Four Ways To Make Your Website Ministry Effective

February 11, 2018

Obviously, today almost every church has a website, but sadly many church websites are little more than a newspaper or yellow pages ad for the church (something that has the basic facts and little else) posted online. This is not a factor of graphics or design, but of organization and content. Below are four suggestions to take your site beyond being an ad only to become an effective ministry tool in the coming year.

1—Don’t rely on your home page

Many churches put a great deal of time and emphasis on their homepage and this has increased over the last few years with the advent of sliding header images, the “flat design” movement, and the redesign of many church homepages to look like the landing pages of secular companies.

There is nothing wrong with any of these design trends and many church sites, because of the templates used to create them are very attractive. However, for your church site to be ministry effective it needs to be more than a home page for two key reasons.

One: each category or ministry on your homepage needs to be explained in more detail if you want it to actually involve people, particularly those outside the church. Be sure your home page is the foundation and links to explanations. The cute graphics of programs that don’t make sense to anyone but insiders don’t appeal to visitors unfamiliar with your programs.

Two: Not everyone comes to your church website and sees the home page first. More and more visits to church sites come through search engines links of topics searched for. BE SURE all your pages have clear menus, in the headers or sidebars that let people know what else is on the site and how to get to it.

2—Add depth to the site

Following from the point above, your home page will become less important as you add content to your site, work hard to add content to your site so it becomes more than an extended newspaper ad online. Added content will make your site more of a resource and evangelism tool for people looking to find out more about the Christian faith.

Articles, links, videos and other materials that explain and defends the Christian faith can either be created by your staff and members or you can summarize, comment on, and link to material on other Christian sites.

Consider adding a team of reporters or writers for your website. Assign an editor and give them guidelines in tone and length. Don’t add this content creation expectation on the current staff. Your Sunday School teachers, lay Bible teachers, retired pastors or staff who have the time and desire to write and research can make a great content team. This not only will help add depth to your church site, but you may give people in your church who have the gift and desire to do Christian writing a chance to practice their gift.

3—Don’t forget the basics

Having just encouraged you to add depth to your site, please don’t forget the basics.

People often come to your site looking for basic information and then they will look at other material if it is interesting to them. But if your site doesn’t have the basics they are looking for, it destroys the credibility of your site overall.

Double check to make certain that you have:

Updated times and locations for events—don’t just pass over this quickly—really check to make sure this is accurate.
Up-to-date calendar and service times—if you change the times for special days or events, be sure you put this on your website.
Clear labels or removal of events that have already happened—nothing is worse than last month’s special event still in a primary place on a website.
Links to featured items—today many church websites feature header sliders with key events featured. Be sure these have links to all the information needed to explain the event: if there is a cost, times, dates, etc., and a contact person for more information.

Periodically, informally have someone from outside the church look at your site (sit them down and watch them, pay money for their time) and ask them to find where classes are, when and where basic services are, what is going on for kids, what the church cares about. If they stumble and can’t find things, you know you need work on basics.

4—Get legal with your use of images

Text content isn’t the only area that you need to be concerned about—images are another. Here is what is becoming a pattern for many churches–you really need an image for the project you are working on. You don’t have money to buy one. You go to Google or Bing, do an image search and grab the first image that looks good.

And then later you feel guilty because you feel you may have stolen an image that wasn’t legally right for you to use. Feeling bad isn’t the only issue here. Churches and other organizations can be subject to substantial fines if they use images that they aren’t legally entitled to use. Also, it’s unrealistic to expect the Lord to bless our work if we use stolen material to promote our ministries.

What to do? Check out the short video here for super quick and easy ways to make sure you only snag legal images: http://www.effectivechurchcom.com/2015/01/how-to-legally-download-images-from-google-and-bing/

Websites are a never-ending church communication challenge, but their ability to reach our communities for Jesus will increase if you follow the four suggestions above.

For more advice, samples, templates and more on effective church communications, go to: http://www.effectivechurchcom.com.

5 Power Tips for Taking Bible Study Notes

Kevin Purcell

February 11, 2018

Recently I retweeted a link to an article about using the Bible study notes feature in WORDsearch Bible Software (WORDsearch Blog). My Tweet stated, “Most important feature in any bible study app.” I was describing the Bible study note-taking feature available in most Bible software.

Some people might argue against that statement. Isn’t search more important? Maybe including commentaries it ranks ahead of notes. What about original language study?

Fundamentally, other features like search, language study or displaying eBooks ranks ahead of note-taking in Bible study software. No other key feature gets less attention from Bible study software publishers than Bible study notes. Most offer some kind of notes, but they usually don’t include features like…

Spell-check
Automatic Bible reference hyperlinking
Searching notes
Formatting of text or paragraphs
Exporting or printing

Bible software makers need to give their Bible study notes feature some attention because it can become one of the most important features in the program. If a Digital Bible student uses Bible software with good note-taking tools, then the tips below will turn them into Bible study note-taking power users.

ANOTHER WAY TO STUDY THE BIBLE: LISTENING TO AUDIO

Software with Bible Study Notes Option

Don’t buy Bible software without a good note-taking experience. What should buyers look for? Here’s my list of the bare minimum notes features.

Tie a note to a single verse, a passage, and a whole chapter

Some programs will tie the note to a single verse. Others to a chapter. A few can do both. The best programs give the user many options, including the ability to tie a note to a range of verses or even a single word/phrase. Programs that only tie notes to the whole chapter limit the usefulness. A chapter may include three different preaching texts. I don’t want the first passage’s notes to get in the way while I’m studying the first or second passage in that chapter. If your software only connects notes to a whole chapter, lobby the publisher to fix this or switch. Before buying a program find out if it does this and avoid those that do.

Automatic Bible reference hyperlinking

Most Bible software turns a Bible verse reference into a hyperlink. The user can click it to open to that Bible reference or hover their mouse over the link and a window or tooltip will pop up. If a program forces the user to select the text, click on a button on a toolbar or press a keystroke combination, and then type the reference into a dialog box, then the publisher just wasted that user’s time. The program should let me manually add links to other digital books in the program by selecting and typing in or pasting in a web address or Bible reference. For example, if I type “ch. 13” into a notes file and the paragraph context makes it obvious that I’m talking about chapter thirteen of the book of the Bible other than the one that notes file is attached to, then I should be able to manually add that reference if I want. If the notes feature doesn’t recognize that I typed John 3:16 and automatically add a hyperlink to John 3:16, then bug the publisher till they add it or don’t buy it in the first place.

Spell-check

The more a person uses the notes feature, the more this becomes necessary. Good programs check for spelling errors automatically and underline the mistakes so users can quickly see typos or spelling errors. The program won’t catch them all and may catch false positives, but that’s better than nothing. That’s why the programs should also include the ability to add words to the spell-check dictionary. A bonus would be the ability to easily correct it. I don’t know of a program that does auto-correct, but some do let the user right-click the mistake and it shows a list of optional corrections in a pop-up menu.

