Tag Archives: pastor

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Your Audience Determines Your Language

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audience

Many pastors don’t want to admit this truth, but it is true. One reason we don’t like to admit this is because when you do, someone might say, “Oh, you’re just watering down the gospel.” Which admittedly can happen.

If you don’t keep your audience in mind when you preach, you will miss them and it won’t matter what you say.

When I preach, I try to keep a few groups in mind:

  • The person who is giving God one last shot. Every week, there is someone who walks into your church and says, “God, this is your last shot. If you don’t speak today, I’m done with you.” Now, the sovereignty of God says this person is wrong and God can work regardless of what this person says, but this is their attitude. They are skeptical, hurting, lost and often living in some kind of pain. They have deep questions, lots of baggage. They want to know you know how they feel, the concerns they carry and the questions they are asking. They want to know they are real and legitimate and they want help, even though they will fold their arms and not admit it. 
  • The man who was drug there that morning. Every week, this guy walks into your church. He’d rather be fishing, hiking, biking, swimming, watching football, sleeping or getting a root canal. Anything but being at church. But here he sits. His wife, sister, daughter or mom drug him there and he is doing everything to not enjoy and not get anything out of it.
  • The student who doesn’t want to be there. Like the guy above, you have students who don’t want to be there. Who see God as old fashioned, something their parents believe in, constricting, and not for them. They want visions of how God can use their life, how faith can be bigger than they imagine and how God moves.
  • The man who works with his hands. This guy doesn’t read, he wants concrete ideas not theological ideas that can be debated. He wants you to say it and sit down. He doesn’t want a round about way to get there.

What about everyone else? The Christian who has followed Jesus faithfully for 20 years? Everyone I didn’t mention? I’ve found if you preach to these groups of people, you will hit everyone else in the room.

I’ve also found that most pastors don’t preach to these people. It is hard for me to always keep them in mind.

When I write a sermon, I often imagine having that sermon as a conversation with one of my friends who fit into these categories and how I would present it to them. What I’d want them to know and the questions they would have about it.

Don’t miss this though: your words reflect who you think is there. Whether you believe it or not, your audience determines your language because your language determines your audience.

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8 Ways to Know Your Reading is Too Limited

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reading

I love books. This isn’t a secret if you’ve been around my blog for a long time. You can see what I’ve read recently here and read my book reviews here. When I meet other leaders and pastors, at some point what they are reading comes up. I get some funny looks from some guys about what I read, as I don’t always read books written by Christians or books from my theological stream. Which made me think about how many leaders limit themselves in their reading, much to their detriment.

So, here are 8 ways to know if you are limiting your reading.

  1. Every book you read is from your camp. There are a lot of crazy theological ideas out there, so you need to be wise about what you read. But the reality is though, you don’t know everything and you certainly don’t have the bible and every theological idea all figured out. I don’t either. It is good to read authors who believe differently than you so that you can be challenged. I disagree on almost every theological point with Rob Bell and Brian McLaren, but their writings have forced me to ask good theological questions and made me stronger for it. Now a short note, if you are new in your faith, this isn’t a good idea as you don’t have the foundation to question yet. If that’s you, ask your pastor or a respected Christian for some book recommendations.
  2. Every book you read has bible verses in them. You should read some books by authors and leaders who don’t follow Jesus. There are great leadership and living ideas in books that have no bible verses in them. You should read health books by people who think we evolved from monkeys. One of the reasons is to learn how to communicate, but also to see what people who walk through the doors of your church believe.
  3. Every book you read confirms what you already believe. This is similar to the first one, but if you put a book down and are not challenged in your faith or leadership, you wasted your time.
  4. You finish every book you start. I get asked a lot why I don’t write negative book reviews. Every book you review you say that you like is what I’ve been told. The reason? If I don’t like a book by p. 40, I put it down. Life is too short to read a book you don’t like or aren’t being challenged by. If it’s poorly written or boring or not challenging, it’s off the list. Don’t feel the need to finish every book you start or to read every chapter of a book, they may not all be relevant.
  5. Books don’t challenge your heart. Similar to point 3, but you should be challenged. You should find ways to improve your preaching, leadership skills or your faith, being a spouse or parent. If not, put it down. If a book does not put the magnifying glass up to your heart and life, it isn’t worth the time.
  6. You never read a novel. I love novels. I love novels about spies or lawyers in particular. Throughout the year, I stop my reading list and pick up a novel. Some of my favorite authors are Dan Brown, Daniel Silva, John Grisham and David Baldacci. Baldacci’s Camel Club series is still one of my favorites. Every pastor should read at least 1 novel a year just to give their brain a break.
  7. Every book you read is for a sermon. You should read books that have no application in a sermon. It also sometimes happens that you are reading a book that you discover something that will work in a sermon, that’s great too. If you are doing a series on marriage, you should be reading a book on money or grace just to keep growing in other areas.
  8. Every book you read is by a pastor. You should read books by CEO’s, bankers, doctors, trainers, money managers, scientists, not just pastors or speakers.

