having small wins, you begin to see eye to eye, you’re connecting again. You get pregnant after a long, difficult season of infertility. Your work is beginning to get noticed, you get some accolades, a promotion, get accepted for that master’s program.

Like a church, you can start to get jealous at this point. Someone else seems to have an easier time. Their child isn’t as difficult, their marriage (while yours is great) is better.

The next season is the harvest. Plants are growing, you are reaping rewards from your hard work. In this season you have unprecedented momentum. You can do little wrong. Every idea you try seems to work. Your sermons click, community groups multiply, money is great, staff is getting along. There is a buzz about what God is doing in your church. You might even be getting noticed in your city, people are talking. This is the season you hear about on twitter, blogs and at conferences.

This is where you can look back with some accomplishment on a project that has taken awhile. Maybe you had a lot of work you had to do in your marriage, you sell a business, a business is finally humming and hitting on all cylinders, you graduate, and all the work you put into your schooling is done. It is a season of accomplishment.

This is the season everyone wants to live in.

The reality, though, is that this season comes to an end, and then you start over. What often keeps pushing you through this cycle is the reality that the harvest season does come.

So how long do these seasons last? It depends. Some leaders, churches, careers and marriages get stuck in an early season and never reap any benefits. Some after going through the great feelings of the harvest and seeing things start over simply throw up their hands and quit. Most people seem to stay stuck in an early season and wonder why life is so hard.

If you are in a hard season in life, don’t despair. It doesn’t last forever.

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The important thing for a leader is to know what season they are in personally and where their church is so they can lead effectively and know how their church is doing. People need to be reminded that hard seasons do not last forever, but they also need to be reminded to enjoy the seasons of growth and momentum.

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How Does Your Church Make Decisions?

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decisions

Most people don’t realize it, but the one thing leaders spend the majority of their time on is decision making.

I know you think you spend a lot of time on relationships and in meetings, but when you boil leadership down, much of it is spent on decisions.

Most churches don’t have a strong decision making grid that they look through. For many churches, decisions are made based on cost, if they will lose people (or make people mad) or who thought of the idea (if it is a person with power, that gives more weight to the idea in most churches).

Facing a decision at work? Here’s how to make the right one.

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While there are some valid points to those, making decisions through that grid won’t always get your church to where God wants it or accomplish the vision God has given you.

Think of your decision making grid as the hills you are going to die on. These aren’t necessarily theological hills, because the theological hills you will die on should kill a decision before it gets too far.

This a philosophical grid.

Here are some questions to consider for your grid:

  1. As you make a decision, will how that decision affects the next generation or empty nesters be the factor that pushes it over the edge?
  2. Are the opinions of churched people or unchurched people more important?
  3. How much does money factor into the decision?
  4. How much risk are you willing to take?
  5. Who are you willing to lose?
  6. Who do you hope to gain?
A grid to help your church staff make decisions.

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5 Systems Every Church Needs

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systems

Depending on who you ask about church systems, you will either get excited looks about the potential of them and how they can help people, or you will get looks of disgust because they sound like the business world and not very shepherding.

Yet the reason many churches fail is not because of a lack of caring but a lack of intentionality.

The reason many churches fail is not because of a lack of caring but a lack of intentionality.

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They are led by pastors who are incredibly relational and shepherding but lack the organizational skills to help people grow. And that is the crucial piece of that word failure. I’m not talking about not growing but about failing to help people reach the growth in their discipleship that God has for them.

In a small church, that happens one-on-one with a pastor. As a church grows, that must begin to spread out or there will be a lid on how many people a church can disciple and help grow in their relationship with Jesus.

The answer to that dilemma: systems.

Many large churches have these systems down and do a great job at them. Sadly, many church plants need these systems but do not have them in place, so they fail to get the traction they’d like or see the growth in the lives of their people.

Here are five systems you need to have in place to not only grow as a church, but help your people grow:

5 systems every church plant needs to grow.