Text and Paragraph Formatting

Some programs only let a person enter simple text. The programs can’t make it bold or italicize it or can’t indent a paragraph or change its color. Some programs can’t use automatic number or bullet lists. Good notes editing boxes will include all of these features.

WOULD YOU PAY A MONTHLY SUBSCRIPTION FEE FOR FEATURES LIKE THESE?

PAGE TWO: MORE FEATURES AND PROGRAMS:

3 Experiences Guests Won’t Forgive

Dan Reiland

February 9, 2018

Some of your visitors are looking for reasons not to return.

These guests are difficult to please. If they look for the flaws in your church, they will find them. There are no perfect churches, and pleasing everyone is impossible. Do your best to love everyone, but the prospect of chasing people who are intent to run is usually a futile process.

Some of your visitors are looking for reasons to stay.

These guests are looking for a few things that are important to them, such as friendship, spiritual growth, help in a crisis or a healthy environment for their kids. If they find a few things they care most about, they will overlook a few less than ideal aspects of your church.

In fact, it’s amazing how forgiving people can be if you treat them well as a person.

The musicians on your worship team may not be world class, or perhaps you don’t have enough parking, or maybe your student ministry isn’t what you want it to be. But if you treat people well they are usually pretty forgiving.

This is not an excuse to ignore the things that need attention, but it’s enough grace to know that you can still do great ministry while you work on what needs to be improved.

First time guests and people new to your church will give lots of grace for the flaws and shortcomings if you treat them with:

Kindness
Respect
Love

But there are some things people who are new to your church will not forgive. These are mistakes you cannot afford to make.

3 Experiences Guests Won’t Forgive:

1) If you treat their kids as a program to be managed rather than kids to be loved.

Structure can beat out spirit, and the programs and processes can become more important than the person.

This can happen in any ministry in your church, but there is little to no grace when it comes to people’s kids.

I’m willing to bet that the heart of your church is about life change, meaning and real spiritual transformation through Christ. You want to see the children love Jesus and enjoy church!

But here’s where it breaks down. If you begin to make your children’s ministry easier on the staff and volunteer leaders by making it more difficult for the parents and kids, you are making a big mistake. You’d never do that on purpose, but it happens.

The leaders must always absorb the pressure, not the guests.

If the kids become a number in the check-in process or are scolded more than encouraged because they didn’t behave just right, or there are so many rules that it’s impossible to keep up with, it’s highly unlikely that the new families will return.

2) If you treat the adults in any way “less than.”

Most reasonable adults are pretty resilient. As I’ve said, they understand there is no perfect church. But if you treat them poorly as a person, you don’t get a second chance.

One thing that’s easy to forget is that even though someone may be spiritually unresolved or disconnected, they are still usually spiritually sensitive.

If the pastor says something that makes a person feel spiritually foolish, or an usher or greeter treats someone with disrespect, they won’t give you a second chance.

We can’t live on pins and needles worrying about offending everyone, but we can do our best to serve with intentional love and grace.

I remember several years ago trying to help a young mom tend to her crying baby in church. I did my best to be kind and respectful, but I inadvertently offended her by asking her to take her child to the nursery. Maybe I could have done a better job, or perhaps it was a no-win situation, but the result was she was upset and said she’d never come back.

Most of these situations are nuanced and unintentional, but it’s so important to do our best to treat our guests with love, respect and kindness.

3) If you treat any guest with an eye to get more than you give.

It might seem nearly impossible for a church team to treat any guest in such a way where that person felt like you wanted more from them than for them. But once again, this is easier than it sounds.

Church leaders are often under pressure. They are under pressure for things like more volunteers, larger offerings and support in general for the vision and direction of the church.

For example, if a church is hurting for more volunteers, they can put pressure on people, including guests, to sign up.

When pressure (or even guilt) is employed rather than inspiration and encouragement, you have fallen into the mistake of wanting more from the people than for them. Your guests have no appetite for that.

Another example might be if a church is behind in the budget. That can sometimes “leak” out in a sermon, or during the time to receive the offering. This kind of pressure makes it feel like the church wants more from the person than for them. If this is what your guests experience, they are not likely to return.

Kindness, respect and love will always help you treat people well.

Fitness Lessons for the Church

James Emery White

February 9, 2018

I’ve been on a bit of a fitness kick of late. In the process, I’ve been introduced to four fitness truths that have proven to be extremely important to remember:

1. There’s no secret—much less shortcut—for losing weight. You have to eat less or workout more. Ideally, both.

2. It’s difficult to lose weight and gain muscle at the same time, but this site can help, even though it’s the holy grail of fitness to achieve both. The reason it’s difficult is because they encompass two different diets and two different strategies. To lose weight you have to cut calories, to gain muscle you have to feed your body protein (which is often high in calories).

3. You can’t spot-lose fat (unless you have liposuction), but you can spot-build muscle.

4. It’s a myth that a pound of muscle weighs more than a pound of fat. A pound is a pound. But muscle is more concentrated, so a pound of muscle is smaller than a pound of fat. So you can look like you’ve lost weight yet weigh the same if you’ve exchanged fat for muscle. That’s why there were so many memes following Donald Trump’s recent physical examination that revealed he was 6’3” and weighed 239 pounds, putting him beside others who have the same dimensions but with vastly different visual results.

Interestingly, these four truths are extremely relevant to the church.

1. Just as there is no secret shortcut to losing weight, there is no secret shortcut to growing your church. If losing weight involves eating less and working out more, then growing your church involves inviting people to attend and then having a wide-open front door that serves them when they do. That front door involves friendliness, a practical message and a high-quality children’s ministry. And while it really is just that simple, there is no shortcut.

2. Just as the holy grail of fitness is losing weight and gaining muscle, the goal of the church is reaching the lost and discipling the believer. Or perhaps, more to the point, reaching new people while keeping older ones. At first glance—like losing weight and adding muscle—these dynamics can seem to be in tension with each other. But just as you can have a high-protein, low-carb diet to lose weight and add muscle at the same time, you can reach the unchurched and develop the believer at the same time. As I often quip to people who try to pit evangelism against discipleship as either-or: “Then Jesus lied.” By that I mean that His Great Commission calls us to both. If we can’t do both with equal fervor, then we’re implying Jesus called us to a false mission. But He didn’t. He just called us to an intentional one. We may have to do cardio and strength-resistance, cut carbs and eat protein, but the point is that we can do both.

3. Just as you can spot-build muscle, but not spot-lose fat, within the church you can spot-build strength where there are areas of weakness, but you can’t spot-lose things that are more systemic. For example, you can build a building or add staff to address “muscle.” That’s just lifting in a certain way with a certain weight. But there is nothing you can do physically or materially to address the “fat” of a lack of missional focus, misguided values or blurry vision. That needs the holistic approach of serious cardio or even liposuction.

