Zach Zehnder's Blog, page 20

This One Thing Stops So Many From Truly Being Free

Despite Jesus offering freedom to all, there are many who aren’t experiencing the full, free, and abundant life that we so often quote is available to us.  Sadly, many of those unfree people even claim to be believers in Jesus.  Why is this?

Over the past year I’ve had the privilege to really dive deep into this question and it’s led me to my next book Forgiving Challenge available this Fall.  In fact, on July 13th at 11AM CST, my wife Allison and I will be leading a FREE webinar talking about the forgiveness of God and going deeper into how Christians become forgiving people.  Register here if you’d like.  Did I mention it’s FREE?

How do we live with the freedom that Jesus has won for us?

When I think of freedom I think of ascending to the peak of a mountain.  If our walk with God is like a long climb (isn’t that what it feels like at times?), there are different phases that we go through before we reach the top.  It’s not always straight and easy to the peak. Sometimes we ascend quickly, sometimes we fall down, and other times it feels like we are just going through switchbacks.  So how do we ascend to the top and experience freedom?

I believe it’s found in the 5 forgiving phases summed up with the acronym SCARS.

SinConfessionAbsolutionRestorationSanctification

Let’s continue the analogy of the climb to see how this plays out in our lives.

Sin

It is difficult to get to the top of Freedom Mountain. You spent a lot of time training for this climb and now you’re mustering up as much strength as you can to begin. However, you are shocked as you struggle to take even a single, solitary step in the right direction. As you try to navigate your way to the top, you stumble and fall. You keep veering down paths you were never intended to follow. Your errors begin multiplying, and now an already difficult climb is becoming impossible. Every error adds heavy baggage to the climb, and you are exhausted. For some reason, even if you can’t rationalize it, you feel the need to keep holding on to the baggage. Now, it takes everything inside of you to attempt a single step. Eventually, you crash. The climb is over. You’ve failed.

Confession

You admit that there is no way to get to the top on your own. You confess that the mountain is too big, and you are too weak. Your journey is over. A deep sadness comes over you. But in your sorrow, another man suddenly comes down the mountain and finds you lying there. He’s got some exciting news to share with you. He asks you to follow Him. He lifts you up, leads you around a bend, and shows you a new path.

There’s something unique about this man, even if you can’t explain it. He claims this path will lead all the way to the top. But as you examine the path, it doesn’t appear all that impressive. It certainly doesn’t look appealing. It’s rather narrow. Nobody would choose this path on their own. You wouldn’t even know how to find it if it hadn’t been shown to you. You remind Him that even if the pathway leads to the top, you can’t get there. Your bags weigh far too much. You do your best to describe what is in each and every bag. But you’ve forgotten what is in some bags, while you remember only small details about other bags. As sorrow comes over you, the man shows great kindness. Nothing about the bags that you are describing seems to faze this man.

Absolution

The man then offers to carry your bags for you. Honestly, you can use the break. They have been weighing you down, and you are ready to release them. As He reaches for your first bag, you notice a nasty scar in the middle of His hand. He picks up your first bag, then your second, your third. You lose count, and honestly you didn’t even realize how many bags you were carrying. Pretty soon, He has picked them all up. At first you were impressed by this man’s kindness, but now you’re staggered by His amazing strength. You would have never guessed by looking at Him that He could be so strong. The bags felt like bricks to you, but He throws them over His shoulders like bags of feathers. How is this possible? Surely this man will eventually tire, but it certainly doesn’t look like it anytime soon.

Restoration

This man walks with strength, and there’s a joy in His steps. He never once complains about the weight of your bags or makes you feel guilty about having to carry them. Instead, He talks on and on about how excited He is for you to join Him at the top. He assures you it’s a view that you’ve never seen before. When you get thirsty, He asks for your empty water bottle, taps on a rock, and somehow water flows from the stone, filling the bottle. What in the world!? As you drink, this fresh water tastes like no other water you’ve ever had before! Somehow, even though you just chugged a full bottle, not a drop is gone. It’s still filled to the brim. This makes no sense.

There’s only a short distance left until you get to the top. The last steps are difficult, so you’ll need some nourishment to sustain you. The man starts a fire and begins cooking over this open flame. Soon, you’re eating the best fish you’ve ever had in your life. But where in the world did He get this fish from? After eating, He calls you to follow Him again. With every step up the mountain, He is more and more giddy. He’s so excited you are with Him.

Sanctification

You are almost to the top. The man runs ahead to ensure that everything is in order for you when you reach the top. But just as He leaves, you notice how steep and dangerous this last step truly is. If you don’t land the step well, it would have severe consequences. Because of the high grade, you can’t fully see what’s on the other side of the mountain. Doubt and fear begin to creep in. You wonder if the view is even worth it. You’re reminded that the path He led you on didn’t look that impressive. Maybe this view won’t be impressive either. Besides, you have made it up pretty far and can see some cool things where you are. Taking this final step would require great courage. Do you really have what it takes? In the midst of your doubts and fears, He shows up again. He can sense your nervousness, so He offers to take the step with you. He reaches His other hand out to you, and you see a similar scar on this hand as well. He invites you to take this nail-scarred hand and take the final step with Him.

Will you take the last step?

I hope you would say, “Yes!”

And yet, can you believe it, this is the step that keeps so many from total freedom.

In the above illustration, as in life, there are several exit points that you can take on your journey to be free. The earliest exit point is when you commit a sin. If you refuse to bring your sin to God, you will never be free. The next exit point is refusing to believe God paid the price for your sin. Another exit point is refusing to believe that God fully restores you.  At any point, any of these refusals will only lead to more bondage.

The final exit point, however, is the saddest for me. It’s where I see so many leave the journey. What a tragedy that one can be so close to freedom, and yet they don’t experience it because they were one step short. Jesus didn’t do all that He did for you so that you stop short anywhere. Jesus stepped down so that you would step up with Him.

True freedom doesn’t happen until you step up into the freedom God has won for you and wants for you. This process of stepping into freedom is called sanctification.

The definition of sanctification is the process of being freed from sin. Other definitions of sanctification are to be holy, or set apart, but the ultimate purpose is to be free. It’s when we live a holy and set-apart life that we are truly free.

With sanctification, we participate in this process with God’s Holy Spirit inside of us. We cooperate with God in sanctification. However, the devil knows that the best place to attack us on our journey to freedom are the places where you and I are the most involved. He will throw everything that He can against us in this last and final step. This, by the way, is why so many leave the journey of freedom here.

In fact, Satan will make this last step seem impossible. But remember the Good News. God has called you to ascend to the mountaintop, and you can rest assured that He’s given you everything you need to make it all the way up. The God who was with you after you fell taking the first step is still with you as you take the last step. Come, and ascend to the top of Freedom Mountain.

My question to you again is: “Will you take the last step?”

Will you be free?

This devotion was adapted from Day 34 of Forgiving Challenge.  This powerful new resource becomes available the Fall of 2021.  If you are a church leader or pastor and need more information or want to launch Forgiving Challenge with the First Wave or churches, email us at hello@redletterchallenge.com for some crazy discounts and incentives ending July 31, 2021.  And remember, sign up for Zach and Allison’s free webinar here.

The post This One Thing Stops So Many From Truly Being Free appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.