What would you add to the list to know if your reading list is too narrow?

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Be Sensitive on Mother’s Day

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Mother’s Day is a big day for most churches. While Mother’s Day is a great day to honor moms in our lives, it is also difficult for many. Most pastors’ blogs will talk about honoring women, doing baby dedications, giving out gifts to mothers, etc., on Mother’s Day.

Mother’s Day is a hard day for many women in your church. For some, it reminds them of a broken relationship with their mother, of someone who is no longer there. For some, it is a reminder of the loss of a child. For some, it is a reminder that they aren’t mothers, even though their desire exists. For some, it is a reminder that they aren’t married when they want to be.

So, be sensitive.

Here are some things you can do at your church:

  • Honor all women. 
  • Acknowledge moms and the role they play. While you are being sensitive, please don’t ignore that it is Mother’s Day. It is; it’s on the calendar, and everyone knows it. You can be sensitive while acknowledging and honoring Moms.
  • If you give out a gift, give it to all women. We’ve given all women flowers in the past. This year we are doing free pictures for families, couples or groups of friends, or individuals.
  • If you want to give a gift to the moms in your church, give it to your children’s ministry to avoid drawing attention to it.
  • Encourage those who Mother’s Day is a difficult day to come forward for prayer with a leader.
  • Acknowledge that Mother’s Day is a great day for some and a hard day for others. This goes a long way in letting all women know they matter and that you see them.
  • Preach the gospel. You should do this every week, but especially on Mother’s Day. Remind women that their only hope, regardless of where they are on Mother’s Day, is Jesus.
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Communicating the Gospel to Your Kids Through Movies

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movies

I love movies. As a family, it is the same. Every week, we have family movie night. The child who had their daddy date that week gets to pick family movie night. This past week, we watched The Rise of the Guardians. 

If you haven’t seen the movie, here’s a quick synopsis:

When the evil spirit Pitch launches an assault on Earth, the Immortal Guardians team up to protect the innocence of children all around the world.

One of the ways that we’ve learned to communicate the gospel to our kids is through cultural pieces like movies and stories. Every movie and story mirrors the story of God.

In the rise of the guardians, the character pitch was thrown out of the guardians. He came back to take over, to fight them. Pitch, played the character of Satan and evil. At one point, the character of Sandman was killed. At the end of the movie, Sandman rose from the dead, and defeated Pitch when it looked hopeless for the other guardians. Sandman, in that way, was similar to Jesus.

After watching the movie, over dinner we asked our kids and talked through:

  • Who was Pitch like?
  • Why was Pitch evil?
  • What was Pitch trying to do to the kids in the movie?
  • How does Satan tempt us to sin?
  • Who was Sandman like?
  • Did Jesus rise from the dead?
  • Because Jesus rose from the dead, what does that mean for us?
  • Can we conquer sin and death the way they did in the movie?