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1. First time guest. When a guest shows up at your church, what happens? How do you know they came? When you are smaller as a church, you know someone is a guest because you know everyone, or the guest comes dressed up and the regular attenders don’t do that. But as you grow it becomes easier for people to slip in and out. It is good to give people anonymity until they’re ready to let themselves be known to you. But when they are ready, how will they tell you? Is it a connection card? What will you do with that information? If you get a connection card this Sunday, what happens to that on Monday?

You can’t leave that to chance.

I remember hearing Rick Warren say once, “God sends people to churches who are ready for those people to come.” I believe that is true. Many churches that are growing can tell you what happens when someone walks in their doors.

“God sends people to churches who are ready for those people to come.” -Rick Warren

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We give something to a guest because we want to break down the barrier that the church wants something from them. That makes people defensive, especially men, as they are waiting for the church to ask for something. Instead we give them a gift, and then after their first time with us we send them a Starbucks gift card to say thanks. I get so many comments from second time guests who tell me they returned to our church because when they went to Starbucks, they thought of our church.

2. New believer. If someone became a Christian this Sunday in your church, what would you do? Of course you would be excited, but in that excitement do you have a plan for that person to help them grow? More than likely it would involve meeting with the pastor of the church. What if 25 people became followers of Jesus this Sunday? Now, you can’t meet with all those people. So what happens?

This is where you need a system and a plan to know what happens. Who do they talk to? Do they take a class? Do you have people in your church prepared and ready to talk with new believers?

5 systems every growing church has.

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3. First time giver. Giving can get weird in churches because it’s money and it’s private. Many pastors think it is wrong to know who gives in your church. I don’t see that anywhere in the Bible. Now if you struggle with treating bigger givers differently than those who give less, than that is something to work through, but that’s not what I’m talking about. Giving is a spiritual gift that many people in your church have, just like leadership and mercy are a spiritual gift. My hunch is that you know who has the gift of leadership, evangelism or hospitality in your church. You should know who has the gift of giving. And just as an aside, just because someone gives a lot does not make them the wealthiest people in your church, and you already know who the wealthiest people in your church are simply by going to their house and seeing their car and clothes.

In the same way that you should know who has the gift of giving in your church, you should know who gives for the first time in your church and do something with that. That is a huge step of faith on their part. Many pastors overlook that because they are always thinking about the budget and bills, and when someone gives that’s just helpful. But that person is now saying, “I want to grow in my faith. I want to hold loosely to what God has given me and trust Him. I’m bought in here to the point that I’m giving my money.” That is a huge step!

Celebrate that. Help that person continue to grow in that. They may have the gift of giving, they may not, but have a plan to help that person grow in that discipline. Giving is a crucial piece of spiritual growth and being a disciple of Jesus. Don’t let it happen by chance.

4. Community and relationships. Every church leader knows that growth happens best in the context of relationships. We preach on it and tell people that, but we fail to realize that community and moving into a small group of some kind is a huge step for people. It’s a time commitment in an already busy schedule. There is the fear of going to a house of a person they don’t know. How long will the group meet? Many groups are meeting until Jesus returns. What happens if the person goes to a group and doesn’t like it or the leader? Now it is really awkward when they see that person at church, and so many people choose to skip it all together.

These are barriers you have to get past if you want to see people enter into relationships at your church. We’ve experimented with three month small groups and told people, “You can do P90x for 90 days; try a group for 90 days.” We’ve also started to encourage people to enter a serving team first before joining a group. It is less of a commitment in their mind and still gets them shoulder to shoulder with other followers of Jesus. And serving helps you in your spiritual growth.

5. Leadership development. This last one took us the longest to develop, and because of that I believe it really stunted our health and growth as a church. Every pastor wants more leaders in his church. If you want to plant churches, you want men around you who want to plant churches. Yet many pastors simply hope those people will find their churches. If your church is near a seminary or a Bible college, that may just happen and will mask that you don’t have a plan to develop leaders.

Think about it like this: if you wanted to have 10 elder caliber leaders a year from now, how would you develop them? What would have to happen for that to occur?

If you want to plant a church two years from now and that person would come from within your church right now, how would you get that person ready? How would you find that person?

You need a leadership development system.

5 systems every church needs to be healthy.