10 Practical Things that Churches Should Stop Doing

Later this week, I’ll be leading a FREE webinar called “Growing Your Church Challenge: 10 Ideas to Help Grow Your Church that Cost Little to No Money.”  I’ll be sharing some real practical ideas that helped our church grow from just our family to over 800 in attendance each weekend in just 7 years.  If you haven’t already, sign up here.  In light of that, I thought I would share a quick, fun post today about 10 practical things that churches should stop doing.

I believe it takes a lot of hard work to get new people to come to church. Once we get someone new to attend our church, it takes even more intentionality and hard work to get someone new to return.  How do we create an environment in which God is greatly glorified and visitors are greatly welcomed? How do we strike a balance between not taking ourselves too seriously and relying on the Holy Spirit, but also doing our best to eliminate any distractions that may get in the way of an attender having a great experience?

While we will continue to wrestle with these questions, there are some things that churches are doing that I think are no-brainers to stop. While some of these are subjective and certainly my own opinion, I don’t think I’m alone on most of these.  Here’s my list…what would you add?

Eliminate the Pastor’s parking spot

Unless it’s for handicap reason, which in this case, you should provide handicap parking, we should reserve the best spots for our visitors.

Not allowing coffee in the sanctuary/worship center

It’s time to treat our church members like they should be treated.  The worst thing that could happen would be someone would spill their coffee and we have to clean it later.

Misspell words on screens

I don’t care how engaged I am in a service, if I notice an error, I’m always distracted.  Most people are.

Conclude your message 5 times

The pastor should say “In conclusion” only once in a message.  It’s disingenuous and feels unprepared if there are multiple endings to the same message.

Keep the “Free Gift” to visitors a secret

Many churches, in exchange for new visitor information, will offer a free gift to the visitor.  Rather than saying the generic “free gift” I personally would like to know what I would be getting in advance.  Side note, if you aren’t saying what the gift is because you don’t think it’s enticing or valuable enough, it’s probably time to rethink what you are giving away.

Force guests to “stand out” publicly

While we should provide opportunity for those who are new and want to begin making connections, forcing someone who is new to stand up during announcements, wear a name tag, or identify themselves in some other way will make many feel awkward.  The opposite of what we are wanting.

Shame your visitors

This especially happens to the CEO’s (Christmas and Easter Only Crowd).  Rather than shaming them for not coming, extend a heartfelt welcome to come back.  Focus your services and your church around being friendly, welcoming, and encouraging of your guests.  If you try hard all year to get new visitors, and then they actually come, why would you shame them for coming?

Make visitors guess where to go

It’s a big step for someone new to come to your church.  Some of the visitors that come to your church have never been to a church before, or maybe even were prayed over for years before they stepped foot in your church.  Your signage should be very clear on where restrooms are located, where the children’s ministry is, where to go if it is your first time, where to get questions answered, etc.

Pray in the “King James Version”

There is incredible beauty in the words of the most popular version of the Bible.  While it is perfectly acceptable to read and translate this version of the Bible, our speech should resemble the language that we would use today, not one that was used 400+ years ago.  Unless your day-to-day dialogue is filled with King James Version, your prayers shouldn’t be either.  Switching from one mode of conversation to this “old” style feels inauthentic.

Run out of time in your message

When a preacher regularly plans a multi-point sermon but only gets through one point and then rushes through the other points it smacks of being unprepared.  If preaching is your craft, work on it, practice, and don’t let Sunday morning be the first time you’ve spoken the sermon aloud.

Trust me.  I understand how hard it is to be in ministry.  Pastors and church leaders do so many things right that I would hate for one of these small things to turn into a reason for someone not wanting to come back to your church.

So what can you do to help your church grow?  Join me this Thursday at the FREE webinar and I’ll share 10 really practical ideas with you to grow your church that cost little no money.

The post 10 Practical Things that Churches Should Stop Doing appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.

11 Ministry Truths I Learned from 11 Years of Planting, Leading, and Leaving My First Call

Fresh from graduating from Seminary 11 years ago, to the day, I began driving to my very first called pastoral position to plant theCross in Mount Dora, FL.  I had no idea what to expect and it was, by far, the scariest thing I’d ever done up to that point.

And now, 11 years later, I’m getting ready to pull out of our driveway for the last time to start a 21-hour car ride from Mount Dora, FL to our family’s new home in Omaha, NE.

As I process all that God has done through our 11 years at theCross I wanted to share 11 truths I’ve learned about ministry.  These are things that I have learned from planting, leading, supporting, and now leaving my first pastoral call.  Some of these were taught to me at Seminary, but all of them must truly be experienced to learn.  I hope that no matter where you are on your pastoral journey (whether you hope to be one someday, are studying to be one now, or whether you are decades you’re your pastoral experience) that this blog will be helpful and encouraging to you.

But first, let me tell you my story so you can understand more about where these truths come from.

I remember the feeling I had driving down to plant theCross, It felt like the first time I really felt ever put my faith on the line in a big way prior.

I grew up in a loving home with a mom and dad who were committed to one another.  Even better, they were committed to serving God.  My dad was a pastor and my mom was the ideal pastor’s wife and mother.  They were, and still are, amazing parents.  Dad’s about to celebrate 40 years of ministry and my mom just wrote an amazing book on dealing with grief.  So ya, I’m pretty proud of them both.

When I went to a Lutheran university I quickly connected with a girl, Allison, that I fell in love with.  Not only was she way out of my league, but I knew she was Proverbs 31 wife material.  I didn’t hesitate.  After our sophomore year of college, I proposed, and we married one another just one year later.  This July we’ll celebrate 17 years of marriage, and it’s just getting better and better.  It’s the best earthly decision I’ve ever made.

Following college, Allison and I moved to St. Louis, MO, where I enrolled in Seminary.  I was studying to be a 4th-generation Lutheran pastor.  As I was studying, I was greatly blessed to connect with a local church in St. Louis and help them lead a new college ministry at St. Louis University.  Being so deep into books on the Seminary side gave me the head knowledge that I needed, but actually being able to be involved in real ministry at the same time ensured that my heart was in this.  I’ve heard from many others that Seminary is one of the loneliest times of people’s lives, and also, that it’s where “relationship” with God goes to die.  This wasn’t the case for me.

Allison and I enjoyed having our first child, Nathan.  That, by far, was the biggest disruption up to this point in our lives.  But over time, you learn, you grow, you build character, and ultimately you learn to trust God.  Nathan is now a teenager (crazy!) and we have one other son Brady, who just turned 10.

If someone were to look at my life from the outside up to this point, I think you could say my life was pretty scripted.  It was pretty much the way it should go.  The steps were in order.  But honestly, I never felt through the first 26 years of my life that I had actually put my faith to the test in a meaningful way.  Sure, I went on mission trips, spoke up at times about God, led certain ministries, but up to this point, everything was kind of “by the book” and honestly from a faith perspective, easy.

Driving down to Florida to plant a church in a new area from scratch felt different.  It felt scary.  I remember this reliance on God, asking Him to show up.  If he didn’t, I knew I would be in trouble.  Part of the reason I was scared was because even though Seminary gave me confidence in my biblical knowledge, understanding, and overall theology, I felt like I had no idea how to plant a church. And yet, there was something exciting about putting my faith on the line.  It felt invigorating.  It felt new.  It felt like it should feel to follow after God.