Communicating the gospel to your kids through movies and stories takes time and practice, but it isn’t as hard as you think. Every single kids movie from Pixar to anything else has this storyline. Just look and then talk about it with your kids. A great way to apply Deuteronomy 6.

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Why Celebrating Valentine’s Day can Reveal Marital Problems

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book

Today is Valentine’s Day. Today, countless couples will spend thousands of dollars on flowers, dinner and gifts. And because it’s Valentine’s Day, they will pay more than they should.

Valentine’s Day also reveals something and it could be a problem if you are married. For couples, men will pursue their wives. They will make plans, get a babysitter, buy her a gift and make it a special night, all about her. What’s wrong with that you may ask.

Read that paragraph again and see if you see it.

A couple of years ago, Katie was talking with some other mom’s around Valentine’s Day. All the mom’s were excited about a night away from their kids, with their husband and the things he was doing for her. They asked Katie what we were doing. This year Valentine’s Day fell on a Monday and our date night is Friday. She looked at them and said, “Josh isn’t doing anything tonight for me.” They looked sad, poor girl. She looked at them and said, “He doesn’t need to, every week we have date night so I know he pursues me each week and I have his undivided attention every week.”

Silence.

What if, the energy you spent on Valentine’s Day, you spent that each week for a date night? Now, there’s no way you or I could afford what you spend to make Valentine’s Day special. What if you took that energy and money and spread it over the year?

Here’s a successful date night (at home or going out):

  • As a husband, you plan it. This communicates she’s worth your time. She feels pursued. You are able to serve her. 
  • Planning means, you know where you are eating, what you are doing and got a babysitter.
  • If it is at home, you put the kids down so she can relax.
  • Turn your phone, computer and TV off.
  • Look her in the eye and give her you undivided attention.
  • Do this each week.

If, like most married couples you choose to do this once every 52 weeks, you’ll have the marriage most married couples have (which isn’t very good).

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10 Ways to Know if You’re Putting Your Kids Before Your Spouse

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putting your kids before your marriage

No one gets married thinking they will put their kids before their marriage, but over time without being intentional, it happens. It’s easy to do. Kids need our attention, they scream for it (literally). We also rationalize that it’s easier and the right thing to do. Or, we rationalize that we will have time for our spouse later in life, but later in life rarely comes.

Here are some ways you know if your kids are coming before your marriage:

  1. You plaster all over Facebook about how excited you are to take a date night tonight because you can’t remember the last time you had a date night.
  2. The only time you talk to your spouse during the day is for something, you don’t text or call to say “I love you” or “I was thinking of you.”
  3. You don’t touch in public, at all.
  4. Sex is fast and rare.
  5. If you sit down to talk with your spouse, the only thing you can talk about is your kids and what’s happening in their lives.
  6. You don’t have any hobbies or interests outside of your kids.
  7. Dinner is in the car several times a week.
  8. You can’t answer these questions about your spouse: What do they like to do, what is God teaching them right now, what is hurting them or stressing them out right now.
  9. Your kids don’t know what “Mom and Dad time” means.
  10. “Mom and Dad time” does not mean what it should mean. Instead it means watching TV or passing out.
  11. Here’s a bonus one: your spouse complains that the kids come before they do.

Bottom line, it’s easy to do. In fact, most parents think you should put your kids first. This is actually a lie that can destroy your family. Putting your marriage first, makes your marriage strong, which in turn makes your family stronger because of the foundation.

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A Simple Time-Management Principle

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time management

There is an incredibly simple time-management principle that has guided my decisions and how I manage my time.

While it is simple, it has far-reaching implications. Here it is:

Every time you say yes to something, say no to something else.

Every time you say yes to something, say no to something else.

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If you run a company or a church, you can’t do everything. In your family, you can’t afford everything; you can’t sign your kid up for every activity (although lots of parents try).

