Leadership
Holistic Leadership Development
You want to develop leaders who will do what Jesus called us to do, leaders who can take the church forward into the 21st century. You look to the fields and see them, as Jesus does, ready for harvest — and you know that’s where your ministry needs to concentrate.
What’s needed is holistic leadership development — the kind of leadership development that comes from the harvest and leads people back into the harvest, resulting in subsequent generations of new believers and new leaders living as Jesus called us to live.
We can help you develop leaders the kind of leaders you need in a way that is both relational and intentional… and ultimately effective in helping your church accomplish its mission.
Coaching too expensive? Try a triad
Plenty of ministry leaders would love a coaching relationship that helps them become more missional and grows them in their calling. But for many newer leaders, coaching can seem financially out of reach. As someone who has a heart for working with younger missional...
Question #5: What’s the multiplication strategy?
Note: part of a series started April 22nd. A community of Jesus-followers engaged in hands-on ministry to serve the world around them is a thing of beauty. Fruit will be borne from people reflecting Jesus with a spirit of humility. Sometimes it takes a long time, but...
Question #4: How can we get involved in missional incarnational ministry?
Note: part of a series started April 22nd. At this point, we have a new church, a focus on raising up leaders from the harvest and the organizing principle of a network of leaders. Great. But what are we actually doing? The fourth question my coach asked me was, "How...
Question #3: What’s the organizing principle?
Note: part of a series started April 22nd. The third question my coach asked me about my new ministry was, "What's the organizing principle?" Everything has to have an organizing principle of some kind. For one of my previous diatribes on this topic, see my entry...
Question #2: What’s missing?
Note: part of a series started April 22nd. The next question my coach asked me—after I had wrestled for a while with “What’s next?”—was “What's missing?” After reflecting on the state of the church in the U.S. I decided my answer was that true leadership development...
Question #1: What’s next?
Note: part of a series started April 22nd. “What’s next?” It’s a simple question, but one that we need to be asking ourselves on a macro-scale at least once a year. What does God have for me next? How am I to invest my time, resources, and energy? I had two different...
Shifting gears in discipling
When you’re discipling people who are in recovery, I’ve found that there comes a point when you have to shift gears. Once someone is well-established in recovery—not drinking or using but still wrestling with life issues—an important shift needs to happen in your...
The choice for irrelevance
I am 58 years old (soon), and this morning I am speaking to my peers in my own age group because we have an important choice before us. The old ways are no longer working. Church is no longer attractional: "If we put on a really good service and offer really good...
The power of the bright spot
I’m learning the power of the bright spot from one of my current favorite reads, Switch by Dan and Chip Heath. I’ve been incorporating this concept into my coaching relationships as well as my life/ministry conversations. Say someone brings up an issue: “I want to...
The structure of life
I recently ran across a really committed 12-step guy, who also really gets discipleship. He’s been very successful in life-on-life multiplication of disciples. As I talked with him, he expressed strong concern against doing anything structured. Here was my basic...
Sympathetic employers
By guest blogger David Davenport The most critical aspect of bivocational ministry is the day job. Is my employer sympathetic to my call to ministry? How might sympathetic employment work? A business man or manager hires a person who is called to ministry, agreeing...
The power of modeling
A man has been leading one of the 10-week groups we’ve been doing in the transition center. The other day he told me that last night he had one of the residents—a woman in recovery—leading it. “I didn’t tell her that’s what she was doing, but she was leading it. She’d...