April 2007

I’ve recently launched another blog (as if I don’t have enough to do).  “The Productive Pastor” will deal with issues of productivity, being more efficient in our work, and life hacks to help us achieve more.  It’s aimed at pastors but I’m sure others can benefit from the posts as well.

Check it out by clicking here!

I was thinking today about all the new methods that are available to us to attract more people to our church.  Depending on where you turn, you find people walking “across the room” (Bill Hybels), going to “fish” (Andy Stanley), washing cars for free (Steve Sjogren), or finding a “purpose driven” life (Rick Warren).

So what works?  What doesn’t?  How do we know what’s best for us?  The answer is they all do and they all do not.  What?  That’s right.  None of them work but all of them do.  Same goes for the recent trend of playing secular music in our worship venues, dressing down, being “missional” (I thought all churches were missional?), or being the Jesus version of Starbucks. (I prefer Peets as you all know).

Understand, I use many of the newer methods of outreach, discipleship, and worship in our church plant here.  I’m not opposed to any of these methodologies but I see a real danger in building our churches on them.  What ever happened to working it out for yourself?  Finding what works FOR YOU in your context, with your gifts, in your worship setting, and doing it with excellence should be our goal.  Our people are uniquely gifted to do what it is God has called them to.  Do we spend enough time with them to allow them to excel in their calling (training them for the work of ministry) or do we just plug them into a pre-determined program with pre-determined results?  Does that work for everybody?  No, it doesn’t. 

I see the benefit of figuring out what our outcomes should be and setting up a simple system of ministry flow designed to achieve those outcomes.  This is basically the method espoused in Thom Ranier’s latest book “Simple Church” which I thought was one of his best works.  I totally agree as I’m sure many other church plants and existing churches do as well.  The real danger I’ve seen in several circles is the steps within the ministry flow.  Programs if you will.  Many are just replicating the above mentioned programs which all have merit but may not work within a specific context.  Perhaps they all do and they are just being led by leaders who are letting the material run itself.  BIG DANGER.  You know what I’m talking about.  Step One says this so we do it until Step Two and then we do something else.  But what about the person who’s found Step 1 1/2?  Whoops.  That’s not in the book so it must not be right.

I see a great benefit in using others’ successful material if church leadership takes the time to personalize and change it to fit their methods.  A Christian Church in my area did this recently with their takeoff on Warren’s “40 days of service”.  They crafted their own logo, banners, cards, etc. for everything.  They based a sermon series around it and they had many new families come to visit and many stayed and enlisted in several service projects they are having here in the late spring.  I asked the youth pastor who is a good friend of mine if anyone caught the similarities between the two and he said nobody even broached the topic with him.  I think this is a great example of how a church took material and made it work FOR THEM in their context.  I know of other churches who’ve used the same material verbatim out of the package with the same 15-20 people who’ve always helped doing their jobs again.  No success!

It’s the people who are going to make or break these ideas.  How are they gifted?  Are you crafting an action plan designed to maximize their strengths while avoiding your inherent weaknesses? (Marcus Buckingham anyone?)

I pray your outreach to the lost is blessed and that lives are being changed in the process.  Otherwise, we’re just drawing a crowd.

I hate spam email!  I hate it with a passion.  I can too since I don’t have to worry about it’s eternal destiny.  It seems every morning when I sit down to go through my email messages, I get plenty of spam.  Everything from software without the packaging (piracy anyone?) to online drugs and the person who needs my bank account number to transfer a million dollars in my account from Nigeria so he can get out of the country. (I can’t believe people would fall for that one.)

I’ve taken some steps in recent years to cut down the spam.  I have a separate Yahoo email account I use for all non-business related sign ups and such.  I do not use this email for anything other than signing up for newsletters, notifications, etc..  My private email is just that…private.  I use it for trusted friends and our leadership team in case they need me.  I rarely use it for anything else but this to keep out the spam.  I have another email address I use for work related matters to aid in this process also.  The junk mail folder option in Mozilla Thunderbird (especially the new 2.0 release) is very helpful to filter out any other junk that might find it’s way to my private address by way of bots.

For additional tips, check out this article in today’s Success magazine blog by Jeff Zbar.  Excellent advice for all of us.