It’s very simple. If you say yes to something, you will have to say no to something else. I was talking with a couple recently and they were wrestling with whether or not the wife should go back to work. They have small kids, money is tight, and they said, “It would help us financially.” I told them this idea and said, “If you say yes to working, you will make money. But you are now spending less time with your kids and someone else is raising them, you are bringing stress into your life that isn’t there now because you will be home less, because of working.” I kept going but you get the idea.

THE CHOICE IS YOURS

Every weekend, every weekday we make choices about how to spend our time. When a man chooses between spending time on the golf course or at the lake with his buddies, versus with his children, he is saying yes and no to something. We might say yes to what we want to do, but at the same time, say no to investing in our kids or an important relationship.

At the end of the work day, when we decide to take work home, stay just a little bit longer as opposed to getting home, getting to the gym to get some exercise, spend time with friends. We say yes to something and no to something. By saying yes to working late and yes to more stress, we are saying no to a sustainable pace, no to spending time with friends that would relax us or help us to unwind, no to exercising so that we can be healthier.

You can’t say yes to every kind of music, dress, style, and service time. Pick one.

Pastors try to fight against this in their churches. “If we have a program for everybody, we will reach everybody,” they say. But if you shoot to reach everybody, simply you will reach nobody. You can’t say yes to every kind of music, dress, style, and service time. Pick one.

When I planted Revolution Church, I struggled with this every day. As a pastor, there are so many people to meet with. You don’t want to say no to anyone because they might leave, and you need everyone you can get, all the givers you can muster. This often leads you to running ragged, not resting well, not spending time with your family or time with Jesus. We rationalize that we’re serving people, helping them, and that next month we’ll take that Sabbath, that date night.

As a parent, it is easy to do this as we run our kids from one activity to the next in an effort to give them a well-rounded life. By doing that—by saying yes to running their kids everywhere—we are saying no to family dinners, family devotions (often), but we are saying yes to more stress in their life as a family. Many couples sacrifice their marriages for their kids, pouring their time and energy into their kids instead of their marriage as the most important relationship in the family. This is one reason why more divorces happen in year 25 than any other year of marriage now. Empty nesters don’t know each other without their kids.

HOW TO SAY YES AND NO

We say yes and no in our family. We say yes to exercising and a healthy lifestyle. I’ve shared in other places about my journey of losing 130 pounds and keeping it off. Every time we go to the gym or make a meal plan to eat a healthy diet, we are saying yes to health and longevity in life. We have to say no to sleeping in later (as I get to the gym by 6 a.m.), to late night snacks, to too many chicken wings, and to swearing off my beloved Frappuccino.

When we got married, we decided I would work and Katie would stay home. We said yes to her staying home and no to a lot of other things. Other families have nicer things or go on nicer vacations than we do because of this choice. That’s OK. When we made this choice, we knew what we were saying yes and no to.

You need to know the implications.

We say yes to spend time with certain people and no to others. Pastors feel the strain of wanting to be with people, spending time with as many people as possible. But it is simply impossible. For our family, we seek to spend time with the pastors and their wives at Revolution Church, the MC leaders I coach and those in our MC and those our MC is seeking to reach. That is what we as a family we have said yes to. This means we have said no to other things and other people.

You need to know the implications. When you say yes to something, you say no to something else, maybe multiple things, but it happens every time.

IT’S OKAY TO SAY NO

This at the end of the day is what drives many of us to say yes. We have this desire to appease people, to be comfortable, to make others like us. This is what drives so many of us to not say no and to say yes too much.

When someone asks if they can meet with me, I want to help them, I want to say yes. Often I’m able to, but many times if I say yes to that opportunity, I will say no to something else. It might be a date night with Katie, time with my kids, a nap that I need, and my sermon prep time. When we say yes to the wrong things, it is often because we want to make someone like us, approve of us, and be comfortable in a relationship.