4. And while (as mentioned) a pound is a pound, there is a big difference between two men who are both 6’3” and weigh 239 pounds, but where one has the bulk of that weight in fat and the other has it in muscle. One is “ripped,” the other just has ripples. Many churches would be well served to trim down and get in better shape by losing the excess fat of multiple ministries, and building the muscle that comes from doing a few ministries well. I confess I can’t remember whether I read this or had the pastor himself tell me, but recently, I heard of a church that had only about 25 or so people left in attendance, but had something along the lines of 50 committees and ministries. That’s crazy. It’s better to do five things really, really well than carry the weight of 50 things done in mediocrity. Trust me, your “body” will look the better for it.

As for me, I’m down 40 pounds and have added muscle in ways that make me look as though I’ve lost 50 or more. I work out 10 times a week in a combination of cardio and strength-resistance training. My diet is low-carb, high-protein.

Oh, and the church is looking pretty good, too.

This article originally appeared here.

How to Transition Well in Leadership

Aaron Coalson

February 9, 2018

When a leader steps down, there are two things to be concerned with: the health of the leader and the health of the group. Life happens, seasons end, people move. Serving as a leader will have a start date and an end date. We will all eventually have a ‘last night’ as leaders. The question is not if you’ll transition in your current leadership role, but when.

As leaders, we should all plan for that moment well.

This means not only leading with integrity, but transitioning with integrity, keeping your character in tact.

Henry Cloud says: “Character transcends gifts and the context of the expression of those gifts. We need our gifts, but without wholeness of character—integrity we are calling it—our gifts will become unusable…
Disfunction is: when an effort toward making something better makes it worse.”

Too many leaders, in both church and business, step down from leadership too soon, too impulsively and as a result, undo much of the work they had done during their time as leaders. Not just their work…their leadership influence did as well. So in order to transition well, there must be planning and intentionality.

Here are 3 Steps to transition well:

1. Be a leader developer
If you are not developing leaders, your transition will be stressful and difficult, for you and for the people you’re leading. Refusing to raise up leaders is shortsighted and selfish, aiming only to see today and not tomorrow, focused only on your impact and not others.

Here’s a secret to lasting leadership: Your greatest impact as a leader is through raising up other leaders.

What’s better? Leading a group faithfully for two years or leading a group that shares ownership and over time produces two more groups that triples the impact of the single group? This is why I believe leadership development is the most exciting part about leading. Getting to see God do through others more than I could accomplish in myself.

Leadership Development not only shares in the mission today, it plans for the mission tomorrow. The question is not if you’ll transition in your current leadership role, but when.

2. Make a strategy
This strategy should begin in prayer, asking God for wisdom and guidance if he’s led you to a point of transition. Next step is planning. Here are a few tips:

Set a healthy time frame (i.e., I want to transition by this date)
Find a leader, raise them up:
- Have a one-on-one conversation, be vulnerable and honest about where you think things are headed and make an honest ask: Are you interested in leading in this next season?
Create a transition plan including:
- Beginning to share your platform (lead less)
- Pass off responsibility to others
- Work yourself out of a job by sharing ownership
- Set the group to be in a healthier place than when you found it
Stay after the transition
- At least for a few weeks. This gives you time to offer support, encouragement and coaching to the new leader, which will also infuse the group with a sense of trust for the new leader and make the overall transition smoother

3. Communicate
If you’re leading a small group here are the communication steps that should take place. This funnel approach to communication, moving from broad circles to narrow, can be used in any context.

Engage your Small Group Coach
– Let them help, pray and plan with you. They are there to serve you during this time.
Engage with your Small Groups Pastor
– One of my leadership mantras is this: I always prefer to be proactive rather than reactive. Meaning, I want to work with leaders early in this process rather than having to clean up after a poorly executed transition. Keep leadership engaged!
Engage your Rhythm Leaders
– This is where you begin letting key people in on the transition strategy
Engage your small group
– It’s my recommendation to do this at least a month out from the transition date. Too soon, and things seem to stall awkwardly as they wait for the change. Too quick (more common), the group feels devalued and hurt. Announce the transition a week before and you’ll infuse your group with unintended anxiety and confusion.

This article originally appeared here.

How Your Church Can Use Technology To Promote Easter Sunday

Yvon Prehn

February 8, 2018

I have never forgotten a statistic I read years ago by the Barna organization that of the non-Christians who were asked why Christians celebrate Easter, 46% could not give a correct answer. This statistic has huge implications for us as we plan our church communications for the Easter season and in the following article, I’ll talk about why this is and how to use the tools we have today to help people understand the true meaning of Easter.

Why we have this challenge

To begin, the term “Easter” itself to most non-churchgoer’s today means chocolate bunnies, sugar eggs, and the Easter bunny. Look around stores filled with Easter goodies. You seldom see the chocolate crosses that were sold in the past—today, it’s all bunnies and chickies and happy little candy eggs. Even more than at Christmas time, we need to remind our communities that Jesus is the reason for the season.

Easter is the pivotal point of our faith. It is the turning point of all history when the God who became man in Jesus died on the cross and ROSE from the grave. That is what we celebrate, not a bunny dispensing chocolate eggs.

Clarify the meaning of Easter

When you use the term “Easter” as in “Easter Concert” it means nothing to unchurched people this time of year. Just because the term “Easter” is a big deal to you, doesn’t mean it is a big deal to any of the folks in your community. Instead of using the term “Easter” lots of churches refer to it as Resurrection Sunday. That at least gives people a hint of what we are celebrating.

In anything that you use to advertise events, or at the event itself, take the time and space to clearly let people know what you are celebrating. For example, instead of just an ad on your “Easter Concert” and in the program at the event, take the time and space for perhaps the pastor to do a brief article that starts out something like this: “For many of us, we have come to assume Easter is all about chocolate and Easter bunnies, but originally it was the celebration of the Christian church to commemorate the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. He did that on his own power as the God who had come into human history in human form and died on the cross to redeem people from their sins. In all of history, no one had ever made that claim before. Because of this fact, history was split in two; the Christian church was started, and the disciples who ran away in fear after the cross became the fearless messengers of this message.” The pastor could continue by saying something like:

“Many people today believe that life goes on after death and we would agree with that, but we also think it is important to share that though we believe that God created everyone to live eternally, we won’t all live in the same neighborhood. Not only do we believe that because of Jesus we can spend eternity in heaven, but we also believe that those who do not trust Jesus will spend eternity separated from God in conscious torment forever. Join us for our Easter service and learn how you can choose to live in the neighborhood of joy forever.”

A message like this clarifies that Easter is about personal salvation and we never know how God can use it to touch someone to explore the message more deeply. We do know that if we don’t clearly get our message out there, people will not be able to respond to it.

