Posted on Thursday, November 10, 2016

9 Things I Wish Worship Leaders Didn’t Say

by Joshua Reich

We’ve all been in that worship service. The one that got really awkward, really fast when the worship leader said the wrong thing. He didn’t mean to. He was trying. But it happened. He said something, and the feeling got sucked out of the room. The pastor covered his mouth because of the heresy coming out of the worship leader’s mouth.

It happened.

So what did he say?

Here are 9 things I wish worship leaders didn’t say (or said less):

9 things I wish worship leaders didn’t say (or said less):

1. Turn to your neighbor and ________. I’m an introvert, so I hate any time that I have to turn and say anything to anyone. I do this sometimes in a sermon, but rarely if ever. Maybe two times in eight years. If you’re a guest at a church, you don’t want to turn to your neighbor and do anything, unless it’s your wife, and then you certainly don’t want to be in church for what you have in mind. Don’t tell them to turn to their neighbor and say something. I was at one church where they put on the screen during the welcome time, “Hug 18 people.” Nope. Time to sit down and check out.

2. Let me tell you what I just heard in the sermon. A pastor spends anywhere from 5 – 20 hours on a sermon. You just heard it for the first time with everyone else. Please don’t re-preach the sermon. Now if you’re prepared and thought through it, great. But almost every time a worship leader says something off the cuff or prays something off the cuff, heresy follows. Not bad heresy, just things that sound slightly off.

Worship leaders, if you are going to talk or pray, write it out ahead of time. Be prepared. You teach your church about God every time you open your mouth. Make sure what comes out is correct.

3. Who’s excited and ready to sing today?! Almost no one. It’s early and we had a fight on the way to church and our kids were difficult and I stayed up too late on Saturday night.

Also, almost everyone hates to sing in public, especially men. You just need to be aware of that.

Worship leaders, remember we can’t sing as high as you.

We also don’t like to clap and sing at the same time because almost no one can do that. It’s not bad, we just aren’t very good at it. We also can’t sing as high as you can, so when you sing really high, and we know you are awesome and have an incredible range, we stop singing.

4. Father God, dear Father God, holy Father God. This one drives me nuts. It is almost like the worship leader forgot God’s name or needs to remind God of His name or remind the church who they are praying to. I don’t get this.

5. Wispy breath prayer. This goes right along with the Father God prayer, this wispy, romantic, Barry White prayer voice. I remember taking a friend to church. He wasn’t a Christian, and when the worship leader broke out the Barry White prayer voice, my friend leaned over and said, “Is he trying to seduce us?” I kid you not. Just be yourself. Use your voice. It’s good enough to sing on stage, it’s good enough to talk to us. Don’t use a British accent if you’re from America. Be you.

Worship leader, when you pray, don’t use a wispy prayer voice.

6. I can’t hear you. Yes, cause we aren’t singing. We don’t know the songs, so we aren’t singing. The lights and fog are too flashy, so we feel like we’re at a show and don’t need to participate.

7. Let’s give God a hand. This is often a plea for applause for you. If people want to give God a hand or you a hand, they will.

8. Let’s sing this from our heart. What does that even mean? I have no idea what that means. I went to Bible college, seminary, and I’m 80% done with a theological doctorate degree, and I have no idea what this means. Someone please tell me how you sing from your heart instead of your mouth or your gut.

9. Be here now, Jesus. This is one of the worst things a worship leader can say. Is Jesus not there before you say this? Was the Holy Spirit not on the move before you asked Him to be on the move? Or, “God, we just want more of You.” You have all of God you need. That’s not the problem. The problem is we don’t see God, we don’t have the eyes and ears for God, not that He isn’t here.

9 things I wish worship leaders didn’t say (or said less):

Worship leader, remember, what you say and do on stage teaches us how to connect to God and worship. It also helps us respond to a sermon we just heard or prepares our hearts to hear God’s Word. You have an enormous task. Many of you take it seriously, for which I and your churches are grateful.