And now, after 11 years, I am in awe more than ever of this God that we serve.

I had long dreamed of the day I would become a pastor and lead a church, but even my dreams of what I thought would, could, and should happen fell far short of what I actually experienced God do in our family’s time at theCross.  Words from Ephesians 3:20-21 became a reality for us: 20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

We started meeting as a core group in 2010 and immediately we saw God move.  As the core leadership team formed, we got downright busy with serving our community in a big way.  A year later we launched with worship.  From 2011-2018 we grew in attendance from my family of 4 to over 800 on a weekend.  Our church’s history is unlike any other church’s.  In addition to worship, small groups, and outreach, we were unafraid to do some crazy things.  We broke world records, paid for tattoos, opened men’s recovery homes and food pantries.  Hundreds of people were baptized over the years and the community was forever changed.

The staff began to grow. I had the privilege to bring long-time friends of mine, even a friend from college that we’d dreamt of working together, onto our team.  Armed with a larger staff, we then opened a second campus, bought 46 acres of land to build on, and were on our way to raising capital to build.

And then in 2020, I kind of did a weird thing. 

After a decade of seeing God move in extraordinary ways, and seeing explosive growth in our church family, I stepped down as the lead pastor.  That’s not typically what driven, self-motivated, and at least by worldly accounts “successful” 36-year old’s do.  There was no moral failure, burn out, or lack of passion on my end.

It appeared to everyone on the outside that this was a sudden change.  But, if you know my story, this was anything but an instant decision.

Being a 4th-generation Lutheran pastor, I guess you could say being a pastor is in my blood.  But, I began to see some entrepreneurial gifts in my life all the way from childhood.  It feels like I’ve always had a side thing.  In college, after working at several golf courses for 5 years, I found a way to acquire new golf headcovers and sell them online.  At one point, I was the number one third-party golf headcover seller in the nation.  I kind of just found my niche.  I continued selling golf headcovers through Seminary.

The call to plant theCross was actually a bi-vocational call.  Though it required full-time hours, the main source of our income for the first five years was actually our golf headcover business.  I was experiencing passion and fulfillment on the church side, but the finances were still coming from our side business.  Finally, after the church reached a certain size, I simply had no time left for a side business.  It needed more than my full-time attention.

On top of this, and even more important, I was hoping to be the husband and father that my family needed me to be as well.  Between the church and the business, sadly, I was noticing my family was getting a lot of my leftovers.  This was something that my wife had already noticed and felt for years.  Finally, in 2017, after my wife and I saw a Christian counselor, I decided to say “No” to selling headcovers and focus solely on leading the church.  I trusted that God would provide.

Later that year, I finished a project called Red Letter Challenge.  It was a simple idea that we had tested at our church: take the words of Jesus and put them into practice.  RLC was a vision that I felt God had given me to bring to completion.  So, in 2017, as I wrapped up this project, I felt like I had been faithful to what God put on my heart.  Now, finally, I was ready to give my full attention work-wise to serve the church.

One problem.

God put His anointing on Red Letter Challenge from the moment it became available.  Many people ask me the reasons for success on the RLC side, and I’ve got some human answers, but more than anything I come back to the grace, favor, and anointing of God.

The year I gave up my side business of selling golf headcovers is the year we began to see explosive growth in RLC.  Now RLC had became my side business, except, it was much more than a “side” thing.  Somehow, for the next two years, 2018-2019, I was able to lead both theCross and RLC.

But by the end of 2019, I was pretty exhausted.  More so than that, my family was pretty tired.  We knew that in 2020 something was going to have to change.

About this time, I had a great conversation with leadership mentor and friend Carey Nieuwhof.  Carey had also led a church, started something on the side (blogging and podcasts), and eventually moved more towards his business and into part-time pastoring.  I asked him when he knew it was the right timing, and I’ll never forget his words.  “Zach,” he said, “I knew it was right when I would put 10x energy into one thing and get 1x results, and then I would put 1x energy into the other thing and get 10x results.”  This is exactly how I was feeling.

It wasn’t as if God wasn’t working at theCross.  It was just the large amount of my energy, time, and passion that went into the church simply wasn’t getting the results of my very limited amount of energy, time, and passion that I was putting into Red Letter Challenge.

I felt like God called me in 2020 “to step deeply into where you see me moving.”

This, after all, is what we should always do, right?  It is a noble life to simply step fully into the places where God is moving.

I started giving myself permission and reminding myself that I don’t have to lead a church to grow God’s kingdom.  I began to realize that I love being creative and starting new ventures.  Not only this, but I happened to be married to an extremely talented, godly writer who just happened to have studied and worked in kid’s ministry.  RLC could give us the opportunity to work even more closely together.

Allison and I were left with a difficult decision to make.  I could not continue to lead the church and Red Letter Challenge.

Seeing the unique way in which God had wired me, finding the beauty of God bringing me and Allison together, and most importantly, following where God was deeply moving I decided to step down as lead pastor in July 2020 and move with confidence into Red Letter Challenge.  What began as one book, I began to see as a movement in which we could continue to create Jesus-centered, simple to understand, yet challenging in practice content that would challenge anybody and everybody to be greater followers of Jesus.

I love the church, and I forever will.  I don’t ever foresee a time that I will not be a pastor.  But, I needed to change seats on the bus at theCross, and I did.  My new seat this past year didn’t call on me to lead, but to simply support.  In the new seat, I got to see the current leadership take the bus to a different destination.  It was still a great destination, but not the one in which I had intended under my leadership.  More than anything, I got to see the church I planted carry on and thrive under someone else’s leadership.  Being able to sit on this new seat on the bus, over the past 12 months, has given me a different vantage point pastorally than I had seen in the previous decade.

Several months ago, I was issued a call to become the Teaching Pastor at King of Kings in Omaha, NE and after much prayer and deliberation, our family accepted this position.  I’m excited to team up with a great visionary leader who is a friend, to be on the same team as my dad as he nears retirement, and to give back to a church where my faith truly formed.   I also had full confidence in the leadership that I had built here in Mount Dora to not only continue, but to grow theCross.

The 11 years we have spent building, leading, supporting, and now leaving theCross has taught me many things.  Fresh off of my farewell message at theCross, here are 11 truths I’ve learned about ministry (in no particular order) that I’ve learned from planting, leading, supporting, and now leaving my first pastoral job.

Take a scary step here and there.

You don’t need to have all the answers.  It’s okay to not know what’s next and to put the fate of the church in the hands of our God.  The truth is, we will never have all the answers, and that’s okay.  I have grown the most when I have relied not on facts, but in my faith in God.  If you’ve been running on autopilot for a while, do something to put your faith on the line.  See what God does.

Laser-Focus on Jesus.

The church is bigger than you so don’t make it about you.  If you ever feel like things are going off the rails, ensure that your church is laser-focused on Jesus.  Jesus instituted the church.  Though the church has many expressions, and we get invited into being a part of His church, the outcome of the church doesn’t depend on you.  Be faithful in the time you have to work at a church.  You play an important role in representing Jesus, but it is God who will keep His church going.  Keep planting the seeds and being strategic, but trust that God will grow it.