Use all the tools of social media and technology to implement these suggestions

Website: think of your website as a place to say all the things you could say to people if you had time to explain the Christian faith and what Easter is all about, such as:

Articles about the meaning of Easter, the history of Easter written from the viewpoint of someone new to the church.
Ideas on how to celebrate Easter with kids like the Jelly Bean Prayer and Resurrection Cookies.
Questions about the Resurrection of Jesus, why you believe it’s true and links to apologetic websites
Complete and clear schedules and directions to all Easter events—this is so basic and important and so often forgotten. Being sure all the details are easily available on your website is one of the greatest ways to show you love your church family and community.

YouTube: You don’t have to have perfect production values to get some church videos up on YouTube—you just have to have something significant to say. There are few messages more important than the message of Easter—that we are forgiven and will live forever because of the death and resurrection of Jesus. Shoot short videos of people in your church sharing what this means to them, how Easter changed their life; what they wish their friends knew about Easter.

Instagram and Pinterest: Because these are so highly visual you should post your Easter outreach materials or great Easter graphics with clear captions and links back to your church website.

Facebook and Twitter: Make the obvious announcements and encourage people to come to Easter events—but always remember that these two forms of media are like rivers that flow past your house—and you can’t always remember something that quickly streams by. The application here is that be sure anything you post on Facebook and Twitter, you also have detailed information about it on your website so that when people forget the time of the kids Easter Egg event or the Maundy Thursday service they can look it up.

Media is wonderful but some of the best things you can do to communicate the meaning of Easter is to provide in all your technical communications, ways to interact with humans. Have email addresses of your pastor and others who are willing to interact via email about the messages of salvation. Consider an invitation to “latte with the pastor” at a local coffee shop, a dessert time at someone’s home, or other setting where people are invited to come and ask any question they might have about the Christian faith. Provide a phone number where people can call if they have questions about the meaning of Easter or if they would simply like someone to pray for them.

The Apostle Paul talked about how he “became all things to all people that he might win some” Let his words challenge you this Easter season to use every technological and human tool you have to share Jesus and the joy of His resurrection.

9 Steps to Rebrand Your Church

Brian Jones

February 8, 2018

If you haven’t tried to rebrand your church in the last five years, your ministry is dated.

Rebranding is one of the most worthwhile investments you can make in 2018 to increase your effectiveness in reaching people far from God.

Trying to rebrand your church is much more than creating a new logo—it involves identifying who you’re trying to reach, positioning them as the hero in your church’s story, and aligning everything (logo, font selection, color pallet, signage, etc.) to speak to them.

Right now, there’s no church out there more in need of rebranding than ours.

Our website is clunky and dated. We have this mishmash of colors, verbiage and fonts all over the spectrum. When you get to 400+, it’s common to have a “federation of sub-ministries” as Bill Hybels calls it, where everyone is off doing their own thing regarding external facing marketing collateral.

For us that day is over. Between now and Easter we’re conducting a top-to-bottom rebranding effort here at CCV to bring consistency and uniformity across our entire church.

9 Steps to Rebrand Your Church

My guess is you’re probably due for a fine-tuning yourself. If so, here are nine steps I always encourage Senior Pastors I coach to take. They may help you.

1. Have staff and elders complete 200 community-wide door-to-door surveys which ask the following three questions:

Community Survey Questions to Rebrand Your Church

• Do you attend a church more than two times a month? (If yes, tell them thank you and move on. DO NOT FINISH SURVEY)
• If you were to consider going to a church, what kinds of things would they have to offer to get you to attend and come back a second time?
• On any given week what things do you and your family members participate in? Besides work? Like activities, groups, social functions?

(Do not hand them anything at this point. Or invite them to church. Nothing. Trust me on this. Just say “thank you” and be on your way.)

2. Create an avatar that will serve as the prototypical couple in your community. Based on your community surveys, determine the age of this prototypical couple. Number and age of kids. Greatest needs, wants, weaknesses, desires, etc.

3. Once this information is in hand, buy copies for all staff and elders of Donald Miller’s Building a StoryBrand. It is hands-down the single best book for ministry I have ever read. Period. No exaggeration.

4. Create an overall BrandScript (Donald Miller language) for the church, then one for kids, students, adults and worship departments.

5. Adjust the profiles you initially created of your prototypical couple based on your BrandScript.

Jesus: Sexually Objectified and Assaulted for Us

Seth Stewart

February 8, 2018

This past week, our ministry co-hosted an open Q&A with parents and students about the #metoo and #churchtoo campaigns.

We wanted to answer the questions: What is the Christian response to stories of abuse and assault generally, and the #metoo campaign in particular?

The Q&A was one of those rare moments when there was fire in my veins; words came easily and there was silence in the crowd as (I trust) the Holy Spirit worked. We began by acknowledging that in a room the size of ours there were likely three groups of people present: those who had been abused, those who had abused others, and those who had been wrongly accused of abuse. A Christian response must address all three groups of people, and all three are addressed in the cross of Jesus Christ.

Jesus was sexually objectified.

Jesus was sexually assaulted.

Jesus was wrongly accused.

And he underwent all three of these atrocities for us.

We don’t talk often about the fact that Jesus was crucified naked. But we should. It was an intentional compounding of the shame and humiliation of the cross. Being hung naked was a calculated aspect of his torture. Those in power were proving their dominance by displaying the sexuality of their victim. Though the Bible does not use these terms, Jesus was objectified and assaulted for us. His humanity was diminished by the exposing of his body for the pleasure of others as they gambled away his tattered dignity (Matt 27:35).

Why did Jesus do this?

Jesus did this to offer hope to all those who have been sexually assaulted and objectified. If you are the victim of sexual assault, you can look to Jesus and know that the shame you feel and the guilt that haunts you has been absorbed by a God who knows and cares for the victim and that restoration and resurrection await all those who trust in him.

Jesus did this to warn abusers that He is on the side of the victimized, that he shares their pain and that he will have justice on people who harm those he has died for.

But Jesus also did this to forgive abusers. When I initially sat down to write this, I found it hard to think about forgiveness toward abusers. But my wife reminded me that Jesus died at the hands of abusers precisely so he could extend grace to all those who have committed the worst of crimes. (Thank God for grace-loving wives!) Some of Jesus’ final words were “Father, forgive them.” This is the severe kindnesses of God (Roman 11:7).

This week, Larry Nasser was accused of sexually assaulting over 150 women and children and sentenced to 175 years in prison. One of his victims, Rachael Denhollander, spoke to him during his hearing and offered the same severe and gracious gospel Jesus died to secure.

“Should you ever reach the point of truly facing what you have done, the guilt will be crushing. And that is what makes the gospel of Christ so sweet. Because it extends grace and hope and mercy where none should be found. And it will be there for you.”

Finally, Jesus’ death was one he did not deserve—he was innocent. Jesus died to comfort and vindicate those who have been falsely accused. Careers and reputations can be ended more quickly than facts can surface, and our reactive, sinful and outraged culture means there will be false reports. But false claims, kangaroo courts, lynch mobs and an outraged city did not prevent Jesus’ work of mercy and justice—let it not stop our work either. We must not grow suspicious.