Posted on Wednesday, September 14, 2016

The Top 10 Posts of 2016…So Far

by Joshua Reich

Saw this idea on Art Rainer’s blog and had to steal it. What a great way to review the year so far and help catch up new readers. If you’ve been reading my blog and subscribe, thank you. If you are brand new, welcome. Be sure to subscribe to the right so you never miss a post.

Here are the top 10 posts of 2016…so far:

1. 5 Systems Every Church Needs. Growing churches are not accidental. Yes, Jesus grows His church, but when you look at churches that are growing and healthy, they have a lot of similarities. One of them has to do with the systems they have in place. There are five systems that you need to have in place as a church or church plant to help your church grow and be effective.

2. 5 Books Every Pastor & Church Staff Should Read. Leaders are readers, and teams that have strong leaders read books together. While you can read any number of books together as a team, here are five books that I think every pastor should read and re-read.

3. How to Invite Someone to Church. Inviting someone to church can be intimidating and a weird task. How do you know when you should invite someone? Are there triggers to listen for? This post lays out how to know when to invite someone to church and how to do it.

4. 9 Things I Learned From Preaching About Homosexuality. This past year I preached through the book of Romans, and right off the bat in chapter 1 Paul walks through what has become one of the most controversial conversations in our culture: homosexuality and gay marriage. Preparing for that message was eye opening to me personally and then to my church. I learned a lot, was challenged by it and convicted by it. Before you have a conversation on the topic or preach on it, I’d encourage you to read what I learned.

5. How do I Get my Husband to Lead at Home? This is one of the most common questions that Katie gets from women. The idea of men leading at home can often be a fuzzy goal. Most people aren’t sure what it looks like, or if a husband leads at home, what does a wife do then? This post shows you two reasons why men don’t lead in their homes and three practical steps to encourage them to do so.

6. How to Recover from Preaching. Preaching is exhausting and exhilarating. There is nothing like preparing a sermon, being able to share from God’s Word and seeing the Holy Spirit use that time, effort, prayer and preparation. Yet come Monday, many pastors are run down, exhausted and wondering if they can move forward and preach again. This post shares five things I’ve learned on how to recover from preaching.

7. How to NOT Have a Big Day at Church. Every pastor would love to have a big day at their church, a day that brings in guests, momentum and energy to the church. Yet many churches sabotage themselves and miss a great opportunity. This post shows you six ways to make sure you do NOT have a big day at your church. Ever.

8. Bill Hybels on “The Lenses of Leadership” from Leadership Summit 2016. This post shares highlights from what I think was the best session at this year’s leadership summit.

9. How to Grow as a Leader as Your Church Grows. As a church grows, so must the leader who leads it. It is easy to get caught up in the busyness of church life and find yourself not leading or working on your church, only in it. This post shares five questions for a pastor to ask on a regular basis to make sure they are not only growing as a leader but thinking ahead for their church.

10. How to Stay on the Same Team in Your Marriage. It is easy in the busyness of life to find you and your spouse no longer on the same page. Carting kids around, family gatherings, church, work, hobbies, money, and all of a sudden you and your spouse are running in opposite directions. It happens subtly, and without intentionality a couple won’t get on the same page. This post shares simple ideas to get back on the same page and stay on it.

Here are two bonus posts from 2015 that still get a lot of traffic:

1. 18 Things Every Husband Should Know about His Wife. It is easy for a husband to stop learning about his wife, stop pursuing her and simply exist in his marriage. This post shares 18 things a husband should know, and if you don’t know, these would be great conversation starters on your next date night.

2. 10 Questions You Should Ask Your Spouse Regularly. This is a post Katie and I shared last year after a relationship series at our church. These questions lead to some very eye opening conversations for a couple and ones that you should return to on a regular basis. Enjoy!

Posted on Monday, August 29, 2016

6 Reasons Why Being on Time Matters

by Joshua Reich

Have you ever met someone for coffee, only to have them show up late? Or gone to a meeting that was supposed to start at 6pm but started closer to 6:20? Or gone to a church service that was supposed to start at 9am but started closer to 9:13.