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Like I said at the beginning, systems are often seen as bad or mechanical, so many shepherding leaders don’t use them. Systems help move people in their relationship with Jesus. Systems are crucial to the health of your church and the growth of your people.

Church systems are crucial to the health of your church and the growth of your people.

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What a Pastor Wants from His Church

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pastor

Someone asked me what made a lead pastor love his church. Outside of the obvious: being called by God to lead and love the church they are in, the answer is pretty simple.

What a lead pastor wants from his church is also what a church wants from their pastor.

Here are some things that if you attend a church, your lead pastor wants from you but maybe has never said (in no particular order):

What a pastor wants from his church is what his church wants from him.

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1. Commitment.

A church wants their pastor to stick through thick and thin, and so does a pastor. He wants people who will stick with the vision and not quit. He wants people who are sold out to what God has called them to, not just consumers who show up for the latest sermon series.

Your pastor wants a church that has people willing to push through hard times and stay committed. This is not something our culture does very well, and most churched people are terrible at it. Hurt feelings, leave the church. Don’t like the music, leave the church. Moved to a new facility I don’t like, leave the church. Sadly, pastors and the people who attend their church don’t expect the other to stay. They have both watched too many people come and go. This should not be so.

Your pastor wants you to be committed to your church.

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2. Loyalty.

Your pastor wants you to be loyal. Being loyal does not mean following blindly. Loyalty means that when you have hurt feelings, you talk it out with the person who hurt your feelings, not share a prayer request in your small group about it. Loyalty means that when you hear people being divisive, you stop it instead of joining in or being silent.

3. Growth.

Yes, every pastor wants the church to grow, but that’s not what he wants from you. He wants you to grow into the person God has called you to be. He wants you to use your gifts inside the church and outside the church. He wants you to be in community and take the risk to make that happen and make community a beautiful thing. He wants you to be generous not only with your time but also with your stuff. He doesn’t want you to be stingy.

Your pastor wants you to grow spiritually.

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4. Prayer.

In the same way that you want your pastor and leaders to pray for you, your pastor wants you to pray for him and his family. He wants you to lift him up during the week while he’s working on a sermon, he wants your prayers on Saturday night before church, and then afterwards when he’s exhausted and spent. If you don’t know how you can pray for your pastor, you can ask or simply pray during those times.

Your pastor wants you to pray for him and his family.

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5. Appreciation.

Everyone wants to be appreciated for what they do, whether it is as a volunteer, in a job or in a relationship. We all want people to say thanks, give a gift or let us know how something made a difference in our lives.

Being a pastor is no different.

While many churches use October as pastor appreciation month and say thanks to their pastor then, some churches give their pastors gifts or people in the church are generous in some way, many churches show no appreciation to their pastor outside of saying, “Today’s sermon was nice.” To be fair, many pastors do not show appreciation to their volunteers and staff, and so the cycle continues. I’ve talked to many pastors who left their church, not because God told them but because they didn’t feel appreciated.

Your pastor wants to be appreciated.

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There are more things that could be added to this list, but if every person in a church did these five things, I believe the longevity and happiness of pastors would soar. I also believe the health of churches would greatly increase.

5 things your pastor wants from his church.

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The Most Important Step to Change

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Breathing-Room

For all of us, something or someone runs our lives. When this happens we find ourselves not living the life God has called us to. When we stop long enough to catch our breath, we realize how tired we are, how much debt we have, how we said yes to things we should have said no to.

If we aren’t careful we simply jump from “I need to lose weight”, to “I need to get out of debt”, to “I need to slow down”, and we try to make changes in those areas. We get on the latest diet, sign up for a financial class or clear our calendar for a week.

If you are like most people who try this approach, a month from now you’ll look up and see the same problem.

The question becomes, “What then?”

In most church counseling sessions we would look at the sins in your life. We would talk about your addiction to porn, your willingness to give your heart and body away in relationships, the pace that you keep, how you go into debt buying stuff you can’t afford, how you always gossip, or why you push yourself and your kids to be the best and attain a certain kind of lifestyle. We often want to move to fixing those things and think, “I’ll just stop doing them.”