Let all of us, victims, abusers and those falsely accused look to Jesus: the just and the justifier, sexually assaulted for us.

This article originally appeared here.

I’m Not Just the Worship Guy

John Williams

February 8, 2018

Ministry…what does that word even mean? Many of us associate that with serving or volunteering, while others may associate that word with their vocation. Missions and outreach may also come to mind. But in reality, it’s all ministry.

The word ‘ministry’ has always meant something to me, and recently, it took on a new meaning. In January of 2015—after five years of serving—I was brought on full-time as the Worship Arts Pastor at my church. My wife and I had been praying for a long time that God would open this door, and He did! Leading up to the first day on staff brought on a lot of emotions: excitement, anticipation, uncertainty and personal fulfillment, to name a few. I was ready to hit the ground running, and I had a plan.

We are a mid-sized church in Orlando, and it was a huge step of faith for our church body to hire two full-time pastors this year, one of them being myself. I quickly realized during my first week, that Worship Arts was just a fraction of my role. Being that there are only four pastors on our staff, including our lead pastor, all of our plates are pretty full.

The first week came and went very quickly; my head was spinning! I knew that, vocationally speaking, ministry was not a breeze. But even though I had been part-time for five years, I really had no idea just how true that was. Before long, I was re-configuring our soundboard, editing videos, designing sermon graphics, overhauling our children’s ministry room, making maintenance supply runs to Home Depot, preparing for new songs, calling the fire martial, making hospital visits, and so on. The list was almost overwhelming. Thankfully, I work with the best people I’ve ever had the pleasure of serving with. They are patient, courteous and great teammates. My fellow pastors are true men of God and incredible leaders.

I would be lying to you if I did not admit to thinking to myself, “Will I even have time to prepare for worship?” I went home and prayed about it, and God spoke to me and revealed what I had written and spoken about so many times before: Worship is everything you do in service to the Lord. I felt ridiculous thinking that my schedule was overwhelming, and then I thought about my fellow pastors, and what great examples they are. They’re doing the exact same thing—wearing multiple hats, serving where needed, and are never too busy to pray and meet with those in our church body.

It’s incredible how God can take a person and change their perspective. For me, being called to ministry as a worship pastor means a calling to so much more than music. I learned that I am a Pastor, first and foremost, and that I’m not just the music guy. A pastor is a shepherd of God’s church. That’s serious business, not to be taken lightly. But it’s also a blessing to know that God can use me in so many more ways than arranging worship song sets, writing original music, or conducting rehearsals and worship gatherings. I’m not just the music guy. I now begin my days with praying a simple prayer: “God, use me however you can to further your kingdom, and spread your gospel.”

Here are some of the things that I learned in my first month:

Whether you are staff or volunteering, serve with the attitude of a servant.
Make it a point to remember that we were called to this service, not by our doing, but by God’s.
Have an attitude that is both submissive to Jesus, but also to your leadership.
Thank God for every opportunity you have to serve others.
Be ready to meet the need, no matter what that is.

This article originally appeared here.

How to Better Use Video in Your Church

Jonathan Howe

February 8, 2018

In my previous post, I discussed why your church should be utilizing video more in 2018. I also promised that I would write about some ways we are seeing churches successfully use video. Here are six such ways:

Simulcast Services. This is probably the most common consideration when it comes to using video in the church. There are several platforms available to churches that want to stream their services online. Everything from free platforms like Facebook Live to more expensive ones that are for more professional setups can be used. Even if the services are not live online, they can be taped and uploaded at a later time for members who may have missed the service that week.
Facebook Live. I’ve seen several churches start to use Facebook Live for special emphases in 2018. One such church local to us in Nashville, The Bridge, is using Facebook Live during their 21-days of prayer to start 2018. They’ve seen an increased engagement in the campaign as a result of using video to complement what members are doing on their own. There are so many ways to use Facebook Live in your church. The possibilities are endless.
Instagram Live Stories. This is similar to Facebook Live, but involves more of a social media aspect and timeliness. Because of their 24-hour lifespan, Instagram Stories can be useful to provide a behind the scenes look at what goes on during the week at the church or for quick reminders.
Video Announcements. Many churches have moved to video announcements over the past couple of years. You have much more control of the content and time when you have video announcements. They’re also super simple to repurpose into a social media post later in the week. Simply upload the video to Facebook or Twitter and your members can see it again or catch what they missed.
Event Recaps. These can help explain why you do what you do. You can show people the results of an outreach event, encourage them to contribute to the event next time, or even inspire members to volunteer.
Testimonies. I’ve seen several churches use video testimonies for baptisms, evangelism encouragement and stewardship emphases among other things. Video allows for editing and often makes the person providing the testimony more comfortable than standing on stage and speaking.

Does your church use any of these video methods? Does it use something else?

This article originally appeared here.

Shepherds Need to Care for Themselves Too

Jeff Tunnell

February 8, 2018

As a pastor, cell pastor or cell leader, it is our responsibility to be students of the Word of God. This is a joyful responsibility and we feel privileged to know that God has invited us into a strong relationship with Himself and His life-giving Words.

When Jesus, the Great Shepherd first gives us the task to watch for His flock, great joy floods our heart (Acts 20:28). We are faithful to rise early and seek Him (Psalm 5:1-3), ensuring our steadfastness to be good shepherds, like our Master.

Over time, the needs of the people, like sheep, begin to occupy much of our time. Initially, being able to care for God’s people delights us and we willingly respond. However, their needs expand, eroding and encroaching upon us until we find ourselves pressed for time to spend with the Master Shepherd.

It becomes ‘easy,’ or a temptation, to use our own devotion time to prepare for public presentations. Our Word study for personal growth is overcome by our need to prepare for preaching or cell leadership. We justify this change by telling ourselves it is being ‘efficient’ with our use of time.

Picture in your mind, a shepherd running all around the fields, constantly caring for roving sheep, without stopping to care for himself/herself. The shepherd becomes so busy there is never time to check in with the flock owner and eventually connection is lost with the overall purpose of the owner’s desires and timing. Only eating when trying to feed the sheep, overrun by the constant needs of the flock, this shepherd is destined for demise.

Return to your first love! Be an example to the flock! Seek first the kingdom of God and allow the Master Shepherd to refresh you so that your joy will remain full in responding to the call to care for HIS flock (Psalm 23).

This article originally appeared here.

How We Use an Automated Series of Emails to Partner With New Parents

Nick Blevins

February 8, 2018

I don’t know about you, but we’re always looking for new and better ways to partner with parents. At our church, we have a four-part strategy for partnering with parents and one of those components is communication. In terms of partnering with parents, communication looks like:

Keeping parents informed of what their children are learning so they can continue conversations at home.
Sharing ideas and resources parents can use to lead well at home.
Reminding parents of events and opportunities our church has for their family.

Part of our communication plan is a weekly email to parents that shares what their child learned and resources they can use at home (we use Orange curriculum). One way we were missing the mark was with new parents. When new families registered, they were added to our weekly email and received the same resources everyone else receives after each service.