It’s frustrating. It’s also disrespectful and I think it hinders your influence in life.

Here are three things that being on time shows:

3 reasons you should never be late.

Your Leadership, Influence and Time

1. It shows respect to the person you are meeting with (and their time). When you’re late you communicate, “I’m more important than you.” Now you would never say this, but being late can be an attempted power play. It shows a lack of care for the other person because it says, “Your time isn’t as valuable as my time, and what you have after this isn’t as important as this is.” You can’t make that decision.

2. It shows you are self disciplined. When you are late (even though it will happen sometimes), it often shows you aren’t disciplined. Maybe your previous appointment went long, which means you should let the person know you will be late. There is nothing more frustrating than waiting for someone who is late and not knowing when they will be there. So let the person know.

But being on time means you have planned your day, you know how long a drive will take or how long a meeting will take. It also means you keep meetings on track and don’t allow a 30 minute meeting to become a 90 minute meeting.

3. It shows you have your priorities in line. As a leader or a person who wants to have influence, your priority is people. Wasting their time by being late shows your priorities are out of line. It also shows you think higher of yourself than the other person.

3 reasons being late hinders your influence.

Church and Time

Now let’s apply all of these to a church.

3 reasons you lose influence as a church when you start a service late.

Why? So many churches and church plants don’t start on time. I remember when we first started Revolution and it was 10am, and the only people in the auditorium were myself, the band and the tech team. Our worship leader looked at me and said, “Do we start?” I thought for a minute and said, “Yep, we start on time.”

1. It shows respect to the people who came (and their time). Time is important in our culture, and we don’t like it when someone else wastes our time. For a church, you want to communicate to guests (and they are usually on time) that you will respect their time. This communicates, we will respect you. It communicates care and respect to the kids’ workers, because churches that start late often go late, and that is a fast way to lose kids’ workers. (They often have enough stuff planned for the allotted time, so if you go over, the Holy Spirit better be sending revival!)

Pastors often think, “We are supposed to start at 10, but most people don’t show up until 10:10, so we’ll start at 10:12.” Here’s what you just told everyone in your church: “We start at 10:12 so come then.” Which means they’ll show up at 10:20.

2. It shows you are disciplined. A lot happens on a Sunday morning, and it is easy to fall behind schedule or start late, especially if you are a portable church. This means to start on time you need systems to make sure things get done in a timely manner and aren’t stressful. Are some mornings stressful? Yes. Do things break and fall apart? Yes. But that shouldn’t be the norm.

3. It shows you have your priorities in line. Again, people are your priority, and if you as a church care about their time, whether they are a guest, a member or a volunteer, you communicate care to them. When you don’t prioritize time, you communicate you don’t care.

6 ways to grow your influence through how you use time.

Posted on Thursday, July 28, 2016

5 Ways to Get the Most out of Reading Your Bible

by Joshua Reich

One of the ways we battle condemnation, guilt, regret, shame, and hurt is through our mind. Our minds are incredibly powerful things. They determine our steps, our feelings, what bothers us, what we think, and the decisions we make that have an enormous impact on the people we become. We often think our minds aren’t that important, that we are feelers, or emotional people making emotional choices.

But we aren’t.

Our minds drive much of what we do. In fact, the New Testament often talks about the battle of our mind, and in numerous places the apostle Paul encourages us about what to think. In Philippians 4:8 he writes, “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” Why? Because what we think about determines so much.

So, how do you change your thinking? How do you battle your sin in your mind? This is important because much of our sin comes from thinking. We often think we sin and “it just happened.” But it didn’t. We chose to be there, chose to open that website, chose to say those words, chose that person as a friend.

In the same way, through the power of Christ, we can choose to not be there, to say no and not hang out with that person.

To do that, though, requires intentionality and putting on the mind of the Spirit. (Romans 8:5) The best way to do this is through reading the Bible, words inspired by God, authoritative, true and sufficient for our lives. One of the things I love about our church is that we produce daily devotional questions to go along with the sermon that you can subscribe to by emailing here.