If you’ve ever tried this approach, you know it doesn’t work. We can’t simply change our behavior and see lasting change. Until we understand why we do something, change and freedom will continue to elude us.

Have you ever been to a buffet – one where the plates are stacked, and whenever you pull a plate off, they all move up? Think of your life and sins as being like that stack of plates. Most of the time when we sin or hear about sin in a sermon, it is about the plate on top. To see true change, to see the things that crowd out our lives get conquered by the power of Jesus, we have to keep pulling up plates until we get to the last one, what we’ll call the sin under the sin.

If we aren’t careful this sin under the sin starts to drive our lives. What makes this easy to miss is that it is often something good that we give prominence to in our lives. Things like our kids, a job, money, keeping a clean house, retirement, a dream house or another goal.

These things are what drive us to go into debt, to run at an unsustainable pace on our calendar, which leads to an unhealthy lifestyle. This is the why.

The most important step to change is knowing why we sin.

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Let me put it another way: often when we sin, without realizing it we are looking for meaning. We sin from a place of emptiness.

We sin from a place of wanting to be filled up, a hope to feel better, more alive, a part of something, or to take away the fear of missing out on something. The search for meaning drives many of our decisions, and ultimately it’s the driving factor in our search for breathing room.

Often when we sin, without realizing it we are looking for meaning.

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*This is an excerpt from my upcoming book, Breathing Room: Stressing Less & Living More. Click on the link to purchase it.

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How to Engage Business Leaders in Your Church

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business leaders

The other day I got a question from a church planter that I hear a lot: How do I get older, more mature Christians to my church plant? How do I engage and utilize the gifts of business leaders in my church? The answers are deeply connected.

Most church plants are filled with young professionals, young families, and singles. Because of this, most church plants have a lot of energy and a lot of kids.

In every church plant there is a group that is often overlooked. If you ask every church planter what he wishes he had more of, his answer would be this group. It is older people, established people, people with wisdom to share.

For many church planters, they are entrepreneurs, driven by leadership and vision, but they struggle to make that vision come to fruition. They struggle to build systems of follow up, systems to care for people and make sure no one falls through the cracks. While they can cast a vision and tell you what their church will look like in five years, they can’t tell you how they will get from where they are to their desired destination.

Often the person who can help them is a business leader. This person may be in their 20’s or 30’s, but they will often be someone in their 50’s. Maybe they are retired or looking for an opportunity to serve and make a difference with the gifts they have.

Sadly their is one reason this person never gets to serve in the church and use their gifts, and it hurts the business leader and the church plant and the pastor: It is the fear of the pastor; it is the intimidation that a pastor feels towards a business leader or someone with organizational and administrative gifts.

Why?

Usually this leader is very high capacity; they accomplish a lot because of how gifted they are organizationally. They have years of experience, so they know how to work well with people, which makes them likable and well spoken.

All of this leads a younger church planter to decide to go it his own way and not utilize the gifts of the people in his church.

Now here is what every church planter tells me: We need more older people. We need older couples who can mentor younger couples. We need wisdom.

But what they don’t realize is they have communicated to that person, that person that they want so badly at their church, We have no place for you. 

Not on purpose, but the message has been sent loud and clear.

So what can you do? How do you turn the tide?

1. Give them something real to do. If you want older people in your church, if you want experienced business leaders to connect in your church, you must give them something real to do. Real responsibility. They have experience with budgets, decision making, systems, efficiency, communication and productivity. Tap into that. Learn from them. Ask them questions. You also need to think through responsibility below an elder level for these leaders, as all of them won’t want to do that, and you may not want them all to do that.

If you want experienced business leaders to connect in your church, you must give them something real to do.

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2. Stop trying to be the young, cool church. Yes, the target of most church plants is 20 – 40 year olds, which often means the message, sermon, communication, ministries and music are tailored to that group. You don’t need to change that to engage an empty nester, you just need to think about how to do that. Use examples in sermons that would be helpful to them. Highlight the people in your church that aren’t 20-something’s.