FOCUS

This is really a question of focus. When we say yes and strategically, we live more strategically. One helpful thing for me has been to lay out my ideal week and identify what the most important things for me to accomplish each week are. This helps me to see the time I actually have available for things that pop up at the last minute, it helps me to gauge if I can say yes to those opportunities without hurting the most important things.

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Before You Criticize Your Pastor

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pastor

The longer I’m a pastor I’ve realized something about churched people. When I say a churched person, I mean someone who has been attending church for any length of time and is a follower of Jesus (pretty broad definition). Many people in this category, while they love their church and want to see God do incredible things in their city, they also have the idea that they are smarter than their pastor or at least could do his job better than he’s doing it.

Now, they may be smarter than their pastor. There are lots of people at Revolution more educated than I am and smarter in a variety of disciplines than I am. There are people who may be able to do my job better than I can, but aren’t called to it.

I’ve written about criticism and how to handle it as a leader in other posts that you can read here and here. What I want to focus on here is before you criticize your pastor,

Here are some questions you should ask yourself before criticizing your pastor (or anyone):

8 questions to ask before criticizing your pastor.

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  1. Why does this matter? At the end of the day, some of the things that bother us simply are not that important. In marriage, your spouse does all kinds of things that drive you nuts (Katie doesn’t do anything that drives me nuts but I’ve heard other people complain about their spouses). Sometimes it isn’t that big of a deal. It might be a situation where you just need to let it go.
  2. What do I hope to gain from this? What is the end result? Do you hope your pastor will say you are right and they are wrong? Do you hope to help your pastor grow or simply point out his faults? Do you want any recognition in this process?
  3. How would you feel if you didn’t criticize your pastor? What if you didn’t say anything? How would that affect your heart? Would it drive you nuts or would you forget about it?
  4. What if nothing changes? This gets to the heart for many, what if your pastor doesn’t do anything with what you say? What if they disagree with you and tell you nothing will change? How will handle that? Your answer to this question will reveal a lot of your heart and if there is sin there.
  5. Is your criticism actually from the Bible? Pastors hear all kinds of things they are doing wrong or that their church can do better. Most of the time those criticisms simply come from people who would rather things were done differently. Is your problem actually in the Bible? Is your pastor sinning?
  6. Have you talked to anyone else? If you have, you’ve already sinned and you need to repent to God and to your pastor. Don’t bounce it off someone else, don’t do a veiled prayer request.
  7. Is this consistent with my pastor’s character? Could he have just been having an off day? Many times criticism comes from things that are not who your pastor is. If your pastor consistently does the thing or sin that you see, then talk with them. It may just be that something is going on in your pastor’s life that is tough, he maybe didn’t mean anything by what he said or you may have misheard him.
  8. Am I jealous of my pastor? Maybe you want his job, the upfront attention he gets. Many people think being a pastor is easy, glamorous and fun. At times, it can be those things, but it is usually hard work. Often, criticism comes from a place of jealousy, either for their pastors job, attention, status, relationship with God, or marriage. When I meet with someone who is upset at me or Revolution, half of the meeting will be the person venting about their spouse or another area of their life that they are taking out on me or our church.
8 questions to ask before criticizing your pastor.

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At the end of the day, disagreeing with your pastor is okay. Pushing back on something you think is a sin, wrong or don’t like is okay. The problem is in how it is often done. In veiled prayer requests at a missional community, a blog post, gossiping without talking to the source. Sometimes though, you need to not say anything. Sometimes it isn’t a big deal. Sometimes you need to give your pastor the feedback you are holding on to.

You also need to be prepared for your pastor to disagree with you and do nothing about it. This is when the heart issues will pop up for you. What if you believe something is wrong or should change and your pastor does nothing with it? If it is a sin, you should talk to other elders, but let your pastor know that you think this should happen. If it isn’t a sin but is just a difference in theology or how things are done at the church, if it is a big deal for you, you should leave and find another church. Here are some things to work through and keep in mind if it gets to that point.