5 questions to ask if your bible reading has grown stale.

As you read through your Bible, it can be daunting. Here are some questions I use to put on the mind of the Spirit:

What does this passage say (not to me, but actually say on its own)?
What words or phrases stood out to me in this passage?
Why do I think those words or phrases stood out?
What is God trying to show me through that?
Are there any sins I need to confess, changes I need to make or steps I need to take because of what I’ve read?

How to get the most out of reading your Bible.

Posted on Monday, June 13, 2016

How to Prepare a Sermon

by Joshua Reich

I’m often asked by other pastors or church planters about how I prep a sermon. While these aren’t so much things you should do, these are things that are principles for me and shape how a sermon goes from nothing to something.

6 things that go into preparing a sermon.

1. Plan ahead. My goal is to know 18 months in advance what I plan to preach on. This is crucial to my process. I’m a big believer that the Holy Spirit is just as likely to talk to me about a sermon 18 months before I preach it as He is the day before I preach it.

I start by getting away and praying through what am I learning right now, how God is challenging or convicting me personally, and if there is anything in that for my church or is it just for me. I also keep a list of questions I get asked by people in our church through emails and conversations and look to see if there are any common themes to them. During this time I also look back to see what we’ve preached on, what books we’ve covered, how long has it been since we preached through an Old Testament book or a gospel, and when was the last relationships series. I’ll ask leaders in our church about conversations they are having, questions they have, and books they think we should preach through.

One of the keys to a great sermon is planning ahead.

Then I take all of these notes and pray over them, seeing what jumps out. I’ll read through certain books of the Bible to get a sense of what God might want to say to our church. After spending several weeks praying and thinking through this, I’ll share with our team what I’m thinking. At this point it is between penciled in and permanent marker.

We’ve changed series at the last minute and tossed something we had been planning to do for over a year. That happens, and you have to be flexible.

I’ll be honest; this step is by far the hardest part of sermon prep. It takes the most time and has the least amount of immediate payoff, which is why most guys don’t do it. I meet so many guys who are just week-to-week or month-to-month.

2. Research. Once I have a sermon outlined, meaning I create what passages I’ll do on which week, how I’ll break up a book of the Bible, I go to work on researching it. I’ll create a notebook in Evernote and then a notebook in that folder for each week of the series. When I come across an article, a podcast or a blog, I simply hit the shortcut button on my chrome bar and put it into the folder. This is incredibly helpful when you are preaching on a controversial topic like homosexuality. At this point I might read the article, but I’m just gathering things. This is one of the biggest advantages to planning ahead in preaching.

For example, in the summer of 2017 I’m planning to do a series on spiritual practices or disciplines. So right now I’m pulling stuff on how habits are formed, looking at spiritual disciplines and how to best communicate and practice things like reading your Bible, fixed hour prayer, silence and solitude, fasting, etc.

3. A few months out. At this point, I start reading books that cover some of the topics I’ll be preaching on. I started preaching through Romans in March 2016, and so towards the end of 2015 I began reading books by John Piper and others on the book of Romans and some of what is covered in the book.

4. The week of. The week of a sermon is what most people think of when they think about preparing a sermon. And while I spend about 20 hours a week on sermon prep, as you can see, it is not all dedicated to the current sermon.

On Monday morning I spend a couple of hours preparing my heart by listening to worship music, reading some soul reading (John Piper or someone who has been dead for centuries) and reading through the passage I’ll preach on. I write out what stands out, what God is saying to me through the passage, etc. I think the most powerful part of a sermon is when the pastor says, “And here’s how this passage has been working on me this week.”

Monday or Tuesday I’ll start working through commentaries. When I started out I would read 8 – 10 commentaries and gather so much information that I never used it all. Most commentaries say the same things. Go to www.bestcommentaries.com and buy the top ones. My favorites are the NICNT or NICOT, The Message series by John Stott and the NIV Application Commentary. I’ll veer from that depending on reviews, but those are typically the ones I use.