The problem was, we weren’t informing them about the resources. We didn’t explain how it all works, or, how anything works for that matter. In order to help change that, we started an email sequence that every new family receives.

HOW WE USE AN EMAIL SEQUENCE TO PARTNER WITH PARENTS

In the business world, this is referred to as email sequencing, email automation or even email drip. It’s just a series of emails people receive when they subscribe to an email list. We use MailChimp for email communication with parents and MailChimp calls it Automation. We created four emails every new family will receive spread out over two weeks. Here’s what each one is about.

EMAIL 1 – THE TEAM, THE ENVIRONMENTS, SAFETY & SECURITY

In the first email, we introduce the staff who lead preschool, elementary and student ministry overall. We talk about those environments and how much we value safety in all our environments. We end by giving them a heads up about the remaining emails they’ll receive.

EMAIL 2 – LARGE GROUP & SMALL GROUP

In the second email, we talk about what their children experience when they are in the environments designed for them each week. We explain the two primary components, large group and small group. We also link to pages on our website so we don’t have to include it in the email.

EMAIL 3 – HOW WE PARTNER WITH PARENTS

The third email is all about the various ways we partner with parents. We share the reason why that’s important and start off with the BEST partnership we have with parents (Small Group Leaders). After that, we include everything we make available to parents with links so they can read more.

EMAIL 4 – INVITATION TO MEET

In the fourth email, our goal is to get a chance to meet them if we haven’t already. I simply refer to the emails they should have received, remind them about the Weekly Parent Update they’ll start receiving, and ask them if we could meet the next time they’re at church. We had to think through this to make sure it could actually work. We also had to get the wording just right so it made sense in every context.

EXPECTATIONS AND RESULTS SO FAR

We set reasonable expectations heading into it. We didn’t expect 100 percent email open rates or 75 percent of new families emailing me back after that fourth email to meet. We’re getting about 50-75 percent open rates (excellent by most standards) and about 20 percent of people communicate back with us in these emails. The other advantage is, they get to know us through the emails. So, even if they didn’t write back, they’re far more open to talking when they see us at church.

BONUS – GET OUR EMAILS

Like most of our efforts toward partnering with parents, this is an experiment. It’s certainly better than nothing, so while we may change the approach, I don’t see us nixing the plan anytime soon. If you would like to try this at your church, you can get our emails and adjust them to fit your context. Just fill out the form below to get a zip file with:

PDF copies of the email series
HTML files of the email series
A PDF sample of our Weekly Parent Update email

At some point, I’d love to put together a video showing you how you can set this all up in MailChimp. Meanwhile, don’t hesitate to reach out if there’s anything I can do to help.

WHAT IS WORKING OR NOT WORKING IN YOUR PARTNERSHIP WITH PARENTS?

This article originally appeared here.

The Humble Pastor Brags on Himself in the Sermon

Joe McKeever

February 8, 2018

I’m a pastor. I know the trade secrets.

I hope none of the brethren get upset by my letting the rest of the world in on our little quirks here.

When we want the audience to know of our (ahem) advanced degrees and superior education, we tell stories. They sound a lot like this…

…When I was working on my doctor’s degree—I mean the first one, not the second one—I was having a hard time with my dissertation… (When the truth is, he got that degree from a mail-order institution for reading three books and writing two short papers.)

–The other day I met a man at the grocery store. He said to me, “Aren’t you DOCTOR Rogers?” I said, “Yes, I am.” And he said, “Well, Doctor Rogers…. (and the story goes on from there. Throughout the story, that fellow calls him Doctor no fewer than a dozen times. This is to alert the audience to the way he wishes to be addressed.)

When we want the audience to know what celebrated circles we run in, we drop names into the sermons…

–“As I was saying to Billy Graham recently, ‘I hate name-droppers, don’t you?’”

–“The last time I attended the presidential prayer breakfast in Washington, this time I was seated beside a lowly congressman. A far cry from the time they seated me beside the Secretary of State. Anyway, he said to me…”

–“I was so surprised. At the governor’s reception, when our mayor was introducing me to the senator, the senator said, ‘I know the pastor. I watch him on television all the time.’”

When we want the audience to know of our successes, we give our testimony, which begins humbly. That way, our bragging sneaks up on you and is not so obvious to most people…

–“I started that church in a storefront with three people, plus my wife and children. Some weeks, there was not enough money to pay the light bill. And once some people got mad at me and left, leaving us with half the congregation and all the bills. But I’m here to say God really blessed. He blessed us so much that within five years, we were running over 500 in attendance. The denomination gave us an award as the fastest growing church in the state, and invited me to speak at the annual meeting. My picture was on the cover of the state paper. God is good.” (This humble testimony sounds a lot like bragging. It sounds that way because it is.)

–“That was one of the most heart-breaking times in my life. But the Lord is faithful. He laid it on my heart to write that down, and a publisher contacted me, asking for permission to publish it. To date, that book has sold many thousands of copies. The publisher says it’s the best book he’s ever sold.”

–“Someone stopped me on the street and said, ‘Didn’t you used to pastor Shiloh Number Three over at the crossroads?’ I admitted that, yes, I’d done that some years ago. ‘Well, where are you now?’ he asked. And I had the privilege of telling him I’m at the biggest church in Shenandoah County, that we run 28 buses bringing people to our services, and our budget last year was $358,000. He was amazed.”

–The publisher wanted me to write a little bio about myself for the book. Now, that’s hard to do, to brag on yourself. I had no trouble bragging on my church, to say that we have the largest church in this part of the state and led the state in baptisms the last three years in a row, but to say something about myself was hard.” You just did, friend.

That’s how it’s done. In fact, it’s even possible to brag on yourself in a prayer. The Lord told us how it’s done in Luke chapter 18…

“A Pharisee stood (in the temple) and was praying thus to himself, ‘God, I thank Thee that I’m not like other people—swindlers, unjust, adulterers or even like this tax-gatherer. I fast twice a week, I pay tithes of all that I get.”

That’s how it’s done. But we don’t recommend it.

What if we quit bragging on ourselves and hanging our fragile egos on the line for all the world to see? What if we did our job and said to ourselves, “I am only an unworthy servant; I’m just doing my job,” and left it at that (Luke 17:7-10).

What if we bragged on Jesus?

This article originally appeared here.

3 Tests of Pulpit Plagiarism: Do You Pass Them?

Ron Forseth

February 8, 2018

I reviewed a copy of Scott Gibson’s book Should We Use Someone Else’s Sermon? published by Zondervan. Scott’s the Director of the Center for Preaching at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and co-founder of the Evangelical Homiletics Society.

His book squarely addresses the issue of plagiarism in the pulpit and has a lot of good insight into answering the question posed by the title of the book. The book is extensively researched and articulately written, including vivid examples of pastors who have gotten into deep water with their sermon preparation practices. Just the book’s style and intellectual treatment of the topic makes it worth reading. It’s a fairly brief book with just over a hundred pages and carefully prepared with 324 endnotes. I recommend that preachers get a copy.