Look to replace yourself on Day 1.

One of the best mindsets you can operate with from the beginning is to realize that your time, whether it’s 1 year or 50 years will end at your church someday.  Knowing that your time will end will give you greater permission to pour into leaders from the beginning.

Work hard but don’t take yourself too seriously.

Leading through the first few months of the pandemic was one more reminder that the church can and will continue to exist in many different forms.  Hard work and preparation are important.  But if you are working hard and preparing so that you don’t need to rely on the Holy Spirit that is a problem.  Find the right balance. If you are not enjoying God, your job, or your church, take a vacation and figure out why.  Talk to God about it.  He’s ready to listen!

Be friends with the people in your church.

During Seminary, I heard several professors encourage their students not to befriend those in their church.  The rationale behind this thinking was that there should be a proper distance maintained from parishioners with the clergy.  I completely disagree.  I love what Paul said to the church in Thessalonica that he planted: Because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well.  Looking back, I don’t know that it’s possible to share the Gospel of God well without sharing our lives together. Real ministry doesn’t happen at a distance, but in relationship with one another.  There are times that you will get burnt with this mindset.  But there are also times where you will make friends that will become family.

Don’t settle for clean and easy.

When we look at the life of Jesus, we see that His rescue mission ultimately led Him to be brutally tortured and killed.  Along the way, He befriended those no one else would, and went out of His way to give grace to the ones who were least deserving.  Those of us in ministry are called to represent Jesus. It’s impossible to truly represent Jesus without getting messy.  With mess comes trouble, gossip, confusion, and critics.  With mess also comes some of the greatest stories of grace and redemption.  Get messy.

Nobody fulfills like Jesus!

In a world filled with people looking for purpose and meaning, nobody gives it like Jesus.  Living with purpose and meaning gives incredible fulfillment.  Even though there were many days of pastoring where I felt unqualified, one thing I have never lacked is purpose.  While purpose doesn’t have to be found in full-time ministry, purpose is found in following after Jesus.  If you are waking up with no purpose, pray to Jesus, and take a step in His direction today.

Your family comes before your church.

Before you are called to your church, you are called to your family.  Never forget the order.  While ministry can be rewarding and fulfilling for you, at times, it can also be demanding and difficult for your family.  Technically, you are never off. With all of the demands of ministry that will come your way if you are not intentional, likely, family will get your leftovers.  Not one email from my loving church family has ever encouraged me to spend time with my family.  It won’t happen unless you make it a priority. Every week schedule some intentional family time.  Every quarter schedule some intentional family days.  Every year schedule some intentional family vacation.

Play offense, not defense.

We have the greatest news in the history of the world and yet our churches collectively are in decline.  The mission field, especially after more than a year of leading through the global pandemic, has literally, never been as large as it is right now.  Now is the time to play offense, not sit back and settle for the status quo.  Offense doesn’t have to look the same for you as it does for others.  Some of my fondest memories of theCross are when we did things that nobody else has ever done.  Whether it was breaking the world record for the longest speech to open a men’s recovery home, constructing a landscape in downtown Mount Dora out of canned goods for a food pantry, or racing through downtown Mount Dora in a shopping cart relay race for charity, each and every one of those events will be memories that I’ll forever have.  And more importantly, each of those events helped spread the Good News of Jesus in a unique way.  If you need help in this area, check out this blog.

Don’t be afraid to challenge your people.

Consumer Christianity is something we all are fighting against.  There is a time to consume, but there is also a time to contribute. The Gospel includes Jesus dying on the cross for our eternal salvation, but it is bigger than that.  The perennial call that Jesus offered to all of us is the opportunity to follow after Him.  While believing in Jesus will always be important, it’s in the following of Jesus that truly gives us the abundant life we are all chasing today.  Create churches that allow people to come along on the journey no matter where they are in their belief.  Challenge them to take up the call to follow after Jesus and people will discover the life that they were made for as they take up the words of Jesus in their life.

You can’t do it alone.

For the church to be the fullest expression of Jesus that it can be each person is bringing their gifts and unique talents to the table.  Every one of us has a spiritual gift, but not a single one of us has every spiritual gift.  I cannot be more grateful for the army of people that God brought into my path over the past 11 years.  There is so much beauty that God brought out of our church that was not directly related to my gifts.  Pastors receive too much credit when things are going well and too much blame when things aren’t going so well.  Continue to use your gifts, partner with others, and fully rely on God and let’s watch what God does through your church!

Those are my 11 ministry truths I’ve learned thus far.  What truths would you add?

God bless you and thank you for serving the church so courageously!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The post 11 Ministry Truths I Learned from 11 Years of Planting, Leading, and Leaving My First Call appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.

Part 4: 10 Ideas to Grow Your Church for Little to No Money

Welcome to Part 4 of a blog series called “10 Practical Ideas to Grow Your Church For Little to No Money!”  In this blog, not only will you learn the final two ideas to grow your church, but I will share with you what I believe is the lowest hanging fruit when it comes to growing your church.

As more and more churches are emphasizing and planning to get back into full participation in worship, these blogs packed with practical ideas to help maximize your church’s impact.  Over the past 12 months momentum for the overall Church has decelerated like we’ve never seen before.  I firmly believe, however, that a shift is happening right now.  It’s the churches that don’t play prevent defense, but instead, pull the goalie and act with urgency that will see great dividends.

If you missed Part 1, you can read that here.  Part 1 presented why church growth is important and gave ideas 1 and 2 to help your church grow.

If you missed Part 2, you can read that here.  Part 2 presented ideas 3-5 and talked about the single biggest key to church growth, and how our church leveraged this to become the fastest growing church in our denomination.

If you missed Part 3, you can read that here.  Part 3 presented ideas 6-8 and how we tripled the amount of connection cards we received by doing just one thing.

Part 4 continues with two more ideas to help your church grow.  So let’s dive right in:

Idea 9: Get Feedback from a “Secret Worshipper”

You have likely heard the term “mystery shopper” or “secret shopper” before.  These shoppers go in undercover into stores to observe, interact, and report on other customers and store employees.  After their experience, they deliver feedback (positive and negative) to the organization in order to help them achieve their mission more effectively in the future.

A few years ago, I asked the pastor of a neighboring church, (they happened to be one of the fastest growing churches in our nation) if they would be willing to send somebody to our church for a weekend to worship with us and to report his feedback to me.  I wanted this to be as normal of an experience as possible and so nobody else on the church staff even knew that he was coming.  This was important because when we know someone is watching, sometimes we will tweak what we do.  In addition to this, I was particularly interested in how effective our church was in reaching guests.

This “secret worshipper” helped point out a few things that we had overlooked.  The major takeaway point is that he felt a little bit lost in our church as a first-time guest.  Not only did we not address him much, but we also lacked a clear next step for guests.  In addition, our connection cards, as well as the language that we engaged with our people, he deemed to be “insider language.”  In other words, the members of the church knew what it meant, but likely, it was foreign to first-time guests.  Finally, he recommended that our church create a better “New Here” experience.

