Responsibility

I have been in ministry for over 30 years. Church business meetings over those years and in those churches have been "interesting". I have been in churches where we debated everything! Many of you know what I am talking about. The $200 printer needed to be voted on by the church in business meeting and then needed to be tabled to see if the committee could find something better (read that cheaper).

The congregation where I now serve is on the other end of the spectrum. While we have committees that provide help and oversight and have the necessary checks and balances in our system, our church family gives to the staff so much freedom. They trust that we have done the work to discover the best solution or that we have a reason for the direction in which we are leading.

With all of that trust, though, is great responsibility. When someone trusts you, whether it is a spouse, a child, a friend, or a congregation, it should make you want to justify that trust even more. Now, as I write that, I know there are numerous cases of the exact opposite happening. There are those who have violated that trust and run off unchecked. Increased trust should, however, lead us to run toward His holiness and not away from it. As a staff, we seek to stay faithful to the Lord, to His call, and to the people who put their trust in us.

With trust in your leadership comes great opportunity. Use that for building His kingdom. With trust in your leadership also comes incredible responsibility! Use that for showing His Honor and Glory!

What are we doing to our volunteers?

Like every church, volunteers are key to what we are trying to accomplish. But therein lies the problem! How we use volunteers and how we treat them speaks to our theology and philosophy of ministry.

At our church we seek to help people move along a path we have labeled 3D. We are seeking to assist our members as they move from discovery through discipleship to devotion. Like many other churches, our desire is to see people develop into "fully devoted followers of Christ." In order to be true to our mission and consistent with our Biblical mandate, we need to see volunteering for what it really is.

Too often we find ourselves looking only at the ministry needs we see in front of us. In order to fill those spots or needs, we then see our volunteers as a "means to the end." They are resources available to us to "check out and use" just like the tables and chairs or the buses. In fact, in one very popular church software system, they are actually listed as "resources" to be scheduled.

However, in our mission statement, helping to move a person into devoted service (volunteering/serving) is a part of the ultimate desire or "end." We must be most concerned with helping people become and accomplish what God has for them. When that is kept before us, it surely changes the way we both view and use our faithful. It makes our concern not the programs, but the people. We are not in the business of filling positions, but of building people.

And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, (Eph 4:12-13)

How about you? Are you looking at people as resources to be used for your programs, or are your programs being used to build up the people? Means or end? It makes a difference!

Flow charts and Doodles

I am a doodler. I constantly draw pictures and highlight thoughts with circles and squares and triangles. I am also from the generation of flow charts and diagrams.

I love the look of these types of things. I also like the fact that they remind us of the direction and flow we desire. These little diagrams help us to communicate thoughts, to chart our progress, and to clarify our mission.

Our vision, should be translatable into pictures. We should be able to deliver a defined graphic illustration of our mission. It might be a chart, or it might be portrait. What does your mission look like? What kind of picture does it paint? How can it be best illustrated?

Does your picture show the progression and direction you are seeking for your ministry and those whom you impact? Does it tell the story? Does it communicate?