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4 Ways to Wait until the Last Minute on Your Sermon

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preaching

I meet a lot of pastors who wait until the last minute on their sermons. Whenever I meet with a pastor or church planter I ask them, “What are you preaching on this Sunday?” I love hearing what series other guys are doing, the creativity. Recently whenever I ask this question, I get blank stares and a response of “I’m not sure, I think I have a title.” Sometimes they aren’t even that far along.

Here are 4 ways to make sure that you are killing yourself on Saturday night to put a sermon together.

  1. Don’t plan ahead. Don’t worry about it. Don’t think about future series, future topics, just wait. By not planning ahead, you will make sure that you won’t find great quotes, examples, stories to use. You will also keep from being able to use videos, certain songs that will allow artists to thrive in your church. For example, I’m going to preach through Ecclesiastes next spring and just the other day I came across something that will bring my point home next March.
  2. Believe that your sermon doesn’t really matter. Some of these are connected, but a lot of people just don’t think preaching is that important. Whether they hold that people don’t want to listen to a sermon or that they should just give a lite “here’s how to make Monday better than Friday was” kind of a pep talk. Your sermon matters. The Holy Spirit likes to show up whenever we talk about Jesus and the hope we have in Him. Lives are changed through the power of opening Scripture.
  3. Unclear on what is the most important thing you do. Too many pastors are not clear on what is the most important thing they do or what should get the majority of their time. Three things occupy the majority of my time:  sermon prep, developing leaders, meeting with new people at Revolution. I essentially give almost my entire week to those 3 things. Even when Revolution was smaller and we didn’t have a staff, that’s what I spent my time on, it’s what I do that adds the most value to Revolution Church. If you haven’t already, clarify how much time your sermon will get, give the best of your day to it. I don’t do meetings in the morning, except on Tuesdays, which isn’t a day I work on my sermon. My sermon gets the best hours of my day.
  4. Be lazy. A mentor told me, “Someone pays the price for a sermon, either the pastor in preparation or the church who has to listen to it.” Too many churches are paying the price instead of the pastor. Why? The pastor is lazy.

 

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Date Night at Home

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date night

In numerous places, I’ve written and talked about the importance of a weekly date night, you can read about that here.

Unless you have free babysitting every week, there is a good chance at some point you will have a date night at home. Often, this feels like a letdown for a couple because there is something fun and exciting about going out. There is something freeing about someone else putting your kids down. For Katie and I, most of our date nights are at home after the kids go to bed.

Here are a few ways we’ve made those special:

7 ways to make date night special on a budget.

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  1. Have a plan. Nothing hurts date night more than having no plan. In the same way that you plan going out, plan what it will look like at home. What will you eat, who is doing what, what time will things get started. You may have to be more intentional about the plan for date night at home because you are at home.
  2. Stay dressed up. Don’t get into your pajama pants. Nothing shuts your brain down more at the end of a long day like getting into comfortable clothes. Stay dressed up. Wear what you would wear if you were going out.
  3. No electronics. The fastest way to kill most date nights is turning on the TV, no checking out Facebook or Twitter or your email. Concentrate on each other.
  4. Plan a fun meal. It doesn’t have to be expensive or a feast, but something special. Something you wouldn’t normally eat. Katie and I love to try new recipes, so we’re always searching. Katie uses this blog a lot for our meal plans and we’ve found a ton of recipes that have been great for date night on this site.
  5. Eat with your kids. At home, we do an appetizer while our kids eat so that we can still eat dinner with them, talk with them about their day and it helps to hold us over until we eat.
  6. Know who will cook and who will put the kids down. It might be more relaxing for your wife to cook. She may want you to handle the kids, or vice versa. Whatever it is, communicate that and stick to it.
  7. Pick a night you are awake for. There are certain nights you are more alert and awake than others. Find that night and do date night on that night. If you have a long day on Tuesday, don’t do date night that night. Maximize the night where your energy levels are highest. I find knowing which night date night will be helps me to be mentally prepared for it.
7 ways to make date night at home a success.

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