I’ll also pull up the Evernote folder at this point and look through it. What is helpful, what can I use, etc.

My goal is to have all of my sermon stuff largely done by Wednesday at noon. This gives our team time to edit what goes in the program, what is on the screen and to make sure our next steps stuff is all ready to go.

At this point the sermon isn’t done, but is cooking.

5. Saturday. Every week I make a playlist on Spotify of the songs that the band is going to be doing. On Saturday afternoon I’ll take a run, listen to that playlist and pray through my sermon, the people who will be there, the things on my heart. This is such a crucial time for me and what God is doing in my heart as I prepare.

6. Sunday morning. I try to be sitting at my computer by 5:30 on Sunday morning. This is a final time to prepare for the day. I look at my heart, confess sin, and listen to worship music, go over my notes and edit them down. I also do my best to memorize my intro and conclusion. How will I present the gospel? How will I lay out the challenge? While I try to not look at my notes, I want the beginning and the end to be as solid as possible.

Then like all pastors, I drive home on Sunday with things I wished I had said or said differently.

But then I get to do it all over again the next Sunday!

What you can learn from how one pastor prepares a sermon.

Posted on Monday, June 6, 2016

Two Things Every Church Planter Must Know

by Joshua Reich

I’m often asked what I would tell church planters or what a church planter should know before they take the plunge into church planting. While this isn’t an exhaustive list, here’s what I told them the other day:

1. Know that you (and your wife) are called. This seems obvious since the qualifications of a pastor and elder start with this in the New Testament, but it is amazing to me how many guys think church planting would be fun. Let’s define that. Fun is going to the beach, hiking with my wife, playing with my kids. As one author said, “Church planting can kill you.” It can certainly kill your marriage if you aren’t careful (or called). If you aren’t called, don’t even think about it. If your wife is not called, and she needs to be just as called you are, then don’t plant a church. You are now one, which means you must both be bought in. If she has doubts or hesitations, listen to her as the Holy Spirit may be using her to talk to you.

The reason calling is so important is because the Bible says it is important. There is a reason this is the first qualification in 1 Timothy 3. The other reason is that leadership is hard, and church planting can be brutal. There will be times when no one likes you, they are spewing venom at you, stabbing you in the back, leaving your church in droves, spreading rumors about you; core team members that bail, donors who forget to send a check, leaders who sin and then get mad because you hold them accountable. And those are just Christians. Wait until your church is fully on mission and reaching people who are far from God. The bottom line, on those days (and there are more of those days than any other days in church planting), your calling is the only thing that will keep you going. I can tell you from experience that the only reason Katie and I started Revolution and made it to where we are now is because God called us to it. It gives you the determination, the energy, the passion and the fortitude to fight.

If your wife doesn’t feel called to plant a church, you shouldn’t plant one.

2. Know what you will be, not just what you won’t be. Lots of people plant a church because they are too smart for the church where they are on staff. Every student pastor I have ever met (and I used to be one) is smarter than their lead pastor. Why else would they be the student pastor under the lead pastor? Makes sense. So many guys start a church simply to prove how smart they are, how innovative they are and how if only everyone who had stood in their way would have seen the light, revival would have happened.

Whenever I meet with a guy who wants to plant I ask him, “What will you do, and who will you try to reach?” This answer should take less than 30 seconds to give. Anything longer than this and it isn’t clear in your head. If it isn’t clear in your head, it won’t be clear for anyone else. How can you form a core team who will give up time, money and energy for something that doesn’t yet exist? How will you get churches to partner with you, support you and pray for you if you can’t tell them why they should?

2 things every church planter should know.

Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2016

What does it Mean that ‘God Makes us New?’

by Joshua Reich

Living with a new heart, new life and new status can be incredibly difficult. I often say that we don’t realize how much freedom we have in Jesus. The reason? We are so used to slavery, what is old and what we know. We know how to live when we care deeply about what other people think, when we let other people define us, when we let our guilt, shame and regret define us. We know those things. They are familiar.