When I asked him about this, he said that his church has signage as you enter their parking lot that says “For a ‘New Here’ experience, turn your hazards on.”  If the hazards are on, from the moment that vehicle arrives on campus, that person has identified as a “New Here” person.  this means they are likely ready to connect.  His church also had a process in place, then, to welcome these people in their own portion of the parking lot, to point them in the right direction, to usher them to meet the kid’s directors (if needed), and ultimately to tell them about the church and find a place to sit in the worship center.

But what if they don’t want to be identified as “New Here” and want to be anonymous?  Then they don’t put their hazards on.  The more I reflected on this strategy, I realized it was brilliant.  Not only do they go to effective measures to get people to attend their worship experiences, but they have also created a way for “new here” people to identify themselves so they can truly give them a VIP experience.

As I look back on the “secret worshipper” experience, not only did I learn a lot about what we were doing right and wrong, but it gave me an opportunity to also learn from another church who was excelling in church growth.

In addition, I found three reasons why this feedback from a “secret worshipper” was helpful:

As you and I are so entrenched in the way in which we do church, there are likely blind spots that we can’t see anymore. Getting a fresh perspective can illuminate some of those blind spots that need attention.Delivering feedback from a third party feels objective and not subjective. For whatever reason, people tend to listen and respect third party feedback more.Going to measures like this shows your staff, key leadership, and church that you care about your guest’s experience and you are willing to make changes necessary.Challenge: Partner with another local church and swap “secret worshippers” for a weekend.

If possible, it would be wise to choose a church that is growing quickly.  After the weekend experience, come together as the two churches and share your findings with one another.

Idea 10: Follow-Up with Guests Fast and Well

Did you know the average church sees 6-10% of its first-time guests return?  If you can get 2 out of 10 to come back you will be well above average and if somehow you could get 3 or 4 in 10 you could start to see explosive growth.  That is why I believe the lowest hanging fruit when it comes to church growth is how well you follow up with those who give you their contact information.

Imagine this.  You get a new person, or family, to come to church.  You then get them to connect and fill out a card and give you their information.  Now what?  Sadly, for most churches, this is where we miss out.  We don’t follow up well.  We don’t thank them for coming.  For most churches, those cards sit in a stack, and every once in a while, in a non-systematic way, they will be reached out to.  Maybe they will be entered into a database where they just become another name.  Maybe their email address gets added to our newsletter.  Isn’t there something we can do to reach out to our guests that is more intentional?

At my church, we sent them a personal note in the mail, we emailed them, and we called them.  The point is to thank them for coming, and to invite them into taking a clear next step.  But, even still, as I examined the process, I realize it wasn’t perfect. Our process was also run by volunteers, which is a great blessing in many respects, but something this important should have some serious staff oversight.  Sometimes guests would get called on Monday, sometimes on Thursday.  If a volunteer was on vacation, it may not happen until the next week. There has to be a better way.

The truth is that it is really hard and a lot of work to get new people to come to church.  But if you’ve succeeded in actually getting them there and had them fill out a card, why would we ever let these cards sit in a stack or simply just mindlessly enter them into a database?  If we are passionate about church growth, this is the group we should really lean into with everything that we can.

Because of privacy issues and how organizations have wrongly shared information in the past, I think many churches are hesitant to over-contact people.  But I believe the risk is much greater on the other end, that churches don’t contact them enough. 

When someone is filling out a card with their information, I want you to see them as raising their hand saying, “Please contact me.”  If we don’t contact them there is a level of letdown for many of them.  The question we should be asking is how should we reach out to them and what does it look like?  What is scalable?  There’s nothing too big we shouldn’t think about though.

One of the podcasts I listen to frequently is the Carey Nieuwhof Podcast.  Carey will regularly host some of the pastors of the fastest-growing churches and ask them to give us the reasons behind their church growth.  Twice in 2017, he talked with pastors of the fastest growing churches in our nation.  And surprisingly, both pastors had something in common: their church visited the guests who filled a card out that Sunday at their home later that day.  Keep in mind, these are churches that are in the thousands for attendancem, and they have found a way to make this a priority.

How?  One of the pastors said his church trains their small group leaders to go and welcome these people, thank them for coming, invite them to take a clear next step.  In addition, they deliver some fresh-baked cookies and a $5 gift card to Starbucks.  Again, they do this on the same Sunday that the connection card is filled out.

The argument, again, is that people don’t want to be bothered.  Amazingly, both of these pastors said they had received zero pushback whatsoever.  Instead of pushback, guests feel loved, special, and it gets them excited to want to be a part of a church that cares.

This approach may be old school, but it’s relational.  I believe this is smart offense.  Churches that put so much effort to get new people to visit should ensure they throw enough effort at following up well with those who do come.

Not only this, but as guests take first steps outside of just attending worship, other systems should be put in place to follow-up and thank them.  Here’s a few other potential ways to follow-up well:

If they come back a second time, possibly a handwritten note with a small gift cardIf attenders opt in to receive emails, send regular invitations to attend a new members style class and any current events happening on campus.If someone gives for the first time, send them a handwritten note to thank them

Finally, if a guest doesn’t come back, it’s entirely appropriate to invite them back again.  If a family doesn’t return in a few weeks, consider mailing a hand stamped and addressed letter with incentive to return (example: coupon for a free book).

Following up fast and well is work, but if this is the lowest hanging fruit, let’s be on the offensive and do our best to get them connected, and engaged in our churches.

Challenge: Examine your current plan to follow up with guests who submit connection cards.

Make changes if needed to ensure that guests are being followed up with in a way that shows them how important they are.

I hope that these blogs have been helpful for you.  Again, click these links if you missed Part 1, Part 2, or Part 3.  While not all of these ideas may work for you, I hope that at least one or two stuck out to you.  And if they work for you church, praise God!  And if these ideas don’t work for your church, I would just plead with you to try something else.  Just try something.

This Jesus that we love and worship is too good for us to simply accept the status quo of declining church attendance, declining engagement, and declining devotion.

The last thing I’ll leave you with is this: Don’t ever apologize for making it easy to encounter Jesus.  If there are people who don’t understand why you would involve the press, leverage or make up big days, include helicopters when you drop Easter eggs, do things outside of the box, strategize to get 5-star reviews online, or do anything else creatively to bring people to your church, just shrug them off and keep moving.  Do whatever you can, anything short of sinning, to reach people for Jesus.

The post Part 4: 10 Ideas to Grow Your Church for Little to No Money appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.

Part 3: 10 Ideas to Grow Your Church for Little to No Money

Welcome to Part 3 of a blog series called “10 Practical Ideas to Grow Your Church For Little to No Money!”  In this blog, not only will you learn three more practical ideas to spur church growth, but I will share with you the secret to how we received 3x more connection cards by doing just one small thing.

As more and more churches are emphasizing and planning to get back into full participation in worship, I am dropping a series of blogs packed with practical ideas to help maximize your church’s impact.  Over the past 12 months momentum for the overall Church has decelerated like we’ve never seen before.  I firmly believe, however, that a shift is happening right now.  It’s the churches that don’t play prevent defense, but instead, pull the goalie and act with urgency that will see great dividends.

If you missed Part 1, you can read that here.  Part 1 presented why church growth is important and gave Ideas 1 and 2 to help your church grow.

If you missed Part 2, you can read that here.  Part 2 presented ideas 3-5 and talked about the single biggest key to church growth, and how our church leveraged this to become the fastest growing church in our denomination.