In my observation, the book is a fairly hard-hitting presentation, starting with words like “sermon-stealing” and ending by calling plagiarism “sin.” There is a whole lot in between that examines different angles on sermon sharing, including historical examples down through the centuries. I’ll share my reflections here, some in contrast to the book.

The book basically answers its own question with “We shouldn’t use someone else’s sermon,” or at least we shouldn’t plagiarize another’s sermon. A better title to the book might be Should We Plagiarize Someone Else’s Sermon? I think my article title leads to a bit more of a messy discussion and, perhaps, conclusion.

With a fascinating and extensive run up to defining the word “plagiarism,” Scott cites two definitions of the term, one from Haddon Robinson:

“In a world of preaching, a pastor who takes sermons from other preachers—word-for-word—without giving credit is guilty of plagiarism. That is stealing what is not yours.”

I think the “giving credit” element is critical but also problematic. Dr. Robinson’s definition raises other questions: If we quote 50 words from another pastor—word-for-word—and don’t cite them, is that stealing? What about 100 words? 500 words? An entire sermon? What if we quote anything or anyone in as little as a sentence? Or two? Is that stealing? The definition can get blurry.

In another instance, Dr. Robinson is quoted as saying:

“It’s hard to footnote sermons. There’s no way to make people in the pews understand all of the sources you are using, especially if they’re highly academic sources. I don’t think anyone expects preachers to stand up there and quote all of their reference books and commentaries by name.”

Robinson’s point is excellently made, though it seems to conflict with the earlier point. If we preach a sermon like a professor writes a textbook, the art of preaching will clearly be undone. We’re faced with this tension, and it’s not going to go away. Hopefully, pastors can develop a framework that can facilitate healthy decision making in their sermon preparation process.

The other definition of “plagiarism” in the book is from a journalist:

“Plagiarism is borrowing someone else’s words and passing them off as one’s own, whether in print, in speech or performance.”

So here’s another question: If we borrow someone else’s words and don’t pass them off as our own, are we OK then? For example, if I memorize and recite the Sermon on the Mount or the Declaration of Independence, is that plagiarism? No. The world knows the content is not mine. The same is true of a homily in Latin provided from the Vatican or Archdiocese. The audience understands from the context that the priest didn’t write the sermon.

National Prayer Breakfast: Faith Helps Us Cross the Aisle

Bob Ditmer

February 8, 2018

At a time when Washington seems more divided than ever, a sense of camaraderie, civility and humility pervaded the 66th National Prayer Breakfast.

Congressman Randy Hultgren, a Republican from Illinois, and Democratic Representative Charlie Crist of Florida, co-chaired the event as they do the weekly prayer gatherings on Capitol Hill.

Crist started the proceedings by referring to the Golden Rule. He says he’s worn a rubber bracelet for several years as a reminder that in the acrimonious field of politics, he should treat everyone the way he wants to be treated and the way Jesus wanted all of us to live—fairly and compassionately.

Hultgren said of the weekly gatherings, “We walk in as Republicans and Democrats from different generations, regions and backgrounds. We walk in with our own views but we always walk out with a little more understanding and a little more unified.”

He called the prayer times, including today’s National Prayer Breakfast, a “journey toward civility, reconciliation and love that Jesus taught us.”

Matthew 7:7 Quoted at National Prayer Breakfast

Senator James Lankford, a Republican from Oklahoma, said he is one of 25 to 30 lawmakers who gather from week to week to talk, pray and encourage each other.

He said the prayer times are highly personal as the politicians offer prayer requests for family, their personal lives, staff and their own needs. “It’s a vulnerable thing to say I have needs and I want you to know about it,” Lankford said.

He quipped, “Senators can’t do everything. In fact, we haven’t done much for a while.”

But he suggested that a sense of humility is not prevalent enough in the nation’s capitol reminding the many lawmakers on hand that times of prayer remind us that “we did not create the world but we can stop and talk to the one who did.”

According to Lankford, when lawmakers humble themselves there is a new atmosphere in the halls of power as we “gather with people who others would see as enemies or opponents and to sit down and say let’s try praying together.”

Lankford, who earned a divinity degree from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, pointed out that just before Jesus gave us the Golden Rule he said in Matthew 7:7, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”

He suggested we don’t treat each other the way Jesus instructed because we don’t stop to ask, seek and knock.

Lankford then prayed for humility in Washington to ask, seek and knock for guidance while admitting that “we don’t know everything or run everything but we have the chance to talk to the One who does.”

President Donald Trump also spoke at the event. His remarks were a bit of a departure from the earlier comments as he focused on God’s blessing of America and the ways God makes himself known.

“We love God we see the Lord’s grace in service members who risk their lives to give us freedom, in teachers who work tirelessly for our students, in the police who sacrifice to keep us safe and sacrifice they do.”

“All we have to do is open our eyes and look around us and we see God’s hand in the courage of our fellow citizens. We see the power of God’s love at work in our soul and the power of God’s will to answer all of our prayers.”

Perhaps another way God will make himself known is through the answered prayers of a renewed sense of harmony in our nation’s capital.

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10 Things No One Ever Told You About Being a Pastor

Joe McKeever

February 7, 2018

I hate to see a young pastor get disillusioned by his first experience or two. But it happens, sad to say.

Those of us who have been in the field throughout all our adult years wish someone had told us a few things about this work. So, assuming we are speaking to beginning pastors, here are a few things we’d love to share…

1. They might not have told you how much fun pastoring can be.

The redeemed of God are among the greatest people in the world (most of them) and they can enjoy life to the fullest. As pastor, you sometimes get to be in the thick of the fun. They love to laugh, to have adventures and to encourage each other.

As pastor, you get to dream up programs and ideas that will affect your community, touch lives, transform homes and reach the future—and then put it into effect with a huge corps of sweet-spirited workers as your team. How cool is that?

As for those who say working with church volunteers is not unlike herding cats, well, it can be a challenge sometimes. But that’s good also. God has not called us to a life of ease, but something difficult and good and eminently worthwhile.

2. They probably didn’t tell you there are often unexpected financial benefits to pastoring.

The government allows ministers to receive a housing allowance but pay no tax on it. And the church can set aside money for your mileage and other ministry expenses and cover them for you, instead of their coming out of your pocket. From time to time, generous church members may give you money, for no reason other than the goodness of their heart. Churches vary on this practice, of course, but of my six pastorates, two of them had generous members who took care of their preacher in this way. It was never a large amount, but a hundred dollars here and a hundred there can make life a lot easier.

A wealthy church member once bought me a new car. And wanted me to tell no one he had done it. A couple of times when my family was leaving on vacation, another member would walk across the street to my office and give me a few hundred dollar bills to help with expenses. Once he handed me a check for a thousand dollars to be put in the church account, but which I could use to help people. He wanted no tax credit for it, and I was accountable to no one but the Lord. (Those were different days then, and now we’d have more stringent rules as to how the pastor could draw on that account. But I never abused it. Oh, and he would replenish the funds from time to time. I was disappointed for any number of reasons when he died.)