Yet, we long for new. We long for what we are promised in Jesus: freedom, life.

We do nothing to earn this grace. It is given freely by God the Father so that we can be rescued from His wrath. What is amazing is that in Romans 5 we are told that while we were still sinners, before we knew our need for God, for grace, for the cross, Christ died for us.

So what does it look like to live in this new life, this new heart, this new status?

1. Remember what you were saved from. This is what communion reminds us of. In communion we pause and think about not only how broken we were but also what we were rescued from. Maybe a good image to think of is the road that your life was on and where that road was leading. And I’m not talking about hell versus heaven. In real practical terms, what did God rescue you from?

2. Practice confession. 1 John 1:9 says that if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins. This verse often gets quoted to people who don’t know Jesus, but 1 John was written to Christians. This means we need to continually confess our sins. Not to be made right with God, because that was accomplished on the cross, but to make sure there is nothing in our hearts that hinders our relationship with God. Confession is not telling God something new. He already knows what wars for our hearts and the brokenness we can fall into. Confession is to remind us of what wars for our hearts and what we need to fight in order to live in the new life of Christ.

3. Remember you didn’t deserve it. It is easy to think we were worth saving because of who we are or what we do, but we aren’t. We didn’t deserve it. God didn’t need to rescue us, yet He did. John Piper said, “God did not spare His Son because it was the only way He could spare us.” If you deserved it, it wouldn’t be grace.

4. Know that Christ’s death is your hope for life. We often focus strictly on eternal life whenever we talk about the life we have in Jesus, but that life starts now. Living in freedom now, bringing God’s kingdom to earth through your life in the power of the Holy Spirit today. When you are tempted to sin, to fly off the handle, to control your life, to let other people define you, remember you were bought and rescued. Your freedom has been granted. That memory, that thought, that mistake, that generational sin passed down, in Christ that isn’t who you are anymore. That, “I’m just the man that ____.”; or “I’m just the woman that _____.” In Christ, that isn’t who you are anymore.

Posted on Wednesday, May 25, 2016

How our Searching Faith often Misses God

by Joshua Reich

Boasting is a tricky thing. It is easy to think we don’t boast because we are down on ourselves. We lament how things don’t go our way, how difficult our life has been or even how God could never love or forgive us.

The other side is that we think so much of ourselves. We puff up our talents, gifts, experiences, our behavior and how great we think we are. We have been told over and over that we can do anything. We get trophies simply for showing up.

Both of these views of ourselves get placed on God and have enormous effects on our relationship with God.

The first keeps us from experiencing God’s goodness in difficult times. We keep God at a distance because of our brokenness, never experiencing God as Father, never experiencing His grace or feeling His love. We are so afraid of betrayal, so afraid of God being “like we thought He’d be like” that we don’t trust the Bible. We don’t trust the promises of God. We don’t trust that God always does what is good, right and perfect.

Do you keep God at a safe distance?

The second keeps us from experiencing God’s joy and peace because we are always doing, always performing, always running, always making sure things are perfect, making sure we keep up with the Joneses in our lives.

Do you experience God’s joy and peace?

Both miss grace.

Both miss joy.

Both miss peace.

Both miss God.

How we miss God.

What we see in Romans 4 is that grace is extended. We are made right with God, not by doing something for God, not by being obedient to God, not even by believing in God (the book of James tells us that even the demons believe in God), but we are made right with God and experience His grace when we believe God.

Posted on Monday, May 23, 2016

The Letdown of Ministry

by Joshua Reich

It’s Monday.

Yesterday was a long day. Maybe it was a good day. Maybe it was an average day. But it was a day.

Some Sundays you preach your heart out, counsel, pray with people, trying to respond to the Holy Spirit’s movement, and it is amazing what happens. People respond, sin is confessed, people are saved, marriages are changed, people take next steps in their sanctification, and you think at the end of the day, “I can’t believe I get to do this.”