Part 3 continues with more ideas to get more people through the front doors of your church. Let’s get right into them.

Idea 6: Strong Social Media Presence

If you are like me, then you probably have a love/hate relationship with social media.  I love the fact that it’s a tool that we can use, but I hate how addicting it can become.  I also hate how divisive conversations can get.  While we all, individually and collectively, should have appropriate boundaries when it comes to social media, I am convinced that the answer is not total abandonment. There is so much darkness spread through social media, which means never more has shining the light of Jesus been needed.  The apostles, especially Paul, would often go into secular marketplaces and have discussions which gave them the opportunity to present the Gospel.  Today, social media is that marketplace for us to shine the light of Jesus.

Ed Stetzer says, “If churches truly want to see the Gospel impact and influence a community, they should go to the place where the most significant conversation is actually taking place right now. Today, that’s on social media.”

69% of adults use Facebook, according to a Pew Research Report.   That’s up from 2012 when it was at 54%.  With the exception of YouTube–the video-sharing platform that is used by 73% of adults—no other major social media platform comes close to Facebook in terms of usage.  Around 4 in 10 adults say they use Instagram, while smaller shares say they use Pinterest, Snapchat, LinkedIn, Twitter, and WhatsApp. 

Social media is important for these reasons:

Helps get the word outShows your audience that you are relevantIt’s a great place to highlight what you do wellYou can control what goes out to the publicYou can further engage with your people throughout the week

One other major reason why it’s important to use social media is because it is FREE, unless, of course, that you purchase ads, boost posts, etc.

My suggestion, if social media feels overwhelming is to excel in one.  And if you are going to choose one, choose the one where most people are.  That is Facebook.

Among adults that use Facebook, 74% visit the site on a daily basis.

An exception to this is young adult and student ministry leaders should probably consider YouTube and Instagram, and potentially even Snapchat, as a higher percentage of teenagers are using those platforms.

Social media is important, simply because it reaches people.

During one month on our Facebook page not long ago, we had a reach of over 1000 people on Monday-Saturday, meaning our content from our Page was in front of them on their screen.  On each Sunday during that month we had close to 7000 reach that day alone.  Through one month we had more than 32,000 total reach on our Facebook page alone.

Diving deeper into the data I found out that of all the people who like, or follow, our page about 80% of them are within a 25-mile radius of our church.  While we are really excited to stream our services to the world, what’s amazing is that most of the content we send out is largely reaching people that have a chance to one day walk into the doors of our church and be transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit working through us.

We have leveraged Facebook for the church that I have planted from the very beginning.  The amount of people who like our page is anywhere from 10-15x our average Sunday attendance.  We’ve encouraged our people to check in on Facebook during the middle of our Sunday services.  It gives our attendees a great chance to tag the friends that they are with and to let their other friends know where they are on a Sunday morning.  In addition, it gives them a chance to invite their friends, to say something great about our God, or maybe even to brag on their church.  By having them tag friends and check-in it puts your church’s name on a lot of news feeds of people who currently may not like your page.  Again, it’s about reaching as many people as we can.

You say, “Zach, numbers, numbers, numbers, so what.” Each of those numbers represents a person who is loved by God and that He desires to be in relationship with. 

We have seen that reach leads to engagement.

As we broke down the influence social media has had on our growth, we were blown away.  Over the course of a year that we studied, we looked at every “Connect Card” that was filled out by a first-time guest, and we found out that 64 people came to church because they first heard about us on Facebook.  If each card represents 2 people, then that means 128 new people came into our church because of the impact we had on our social media.  Also, we know that not everyone fills out a card, so the number could be well north of 250 in one single year because of how our church stewarded Facebook.

We had a family that came to church because they saw us on Facebook.  Three weeks after attending I had the chance to baptize their daughter.  Two weeks after that opportunity, I heard her father stand up in a room full of about 40 men after we had discussed pride.  He said that he had left his relationship with God due to pride over 3 decades ago, but thank God that recently he heard about our church through Facebook, because now he is back where he needs to be.  He was excited about discovering more about Jesus, rekindling his faith that he once had, and helping lead his family in a godlier way.

What you do on social media can impact the kingdom of God! 

Challenge: Look into the analytics on your preferred social media site.  Make a goal of increasing your reach and engagement in the next 60 days.  

Need help?  Consider reading this article to help you build your church’s social media strategy. https://callhub.io/church-social-media-strategy/.  Additionally consider joining these three incredible Facebook Groups: Church Marketing University, Lutheran Communicators, and Church Communications.

Idea 7: Lead a Churchwide 40-Day Challenge

Over the past few years our team at Red Letter Living have become experts in the 40-day challenge field.  We have discovered incredible power behind an all-in church challenge centered on the life, words, and habits of Jesus.  Many churches we talk to strategically add an all-in church series like this once or twice in each calendar year.

How does an all-in turnkey 40-day help grow the church?  Here’s 5 reasons we’ve discovered:

Challenges Bring Tangible Excitement in the Gathering

I remember in Seminary there were some classes that I looked forward to and some that I dreaded going to.  The difference in how I approached the class typically was a direct correlation to how prepared I was for the class.  In Seminary, as in most graduate programs, there is a good bit of reading.  I will confess to you that there were many reading assignments that I did not do.  Those that know me aren’t shocked by that statement!  But, on the days when I had previously read and understood the reading, I was excited to go to class and join the conversation!

When it comes to church, I have found that how deeply I connected with God during the week still has a direct impact on my attitude in coming to church that Sunday.  The weeks where I had been more lackluster or apathetic in my devotion for God were weeks that were oftentimes harder to connect to God and to others. The weeks where I felt stronger in my devotions towards God would typically produce more excitement, passion, and energy in my worship and response on the following Sunday.

How do you get an entire church to not just attend Sundays but to come with energy and excitement?  It will happen as they read and take steps towards Jesus Monday-Saturday.

Attendance in most churches is a shadow of what it was just over a year ago.  But the expression is still true: “Nothing draws a crowd like a crowd.”  Having an energetic and excited room, spiritually speaking, a room that is Spirit-filled, is a key ingredient that will help draw others back into your church building.

Not only this, but our resources have proven to grow small groups by 40% in just 40 days.  Much of these blogs are written to help us be “fruitful” in numbers, but the reason I love small group growth is because those are the relationships, times, and discussions that can help us also learn and grow in being “faithful.”  At the root of it all, pastors wants churches that not only are growing numerically, but are becoming healthier as well.

Challenges Bring Unity Especially in a Distanced Time

The year 2020 brought incredible division not only to our nation, but to our churches.  Having to deal with a global pandemic, racial tension escalating, and a political election all at the same time, sadly, only 9% of churches said that they did not experience any division within their church. 

Amazingly, however, the #1 positive trait that we have heard consistently about our 40-day challenges during the global pandemic is the word unity.  Why do these resources bring unity?

Culture divides. Jesus unites.

When the entire church is reading, learning, and being challenged daily to take steps to follow Jesus, incredible unity abounds.  In a culture that has become extremely divided, nothing brings unity back to the church like Jesus.

Every person included.

All-in church challenges include opportunity for every age (kids, students, and all adults) to be learning the same principles.  Not only this, but it can be a great bridge between the online church and in-person church.