Part of being productive in the pastorate is to do away with meaningless tasks that eat up large chunks of time.  I used to check email first thing in the morning before I did anything else.  Big mistake!  I took nearly an hour to just go through my accounts and filter out what was needed.  Now, I check it at 10am, 2pm, and again at 6pm after dinner just for a quick wrap up to write down any tasks that might need addressing.  This system helps keep my inbox at zero, increases efficiency (I take less than 20 minutes to go through email at my 10am review now, 10 minutes or less the other two times), and allows me to start my morning ironing out my tasks so I know what needs done TODAY.

I just purchased “The Big Idea” by Dave Ferguson on recommendation from Jason Taylor, my church planting friend in Yuma, Arizona.  I’ve read so much lately, I think my eyes are going to fall out.  On top of preparing for weekly preaching messages, I’m taking college classes and having to read hundreds of pages for those each week and I have my recreational reading that I also enjoy.  I seriously hope the Christian book market goes more audio this year so I can have an excuse to listen to some of these books while I try to get back into a regular exercise routine.  I’m also wanting to read several of the books on the “Personal MBA” list and, fortunately, many of those are available as audio books.  My MP3 Audio player will be getting a workout this summer as I start to dig into those and take a break from my studies in college.

Now, I just need to STOP BUYING BOOKS.  I’ve got a wall full of good stuff I’ve purchased over the last few months that I need to go through.  Prior to picking up Ferguson’s book, I had just purchased “The Minister’s MBA” to stretch my thinking a bit in terms of the systems we use at our church.  No, I’m not to going to pursue a formal MBA once my college work is complete.  I’ve already decided to pursue an MA in Spiritual Formation from Spring Arbor University in Michigan as soon as God allows it. (That could be a ways off!) I’ve been touched by Richard Foster and Dallas Willard’s works on the topic and feel it’s something that’s missing in many of our churches today.

For now, I’ll digest the ideas in this book and another I’m reading on putting together a focused evangelism/outreach follow up program.  We’re doing quite a few of the things Ferguson espouses in this book but it appears his church has taken things up a notch in the way it approaches its planning.  That can make all the difference in the impact we make for Christ on newcomers through our door.  I’m always open to new ideas as I move forward through this church planting journey.

I’ll post some thoughts once I’m through the book.  Have a great time of worship this weekend!

Today Crossway publishers announced the coming release of a new type of study bible for its English Standard Version translation.  The “Literary Study Bible” will be released this Fall season and includes study notes from author Dr. Leland Ryken who has written numerous books, including the concise “Choosing A Bible” which is available through Crossway as a PDF download for you to use in your ministry.

I can see numerous uses for a bible of this type.  Book clubs can meet to discuss actual books of the bible in a literary sense using Ryken’s notes as a basis for the discussion.  Teachers and preachers of God’s Word will also benefit from the notes as it gives another dimension into how the biblical writers organized and preserved their work.

Crossway has made a brief PDF download of the introductory pages available for review.  After looking at it, a couple of things caught my eye.  One was the single column organization of the text.  Bloggers like myself and J. Mark Bertrand have lobbied for this for years and Crossway answered earlier this year with a single column bible prior to the announcement of this study bible.  The fact that the LSB (short for Literary Study Bible) will be in single column format makes perfect sense since it’s supposed to be read as a book and I know of no other book that’s organized into two columns like the bible is.  Also, I like it because it just seems to flow naturally.  I am trying to read the bible a book at a time this year, following the plan laid out by one of my favorite bible teachers, Woodrow Kroll, in his book “Read Your Bible One Book At A Time”.  The introductory notes and single column layout will make this task an easier effort for me. (Yes, I already am reserving myself a copy of this book when it’s available in the fall).

I continue to be impressed with the ESV as a bible for use in preaching and teaching God’s Word.  I use this text almost exclusively in everything I do.  Our church leadership prayerfully made the switch to the ESV in 2003 and time and again, Crossway continues to impress with the many versions they have presented us.  There are so many options with the ESV, from the .50 giveaway New Testaments we use, the metallic or glow in the dark teen bibles, the large print text for our seniors, and exhaustive center column references in their deluxe reference edition.  Ligonier Ministries has also given us the “Reformation Study Bible” and now, we have Ryken’s LSB version to broaden this outstanding translation’s reach!  I’m looking forward to the full text this fall and already have plans to use it to reach out to our community in new and exciting ways.  It appears Crossway has done it again with the Literary Study Bible.  I hope you’ll check it out.

