Get a Bible, For Crying Out Loud…

Over the last year much attention on discipleship has been focused on self-feeding.

Pastor David Trotter says that in ten years of ministry at three different churches, he has heard hundreds of people say that they aren't being 'fed' enough -- they are getting too much milk and not enough meat. But he makes the point that several other prominent pastors and bloggers have made recently: As followers of Jesus, we are called to feed ourselves and feed others who are new in the faith...

How does the responsibility for self-feeding integrate with your responsibilities as a leader/teacher? I think teachers can model, train and honor self-feeding.

Modeling - occasionally share with your group things you have gleaned in your personal study that has nothing to do with the lesson plan you are delivering.

Teaching - Help people with practical advice about where to start reading, how much to read, strategies that help you in your personal reading (journaling, note-taking, highlighting, reading schedules, etc.). I just learned a couple of weeks ago about a leader who bought Composition Notebooks (like those used in college classes) and a stack of men's magazines. The students clipped headlines and pictures of things that were personal to them. Pasted them to the cover of the journal then wrapped the whole thing in clear contact paper. The thought was that a spiritual journal is PERSONAL interaction with God so the place where those thoughts are recorded should be personalized.

Honoring - We honor self-feeding by assigning it value. Promote it as a noble challenge (See the 31 Day Challenge) and give people a chance to share what they have been learning in their personal time of "eating alone"

MondayMorningInsight.com > Get a Bible, For Crying Out Loud…

Me2We: part 1 of 5

I just found the first installment of a series that has great potential. While it is written for pastors, I think it is a good taxonomy for any church leader. Below are some excerpts, for more detail see the link at the bottom. Through my 20 years of ministry I can sadly say that I have been guilty of many of these and have seen others in colleagues.

Me to We Series...

The term equip means different things to different people. Most pastors believe they "equip" (Ephesians 4) because they preach the gifts of the Spirit and support the priesthood of believers--and seek more volunteers. But I'd like to offer you a better way to assess where you and your church are in terms of the equipping value. This is #1 of a five-part mini-series that charts the degrees of equipping on a 10-point continuum where 10 represents the point of highest value.

Point 1: Emperor Pastor -- Point 1 is at the lowest end of the equipping continuum. This pastor functions as the pastor, striving to be all things to all people. He or she is the ultimate server, schooled and trained to do whatever it takes to carry out acts of service for people.

Although the Emperor Pastor can have a wonderful heart, a servant's attitude, and be fully committed, quite often there exists some degree of emotional baggage or self-image issue that causes the pastor to try to be all things to all people. Most pastors in this category go to bed with their cell phones or beepers on in case someone needs to get hold of them. They're available 24/7 and even make this one of their bragging rights. The problem is that this sort of codependent mind-set rewards enabling behavior from the church members, who applaud their pastor's efforts to "be there for them."

The problem is that most people are intentionally or unintentionally kept out of ministry and prevented from using their gifts because of the culture this type of pastor perpetuates.

Point 2: Controller Pastor -- The Controller Pastor is open to letting others be involved in a role of service, so long as it's one of support to his or her ministry.

Sometimes slightly more people are involved in acts of service, but the pastor sees them as ministry pawns and recruits them to do the "little jobs" around the church.

There's only room for one key leader.

The result of Emperor or Controller pastoring styles is limited spiritual growth because people fail to use their gifts in ministry and to receive significant ministry through others' gifts.

For an Empowering Continuum assessment, go to www.rev.org and click on Me to We resources, and then "The Empowering Church Assessment." In next week's edition of LeadingIdeas, we'll discuss Points 3 and 4, the Promoter and the Recruiter.

Alan

Alan Nelson is the executive editor of Rev! Magazine, the author

rev.org: Leading Ideas: Are U an Emperor or a Controller?

Expert Advice for Small-Group Facilitators

 Just found a great resource for Small Group Facilitators. If these 3 ideas are helpful to you, check out the link below for more from the same author.

• The biggest challenge for facilitators is staying focused on why the group has gathered together—to grow and develop people. It's all about people. It's not about your agenda; it's not about the great lesson you wrote; it's not about all of the social things that the group likes to do. It's about life-on-life learning. So the facilitator has to help the group avoid getting sidetracked by knowing that there are a lot of good things and bad things that can hijack group discussions, but the group has to stay focused on helping people.
• Tactically, something you can do with dominant people is to seat them right next to you. This takes them out of direct line of sight. When they get eye contact, they often take that as a green light to talk. So having them on your right and left side minimizes that.
• Once you've built the relationship capital, you can start going deeper. Tactically, you can start with the curriculum you study and the tools you use. Americans tend to know more of God's Word than they actually apply. So if you want to take your group deeper, the issue generally isn't how to get more biblical knowledge into them; it's how to get them to act on it.

Source: Expert Advice for Small-Group Facilitators | Building Small Groups

How Do You Fire A Volunteer?

 Found the following question and I wanted to hear your ideas. Post comments below. Just so you know, I don't have anyone on this list right now. I would just like to get ideas for when this inevitably will show up.

Peter Hamm writes: "I think it's possible that the hardest thing we have to do in ministry is letting a volunteer go. Sometimes it's because they do something they shouldn't, sometimes it's because it's a bad fit for them and their giftedness, sometimes it's because they just can't do the job. For instance, what if your welcome team has someone on it who never smiles and insults people as they come in?...

An extreme example, I know, but what happens when you have to let this person know you need to re-direct them into something else. Or say it’s a person who serves in Children’s ministry who just can’t connect with the kids, or even frightens them. Or perhaps it’s someone who just doesn’t get what your church’s mission and vision are, and they do more grumbling than serving.

The most difficult thing for me is creative artistic people, especially singers/worship leaders. (I’ve had some recent experience with this, as we re-aligned our worship teams, and I’m still wading through the fallout on this.) This is the one ministry in our church where easily three times as many people want to participate regularly than I can handle, and some of those people just can’t do it in the way that we have, with God’s guidance, concluded it should be done in our environment (This is a small number, I’d estimate less than one-third of those interested). Others are competent and dedicated, but just not up to the level of some others, who need to be used in this area of their giftedness.

Add to that that artists and singers and creative types tend more than others to integrate their whole value as a person with the thing they do (sing, play, act, draw, paint...) and you have a recipe for ministry nightmares.

So, I’m curious, what kind of tips have you picked up over the years to help you with this? How do you approach people? What secrets have you learned that you could share with the rest of us?

Source: MondayMorningInsight.com > How Do You Fire A Volunteer?

AYCE: All you can eat

Just received the following and thought it was superbly written. If the snippet I provide below whets your appetite, click on the source link then come back and leave your comment. 

If you’ve ever been to an All You Can Eat buffet then, most likely, you’ve seen or experienced this scenario.  The sights and smells have you thinking about second helpings before you even pick up a plate. You begin working your way through the buffet but before you know it, the coaster sized dish they call a plate is full.   Now, the less experienced will just grab a second plate.  However, a true buffet veteran might skip the vegetables altogether, use gravy to keep everything from sliding off, or just add an entire second story. 

Too often, I believe, this is the way I treat God’s teaching.  Whether from scripture, sermons, books, conferences, seminars, devotionals, newsletters, blogs etc…it’s all great stuff but as it begins to stack up I’m not always sure what to do with it.

Source: Guest Blog: Travis Petty at LifeChurch.tv : swerve