Daily challenges give more opportunity to stick together.

Attending church on a weekly basis is an incredible keystone habit in a believer’s life.  Leveraging your church’s social media and/or website on a daily basis, however, will give people opportunity to check in, engage, share, and feel like they are part of a movement.

Turnkey resource allows the staff more time to focus on other areas of ministry

I know what it’s like to lead a church and to be exhausted.  For many growing churches, making the change from a generalist to a specialist is not an easy transition.  In many cases, as churches are growing, the staff are called to do multiple things and can quickly burn-out.  Sometimes the most exhausting thing of all is just coming up with new ideas from scratch.  Creating a space in the church calendar where you don’t have to start anything from scratch is extremely freeing.

By having ready-made materials for 40 days, it allows the staff to take the bones of what’s already there and tailor-make it to their context without feeling overwhelmed.  We provide we churches with sermon manuscripts and videos, weekly kids curriculum, ready-made graphics for in-house and social media, and small group guides and videos.  By providing all of these extra resources, it allow staff to have confidence in the 40-day series, but also gives them ample time to tend to other needs in the church that can build up over time.

Challenges are “Invite-a-Friend” Friendly

We have already mentioned the key to church growth is “invitability.”

Launching a 40-day church-wide challenge is an “invitable” opportunity on many levels!

We’ve seen many churches give away our workbooks for FREE with an invite card to attend on the opening Sunday of the Challenge.  In every case that this has been done, the church has been overwhelmed with the response they’ve seen.

In addition, by having a resource and a system that helps grow small groups, we challenge our small group leaders and facilitators to invite not just people in the church already, but their neighbors, co-workers, and friends who are not a part of the church to attend as well.

Many of our Challenges also provide a great opportunity for a church to host a larger event or serving challenge that could benefit the community.

By adding a 40-day Challenge into your church calendar, you are building in many different invitations for others to join your church.

Challenges Activate New People

I often wonder how much growth the Church loses out on simply because we don’t ask or challenge our people enough.  Many pastors are skilled at proclaiming the justification of Jesus, but fewer are skilled at the challenge of sanctification.  It’s a fine call to ask someone to believe in Jesus; it’s a deeper call to challenge someone to follow Jesus.

The perennial call that Jesus gave to His disciples is “Come, follow me.”  Jesus was inviting all of us to enter His kingdom right here and now.  To participate with Him in bringing heaven to earth.  Until we preach the Kingdom of God and challenge our people to step into that calling, we will always be scratching our heads wondering why our people are not stepping up to the commands of Jesus.  We should never abandon the invitation to believe in Jesus, but we certainly should always be challenging our people to truly follow Jesus.

What I have found over and over and over again is that when you challenge your church, there are people that come out of the cracks that you would have never thought.

Simply by challenging people to lead a small group you will find new small group leaders.  By challenging people to join a small group for 40 days you will have more people join a small group.  By challenging people to open up their Bible, some will.  When you challenge people to fast for a day, some will.  When you challenge people to tithe, some will.  If you challenge everyone to invite a friend to next Sunday’s service, some will.  Let’s not be afraid to challenge people and call them to something deeper.  Watch and see who God works through.  It just may surprise you!

Challenge: Look at your church calendar and find a strategic time to insert a 40-day challenge. 

Our team would love to help you launch a 40-day church challenge.  Simply put, it’s what we do.  If you want more information, here’s a blog on everything you need to know about launching a 40-day challenge.  If you are more visual, here’s a series of 10 short training videos to help you implement a 40-day challenge and see incredible results.  If you are a pastor and would like to receive a FREE Workbook, fill out this form here.  Finally, if you need more information, click the links for Red Letter Challenge or Being Challenge or email us at hello@redletterchallenge.com.

 

Idea 8: Develop a Generous Strategy For Your Connection Cards

It’s an incredible blessing to see someone new in church.  However, I noticed early on that many new people that were coming to our church would not fill out a connection card.  Only a small percentage would be willing to give us their contact information.  By not collecting their information, it was virtually impossible to follow up with them and get them plugged in.

It is poor stewardship to work as hard as we can to get new people to come through the front doors of our church but then not collect their information.

Sitting down with our leadership team, we started tackling the question, “How can we get more of our new guests to fill out a connection card?”  This question becomes even more vital to ask with the acceleration of online church.  Not only should we be pursuing our in-house connection cards, but also our digital connection cards as well.

We decided to first look at what happened in our past year.  We found out that the previous year our church averaged 10 connection cards per Sunday.  In our context that meant that we had 500 cards, and if each one represents 2-2.5 people we had somewhere between 1000-1250 new people represented by the connection cards.

According to Rich Birch’s Church Growth Flywheel, the average church gets 1 visitor per attendee for the year.

If your average worship attendance is 250, you the average church would see 250 visitors in a year.  If you are seeing less than this, the previous 7 points should be seriously considered.

We set a goal in our church to increase the number of new visitors filling out a connection card.

We decided to do three things:

Make Filling out the Card Simple

We looked at our card and simplified it by taking out any “insider” language and also removing any information that we truly didn’t need to collect.  By keeping it clear and quick, this would be helpful.  To me, the only things that were vital were asking for their name(s), their email, their phone number, and how they heard about us.  Things like mailing address, date of birth, etc. could be important for your church.

2. Make Filling out the Card a Priority on Stage

We pointed them to filling out the connection card every service, strategically at 5 times.

Pre-service slidesDuring the welcome by the service hostDuring the offeringAt the end of the servicePost-service slides

In those slides or announcements, it should be very clear, as well, where to turn in or submit the connection card.  These same principles can, and should, apply online as well.

But where we really saw incredible growth was this third idea:

3. Give away a gift and use their card to bless a local charity

When a new guest filled out and turned in a connection card we decided that not only would we give them a specific gift but we would also give a gift on their behalf to one of our local charity partners as well.

Here’s a tip when employing this strategy: Be specific on what will happen if they turn in a card.

When we promised to give a gift to someone when they turned the card in, we decided rather than keeping it vague, we would tell them what the gift is.  Personally, I’d like to know what the gift is, and so would nearly everyone else on the planet.  People don’t sign up for things that are vague or not well thought out.  So whether it’s a mug, a pair of sunglasses, a book, or a chance at a FREE trip to Hawaii, tell them what it is. If you are embarrassed to say what the FREE gift is, it’s probably not the best gift to giveaway.

It is also wise to be specific on which charity will be receiving money and how much money per card turned in.

For our context, we started with $10 and increased it to $20 per card.  We would change the charity every month and invite the leader of that charity to come up after their month and present them with a check.  We would also give them an opportunity to tell us about their charity, and at the same time, invite people to join them in their great work of being the hands and feet of God in the community in which we live.  Finally, we would pray for them.

Not only was this a “win” for people to see this, but people could tell we were being transparent.  It also was an accelerator for some people jumping into long-term serving opportunities with some great non-profit partners.

After moving to this strategy, we measured the next two months and went from 10 cards in a week to 25-30 in a week.  One normal Sunday we saw more than 40 cards!

You might say, “Well, $10-$20 each card adds up to a lot of money.”  The truth is that not only has God called your church to be generous, but if you are constantly bringing in new people through your doors, God will supply your church with more than enough to carry out His mission.