3. They warned us to watch out for bullies among the deacons and eccentrics among the congregations, but no one prepared us for just how wonderful the great majority of the members would be.

Some of the most Christlike and wonderful people I’ve ever known have honored me by calling me “Pastor.” And a few stop me to this day to say, “You’ll always be my pastor.” That’s about as good as it gets.

4. They didn’t tell us that church staff members come in all shapes and varieties, and that some need close supervision and guidance, while others are self-starters and highly motivated without pastoral input.

There is no “one size fits all” counsel for administering the work of a church staff. What worked with one may not be effective with another. That’s why the large churches will often bring someone on board just to administer the work of the church staff members. No pastor has time enough to do this with more than two or three staffers.

If your pastor is expected to administer the work of several staffers, pray for the Lord to show him how to do this. It’s difficult. Someone once told me his staff members expected him to be the CEO of the membership but their pastor, whereas the congregation wanted him as their pastor and the staff’s CEO.

5. They told us that a working knowledge of Greek and Hebrew are good, but they never told us to leave most of that out of our sermons.

Just preach the good news, pastor. People are no smarter or godlier knowing that the verb here is in the aorist tense and that this is the only place in the New Testament where that word is used. Study the Word, learn all you can, and then put it into the language of the people who will sit before you on Sunday.

6. They never told us that church members usually elect leaders based on popularity and worldly success, and not maturity, spirituality or wisdom.

Consequently, a new pastor may find himself having to deal with church leaders who see the church as a business, have no use for doing anything by faith (some actually see faith as a form of escapism), and whose personal lives are an embarrassment to the kingdom. And yet, there they are and the congregation expects you to respect them and work with them.

In time, if you will remain there long enough to gain the people’s trust, you can change the system to make sure that only the godly and mature are placed in leadership. But until then, pray a lot and do the best you can.

The Heart of a Worship Leader: Being Led While Leading

John Williams

February 7, 2018

I guess I’ve always felt like I was somewhat of a leader. With my Type A personality, taking charge of situations has not always been easy, but I haven’t refused the challenge. However, I can say that being a church leader has presented more challenges than any other situation that I’ve experienced in my life. I’ve been on staff at my church now for almost seven years. I’ve served under difficult leadership, as well as leadership I could spend the rest of my ministry under, and I’ve learned a lot from both. I’ve learned how you should conduct yourself as a leader, and more importantly, how you shouldn’t. I’ve learned how to lead a church through difficult circumstances, and how to celebrate God’s victories within the church. I’ve learned that hasty decisions can reap disastrous consequences, and sometimes the best thing is to just sit still and wait on God to move, no matter how many people are telling you it’s wrong.

I’m sure we all have these types of stories. All of the experiences referenced above are lessons I have gleaned from those who have led me. No matter your current situation, or even past experiences, I just wanted to encourage you to encourage the leadership around you. Here are a few points to remember as you lead while being led.

1. SUPPORT YOUR PASTOR, EVEN WHEN YOU MAY NOT AGREE.

This is a difficult one for me, due to my own experience serving under leadership who consistently made poor and unbiblical choices; in such a case, the right thing to do was to strongly enforce accountability for the decisions being made. So please let me clarify; there’s a big difference between following a leader who you know has biblical convictions, and one who does not. One verse that always comes to mind is Hebrews 13:17: “Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you.” The call in this verse is first to the leader, then to the one being led. The responsibility to watch over someone else’s soul is the reason why we know being a leader is a “calling.” Who would want that responsibility otherwise? One day, your Pastor will have to give an account to God for every soul they were trusted to shepherd and disciple. If your Pastor’s heart is exactly that, then why cause strife for them by not being supportive? Even if you don’t agree with the plan, support your Pastor in their decisions. Remember that their call is to lead the flock, which you are a part of.

2. BE A SERVANT/LEADER TO YOUR PASTOR

Jesus himself was of this mindset; in order to lead effectively you must serve those around you. This practice will go a long way in building trust with your leadership. If your Pastor knows that your heart is to serve the church and the leadership of the church, you’re building a relationship that has a foundation of trust. Not only that, but you are allowing your leadership to more openly share their heart, which allows you to understand where God is leading them. Having this understanding opens the door for you to be ministered to, while ministering to others, which is incredible!

3. THERE’S LOTS TO LEARN, SO LISTEN UP!

There’s a good possibility that your Pastor has been in ministry for quite sometime. They’ve seen a lot. They’ve experienced times of growth, and times of drought. They’ve rejoiced and have prayed through times of blessing, and have returned to their knees in prayer during difficult times. I have learned, and continue to learn so much from my Pastor. I cherish every discipleship moment, and glean from his experiences. Sure, sometimes I think I’ve got it all figured out, like I’m the new guy with a new formula. I may think I’m full of the method, but my Pastor is full of the message. He’s lived it, breathed it, fought for it and has been humbled by it; there’s so much to learn from! One day, it will be our turn to do the same for others, but for now, just soak it in.

4. KNOW THAT ONLY ONE MAN ACHIEVED PERFECTION, EVER.

“For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.” – Hebrews 4:15

I know I’m hitting it hard with Hebrews, but this verse is exactly my point. Only Jesus achieved perfection, so don’t expect it from your Pastor. I’m sure some of your congregants hold them in that light, but you can’t make that same mistake. You may not be held to that same standard, especially if you’re not the lead pastor. My Pastor knows my shortcomings, and I know that I can confide in him and receive sound biblical guidance. You should be that safe haven for your pastor as well. Let them know that they can be human around you! As silly as that may sound, it may be exactly what they need at certain moments, just as you and I do. Just as Christ shows every man unending grace, hopefully your Pastor follows that example, and we should as well. Understanding that your Pastor is not a perfect person will free you to learn from them that much more. If you put your Pastor on a pedestal, you’re setting yourself up for failure and missing the opportunity to grow as a leader.

One last word of encouragement: Pray for your Pastors and their families. The enemy in constantly on the prowl for them waiting to devour them and destroy their ministries. The power of prayer cannot be understated!

“We ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Be at peace among yourselves.” 1 Thessalonians 5:12-13

This article originally appeared here.

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HOW WE USE AN EMAIL SEQUENCE TO PARTNER WITH PARENTS

EMAIL 1 – THE TEAM, THE ENVIRONMENTS, SAFETY & SECURITY

EMAIL 2 – LARGE GROUP & SMALL GROUP

EMAIL 3 – HOW WE PARTNER WITH PARENTS

EMAIL 4 – INVITATION TO MEET

EXPECTATIONS AND RESULTS SO FAR

BONUS – GET OUR EMAILS

Matthew 7:7 Quoted at National Prayer Breakfast

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