3. Be who you are and let go of things. As a visionary leader, if you want to engage a business leader, if you want to utilize the gifts of an older Christian, you are going to have to let go of your feelings of pride and intimidation. Often you are the reason they aren’t engaged; you have communicated you don’t need them or want them. You have made it difficult for them to use their gifts and feel needed. I know you don’t think that is the case, but it most likely is.

Often the lead pastor unknowingly prevents business leaders from engaging at a church.

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4. Engage them relationally & show them respect. The best way to engage older people in your church, to get business leaders onto your team and use their gifts, is to engage them relationally and show them respect. Be their friends, invite them over, spend time with them. Ask them questions, get to know them without a desire for anything else. This seems so obvious, but when an empty nester walks into a church plant they often get treated like a unicorn, and everyone mauls them, so they leave quickly.

To reach an older Christian, engage them relationally.

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One of the Deepest Hurts in Your Church

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hurt

When I was 23, I was interviewing for a job at a large church outside of Washington D.C. The interview was going well and it looked like I was going to get the job. At the end of my final interview, Katie and I sat with a group of 12 people around a table and we’re grilled for 3 hours on everything anyone could think of.

Finally, the interview was coming to a close and the person in charge asked if anyone had final questions.

The lead pastor who had been there the whole time but had yet to say anything spoke, “I have one.” He said. He looked at me and said, “Josh, what is your deepest hurt?”

I’ll be honest, the question caught me off guard.

Who talks about hurts and wounds in an interview?

As I fumbled through my answer, not because I didn’t have one, but because I had never shared it. When I finished, he looked at me and said something I’ll never forget: “I’m afraid of someone who can’t identify their deepest hurt, who can’t talk about how Jesus has redeemed that and how they are moving forward because I don’t know when that hurt will rear its ugly head in a situation.”

That was the end of the interview.

Fast forward a few months and Katie and I are meeting with a Christian counselor. He talked with us about how our past affects our present and future in ways we often don’t realize.

We replayed an argument that we had and he asked each of us what from our past did that argument remind us of, what people, places, etc. Amazingly, that argument reminded us of a lot and the brokenness of our past and upbringing. He looked at Katie and said, “When you hear Josh say that, it is reminding you of this. That is the tape that plays in your head.” The same was true for me.

That tape may say, “You aren’t good enough, smart enough, capable enough, beautiful enough.” It might say, “You always screw up, you aren’t good for anything, you aren’t organized enough, strong enough.”

So, when we hear someone say something and it is close to what we heard growing up, we react not to the person in front of us but to the person or situation from our past.

Often, you will find that these feelings center around our desire for control, power, approval and comfort.

This is often where our deepest hurt is found. Often, but not always, it will center on your relationship with your Father so I often encourage people look there first. Something about it has a way of affecting so much of our life.

Once you uncover it, talk through it with someone close to you. Ask them if they see that in you. Do they agree? What evidence do they see in your life of this hurt?

You may need to have a conversation with the people you have hurt but also where this hurt stems from. This will be the hardest road you walk but is also the only way to swing the relational pendulum into the joy and peace that God has for you. Don’t run from this, do the hard work. Even if the person who hurt you scoffs at you or treats this like a small thing, keep digging into it.

I know it is hard to do this, I know that we dislike hurt and pain from our past, but we will never truly be free from our past until we face it. Know that in the cross, Jesus redeemed your past, present and future. He is there and has been there and will use for his glory, but we have to walk through it with him first.

Until this happens, you will play your life out of this hurt.

One of the problems we have and it goes unspoken in our lives is that we are so accustomed to this hurt we don’t even realize it. We are the girl who can’t stop buying something she can’t afford. We are the guy who can’t be kind or give a hug. We are the person who keeps everyone at arms length, we are the over-achiever. Slowly, our hurt becomes a part of our personality and who we are. It is incredibly deceptive, but that isn’t freedom, that is bondage in your sin.

If we don’t deal with our hurt, it becomes a part of our personality, who we are.

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How to Pick Ministry Ideas

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ministry ideas

Pastors know this conversation.