Some Sundays you preach your heart out, counsel, pray with people, trying to respond to the Holy Spirit’s movement, and nothing seems to happen. The music feels flat, your sermon seems to be missing something, people aren’t as engaged (they are there but somewhere else); you counsel people, and nothing seems to move the needle. You pray with people, and it feels like your prayers are hitting the ceiling. You lay down at the end of the day and think, “Why do I do this?”

It is amazing, the longer I am in ministry, how the feeling of a day can impact my memory of that day. My feeling of the day can also impact what I believe God did in that day.

This is important: my feelings and what God does are not always the same thing.

My feelings and what God does are not always the same thing.

Here are five things (and questions) to keep in mind, regardless of what yesterday was like:

5 things and 11 questions for pastors on a Monday.

1. Good or bad, did you give God all that you had? Sometimes our feelings of misery after a Sunday are deserved. We didn’t give all that we had in our sermon prep, we didn’t preach with passion, we didn’t preach from a transformed heart and instead preached some information we were hoping to pass on. Sometimes you preach with everything you have, and people just sit there and take it in. Okay, what then? Does that matter?

2. What do your feelings, right now, say about your identity? Is that true? What truth do your feelings about a Sunday reveal about what you are telling yourself? Is your worth wrapped up in what people think? How many people took next steps? How many people got baptized? What if someone heard your sermon on Sunday and became a Christian in 25 years? Would that matter?

What do your feelings, right now, say about your identity as a pastor?

3. Do you believe what you’d tell a friend in this situation? If a friend called you on a Monday and said, “I preached my guts out and nothing would happen,” you’d remind him that God’s word never returns void, that it always does its work. Now, do you believe that or are those just words on a page? Are those words just as authoritative and inspired by the Holy Spirit as Romans 8, Ephesians 1 or any other passage you love to preach?

Do you believe the advice you’d tell a friend in this situation?

4. God doesn’t need you. This should humble you. God can save every one of the people He intends to save without using any of us. He doesn’t need you or me for His gospel to be preached or for anyone to be rescued and enter His Kingdom. He doesn’t. He doesn’t need your words, your sermons or your songs. But He takes them. He uses them.

5. Today is another day. Get up, exercise, get some coffee, read your Bible and spend some time with your Heavenly Father. It is a new day. What happened yesterday, while it has an impact on today, happened yesterday. Too often we worry about yesterday. Let it go.

11 questions for pastors on a Monday.

Posted on Thursday, May 12, 2016

Take the Lid off of Your Church

by Joshua Reich

In every leadership book or at every leadership conference you hear the mantra, “Leaders are readers”, or “Growing leaders grow churches”, or something to that effect. In his book The E-Myth Revisited, Michael Gerber puts it another way: “The job of the leader is to know more than you do.”

“The job of the leader is to know more than you do.” -Michael Gerber

If you aren’t careful, though, you can put a lid on your church and its potential for growth.

Now before you email me and tell me that Jesus grows the church, he does. Yes, the Holy Spirit can and will do what the Holy Spirit does, often even when we are trying to wreck things with our pride and sin.

At the same time, there are consistent things that churches that are growing, healthy and effective do that others do not. The same goes for their leaders.

I meet a lot of pastors who unknowingly are not allowing their churches to reach their full potential because they are not reaching their full potential. For a lead pastor, eventually your church will look like you, good or bad.

As we grow, I am seeing that I need to spend more and more time learning, stretching myself, getting alone with God trying to discern what is next and not getting comfortable in what we already “know.”

Here are a few questions I am constantly going through:

For Revolution to become twice the size we are now, what do I need to start doing? What do I need to stop doing? What things will keep us from getting there?
If we were twice the size we are now, what things would we do differently?
What things are we doing right now that need to be tweaked? What things need to go to a new level?
What new leaders do we need to raise up?
What leaders need to be challenged to go to a new level?

“5 questions pastors of growing churches ask themselves.