Blog
This week, my wife, Marty, and I had the honor of attending a church planter's retreat sponsored by the Converge Northwest District and held at the beautiful Cannon Beach Christian Conference Center on the rugged Pacific coast in northern Oregon. Read on to discover just a small amount of what was seen and heard at that relaxed gathering. Maybe you and your church can learn from my observations.
Local churches rise or fall according to the health and ministry of their elders or spiritual leaders. And healthy, growing churches have healthy, growing, and serving spiritual leaders. These churches also recruit, train, equip, and multiply spiritual leaders. My prayer is that this blog will assist your church in training present and future elders.
The first year of ministry in a new church is a very important season of shepherding and leading a congregation. This time can enhance or cause major problems in the future. Care should be taken to avoid some popular mistakes pastors make in that first year. Consider them prayerfully and carefully.
Every ministry in your church probably started with some vision, excitement, and hope for the future. But ministries like churches have a life-cycle and that means ministries have to or need to die at some point. How do you handle the end of a ministry in your church? What do you do?
Much of my ministry career has been devoted to helping church plants and smaller churches find lead pastors. This used to be a lot easier than it is today and the future presents more challenges. Take a look with me into the next 20 years in North America. Where will the next pastors come from? Read on to find out.
Does Your Church or Ministry Have a BIG Vision? What the vision of your church or ministry? Do you even have one? It is my observation that not many churches have a vision for what God is calling the church to become. Some do have a mission statement that incorporates the essence of the Great Commission and Great Commandment of the Lord Jesus, but how about also having a vision statement that states where the church or ministry is headed in the future under the guidance of God and with his help? Be encouraged to ask God for his BIG vision. Read more to find out what this means.
What Do You See on the Road Ahead? Every church or ministry needs a compelling vision or picture of God's preferred future. You need a BIG picture including a BOLD vision, an INNOVATIVE vision, and a GOD-CENTERED vision. Read to find out more about the characteristics of a God-given BIG vision.