Someone comes up to you and says, “Do you know what our church needs?” A ministry for _______.

Now, that blank is often a good idea. In fact, it might be a great idea. The one idea that is just waiting to take your church over the top.

What many people and pastors fail to realize, the person asking it doesn’t actually want that. They may think they want that or that they want to be a part of that, but they don’t.

When to say yes to something.

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Typically, when someone in a church says “we need a women’s ministry” or a class on finances or prayer or parenting, we need a group for empty nesters or college students, church leaders jump and start one up because “they don’t want to lose this influential person.”

Now, when this class or ministry starts, do you know who won’t be there?

That’s right.

The person in the original conversation.

Why?

When it comes to our spiritual growth we don’t know what we actually need. 

We often want what we think others have. We look at the end product of another church, another ministry but don’t ask, “What led them to start that? What need were they trying to reach? Does that need exist in our church or city? If it does, what is the best thing to reach it?”

We often get asked why we don’t have a women’s ministry or life stage groups at Revolution. The answer is, we think there’s a better way to reach our target in our city. There is nothing wrong with them, we just think the way they are usually done would hinder our goal as a church.

The other issue we don’t often think about is when a need is presented, it is simply in an effort to meet that need. This is good, but what leaders often fail to realize as they take in suggestions is they are tasked with seeing the whole field, the whole situation, while the person making a recommendation is not.

This isn’t bad, but before a leader goes ahead with an idea, they must stop to ask if it fits into what is already happening, the goal of a ministry or church.

Sometimes the answer is yes and sometimes it is no or wait.

So, when that new idea comes up, here are some criteria to take it through:

7 ways to know if now is the time to start something new or kill something old.

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  1. Does it reach our target as a church? Every church has a target whether they admit it or not. The target of your church, whether that is families, singles, students, empty nesters should drive many of the decisions of your church. Your target is who you are best situated to reach and who God has called you to reach. You want to reach everybody, but are best suited to reach certain people in your city. Who that target is will determine the ministries and ideas you run with as a church.
  2. Does the answer to question 1 matter? Sometimes the answer to question 1 doesn’t matter. God is calling you, your church or team to move forward with an idea that your target doesn’t matter. This won’t happen a lot, but I wanted to put this in there.
  3. Can we afford to do it? Do you have the structure, the bandwidth, the finances to make something happen.
  4. Can we afford not to do it? If you don’t do something, what happens? Not enough pastors list out what happens if they say no or not yet. Often, we live in fear of people, losing people, making someone angry and never list out, “What really happens if we say no?” Often, saying no will not mean the world ends.
  5. Is now the time to do this? Just because an idea is good or great does not mean now is the time to do it. Church planters often feel this tension as the larger church down the road can do a lot more than they can. That’s okay, let them.
  6. If we do this, will it hurt something else we do? Many times, we unknowingly undermine something that we are already doing by doing something else. This is why we don’t do a women’s ministry at Revolution, because of what unintentionally happens in a church when one is going.
  7. Can we be great at doing it? Too many churches do too much because that’s what churches do instead of asking, if we do this, will we be great at it? Can we do this better than someone else? Don’t just do concerts, Awana or classes to have them. Be great at the things you do. This will mean, you will do less.

The reality when this conversation happens is the person who says, “We should do ____” wants to see their church be great, healthy and reach more people. You as a leader though are held accountable for knowing when the time is right to say yes.

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There is no man nor church in the world that can come to God in prayer, but by assistance of the Holy Spirit . . . If men did see their sins, yet without the help of the Spirit they would not pray . . . There is nothing but the Spirit that can lift up the soul or heart to God in prayer . . . The soul that rightly prays, it must be in and with the help and strength of the Spirit; because it is impossible that a man should express himself in prayer without it. He explains, O how great a task it is, for a poor soul that becomes sensible of sin and the wrath of God, to say in faith but this one word, “Father!” . . . O! says he, I dare not call him Father; and hence it is that the Spirit must be sent into the hearts of God’s people for this very thing, to cry Abba, Father: it being too great a work for any man to do knowingly and believingly without it.

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John Bunyan
Prayer