Today I was returning some books my family had checked out at the local library. (It’s close to my church office).  The library regularly puts out boxes of old books it’s looking to get rid of for whatever you wish to pay for them.  Over the years I’ve found some neat titles including some great sports books, extra copies of some spiritual classics like “Knowing God” and a few youth books for my kids to read.

Today was different.  As I perused the boxes of old books and magazines what do I find but a box quite familiar to my youth.  You see it above.  How many of you remember this game?  I remember “Football Strategy” when Sports Illustrated first purchased the game in 1977.  I was 11 at the time and a group of my friends and me put together a simple league of players that would play games each day after school while we waited for our buses to come and take us home.  Some of the guys rode the same bus so we were able to take the game with us and finish it while we rode home!  A ten game league with playoffs was the norm and we usually finished about the same time as the real NFL so we could start playing the baseball game in the spring.

“Surely this is someone’s throwaway” I thought.  “They probably had spare parts in here and decided to get rid of it.”  The box was well worn with a stain or two on it but as I opened it to check out the contents, there preserved was the entire game!  All of it.  All the cards needed, the die, the books, the charts, even the “widow’s guide to pro football” that was thrown into the game as a joke by its creators.  The widow’s guide didn’t even look like it had been read!  “Ah, but what about the football and ten yard marker” I thought.  I figured since I was lucky enough to find something in as good a shape as this, I would fabricate my own from card stock and my laser printer.  Just as I began to close the case, the two little pieces I looked for fell from the box.  They had been tucked in one of the booklets.  I couldn’t believe it.  The game was in great shape.  Aside from normal use, it looked like it had been put back on a shelf sometime in 1982 (About the time my original copy had come up missing!) and never been touched.  My inner child smiled and gleefully put the box in the bag that had held my family’s books and I made my way to the church office to lay it all out on my desk to see if it really was just like I remember it nearly a quarter century ago!

I could write about my first FS game in 25 years but it’s enough to say I remembered the simplicity this game had for me at a time when board games were just beginning to take over my leisure time.  As the early 80’s gave way to the Commodore 64 computer, more advanced sports strategy games emerged and I remembered loaning this out to a younger friend of mine to play.  Within three years I would be married and I never saw the game again.

If you’re under 35, you probably never remembered this game or if you did, you might remember your older brother having his friends over for some fun and snacks.  For the rest of us, you can probably understand my enthusiasm and my wife’s laughing at me when I came home with the game tucked under my arm!  “It’s coming up on Easter Sunday” she said.  “Is this what you did to prepare to reach the guests we’ll have?” Hmmm…I had to think about that for a minute.  “I’ll finish prepping the message in the morning” I replied.  “Tonight, me and my son are going to the coffee shop to play a game”.  She didn’t think my son would have any interest in something I played when I was his age.  Not with the sophistication of the PS2 football games he owns and the techno freak he is.  But he grinned as I told him the story of my treasure find.  Perhaps to humor his old man he said, “Yea, that would be cool to sit down and try to figure this out!”

We’re off in an hour or so…I just hope I remember my great aerial offense tactics to knock down his defense!   Or perhaps he’ll run me into the ground.  Either way, it feels like 1977 all over again!

Fast Company magazine tipped me off to a neat little free tool that you can use to prepare an online organizational chart.  CogMap is an organization chart wiki that allows you to create and edit organizational charts and then publish them for people to view online.  Companies such as Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo have their charts posted online but not many churches are featured…yet!

A few weeks back, Ben Arment blogged about the idea of organizational charts and had some good ideas.  I’ve always liked the idea of preparing ahead of growth and one of the key concepts shared in Michael Gerber’s excellent book “The E-Myth” was the idea of preparing an organizational chart with the future of your company (or church) in mind.  Put together positions that you want to have and place your name in each space if need be.  Then, begin to add new people to your chart as you train and work out specific job duties for them.  This is what I do and it allows me the flexibility to change the chart and move things around as I go.  I’ve always been one to see the church grow in “fractals” similar to Wayne Cordeiro’s church in Hawaii.  You can read about that system in this fine book. 

Check this tool out, sign up, and put your chart together.  I’m looking forward to seeing some new churches on the site soon!