Collecting information from new guests is vital to growing your church.  Being generous and strategic about your connection cards could lead to maximum growth.

Challenge: Go over your current connection card strategy and commit to analyzing and strategizing on these three things:Make it simple (eliminate insider language and unnecessary info requests)Make talking about connection cards a priority from stageFind a way to be generous in collecting this data

I hope these ideas help you grow your church.  Stay tuned next week for the finale.  I’ll write about what I believe is the lowest-hanging fruit when it comes to church growth.

God bless you!

The post Part 3: 10 Ideas to Grow Your Church for Little to No Money appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.

Part 2: 10 Ideas to Grow Your Church For Little to No Money

Welcome to Part 2 of a blog series called “10 Practical Ideas to Grow Your Church For Little to No Money!”  In this blog, not only will you learn three more practical ideas to grow your church, but I will share with you the number one key to church growth and the real reason behind how our  church became the fastest growing church in our denomination.

Over the next two weeks, as more and more churches will be emphasizing getting back to worship in the church building, I’ll be dropping blogs packed with ideas to help you grow your church for little to no money!  If you missed Part 1, you can read that here.  Blog 1 in the series introduced how God desires to grow His church and presented the first two ideas.  Be sure to subscribe to the blog to get Parts 3 and 4 to your email.

On average, according to Thom Rainier, Former President of Lifeway Research, 2% of attenders will promote their church to an unchurched person in a year. 2%!  For those that aren’t great with mathematics, that’s 1 in 50 people.

Imagine if this number went from 2% to 20%.  Imagine the growth that would take place in your church.  How do we increase the total number of people that invite their friends, so that their friends get connected to the church, and ultimately get connected with the life-giving message of Jesus?

According to Rich Birch, author of Church Growth Flywheel, the number one key to a growing church is invitability.  While this may be a made-up word (thanks Rich!), I’m in full agreement. How many times do you give the people in your church a chance to invite, to share, and to brag about your church?  How do we increase the total number of people that invite their friends, so that their friends get connected to the church, and ultimately get connected with the life-giving message of Jesus?

And while the nation is becoming more and more post-Christian, that doesn’t necessarily mean that people aren’t open to attending church. One of the most encouraging statistics that I think I have found is also from Lifeway Research.  82% of people who don’t attend church on a regular basis would attend a church if a friend invited them. That’s incredible news.  And it’s a good reminder of how important it is for us to continue to plant seeds.

Simply put: a church grows when its people talk about it .

The Apostle Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians 3 that while we can plant and water the seed, God will ultimately make it grow.  Creating moments and experiences for people to invite their friends so that God can do His work is of utmost importance.

Part 2 of the blog will share the next 3 ideas with you and also present a challenge for you to further each of these ideas.  All three of today’s ideas will help getting your people to talk about, promote, and invite others to attend your church.  Looking back at the growth that our church experienced over the years, I believe idea #4 is the single biggest practical reason we became the fastest growing church in our denomination.

Idea 3. Invent Big Sundays

In January 2019, we were in the middle of a 3-week series called “Hearing the Voice of God.”  For whatever reason, God stirred my heart to do something different for the service that upcoming Sunday.  It felt as if God downloaded an entire beautiful service structure to me that Monday morning while I was on the elliptical.  Rather than dismissing it or pushing it off or making excuses as to why it wouldn’t work, I talked immediately to our other campus pastor and gave him the idea.  We then clued in our director of music that same Monday morning.  Finally, all 14 of our staff met that Tuesday morning and we ran through the service as a team.

As we were sitting in that staff meeting, we just knew that God was up to something special.  Because of this, and with them now having greater understanding of what would be taking place that Sunday, I challenged each of them to invite their friends and share on social media.  I urged them to talk about why they were excited and why others should come.  Some posted on Instagram, some texted their friends, and a few did Facebook Live videos.

Each of the staff got busy inviting others.  Organically, others in our church, without knowing all the details, helped us build excitement.  They were re-sharing, reposting, and inviting their networks.  Sunday came and we jumped in attendance that random Sunday by more than 100 people than we had the previous Sunday.  You can watch the experience here. This whole effort took work and action, but proved to be valuable in getting new people through the front door of our church.

As we reflected on this Sunday experience next week as a staff we realized that we sort of “invented” a big Sunday out of nowhere.

Every year we know there are two major church days on the calendar:  Easter and Christmas.  Churches across the nation see a spike in energy, excitement, and attendance.  Our prayer becomes that some of those people would then further connect in coming weeks.  But why do we just stop at two big services a year?  Are there other Sunday’s that you could manufacture into celebratory Sundays?

When I’ve looked back at our attendance trends, here are some other Sunday’s we naturally see a higher attendance:

Mother’s DayThe 2nd Sunday in JanuaryThe 1st Sunday after the new school year beginsThe Sunday after Labor DayThe Sunday after daylight savings when you get an extra hour of sleep

Knowing that these Sundays are typically higher attended Sundays should allow us to leverage these days into special experiences.

On top of the ones that will come naturally on the calendar each year, growing churches also understand the importance of celebrating special Sundays as well.  Other types of celebrations that could fall into the church planning calendar could be any of the following:

Baptism SundaysAnniversary SundaysBack-to-School SundayVision Sunday

Do you have any of these on your current church calendar?

Baptisms are such a great tool and witness to bring people into the church.

I remember early on someone was having a baptism for their daughter and invited her friend.  Her friend came the very next day and she was hungover.  Ministry is messy, right?  But she said the only reason she was there was to support her friend.  She heard something she needed to hear that day, because she came back again, and we actually had the chance to baptize her a few months later.  Over the following 18 months, then, I had the privilege to baptize her son, her granddaughter, and her mom.  4 generations.   

9 years later and she’s still a faithful attender of our church.

Some friends would not be inclined to attend on a normal Sunday, but they will attend and support a friend being baptized.

Growing churches should be thinking about how to have 8-10 special Sunday’s a year.  Every Sunday is important, but use these big Sunday’s to do extra special things.

Challenge: Map out the next 12 months of your church calendar and identify 8-10 Sunday’s that could be “Big” Sundays for you and share this with your staff.

 

Idea 4: Seek Publicity from the Press for Large Events

 When I look back at what made our church the fastest growing church in our denomination for a few years, it’s easy to see where the growth really spiked.  It was in 2014.  This was a year, by the way, in which we were severely understaffed and our church building was not conducive to growth.  Why did we grow?

In 2014, we had a couple different stories that went viral thanks to the local press.

In March, as I was preaching chronologically through the book of 1 Corinthians, I got to the section on food sacrificed to idols.  This was an issue that some in the Corinthians church were making black/white that Paul decided to leave gray.  As I was trying to be practical for what this meant for our church I looked at issues that some in the church today make black/white that likely are meant to be gray.  One of those issues is tattoos.

Sarcastically, being a new church plant, I said if anyone would like to get a tattoo of our church logo on their body, that I would pay for it.  I was joking, but sure enough, some took it seriously, and I so ended up having to pay up.  Altogether, we had 23 people that got tattooed with our church logo and the story went everywhere.  This story made the front page of Yahoo, Huffington Post, and many other top news organizations around the world.

Later in that year, in November 2014, I had this crazy idea to break a Guinness World Record by preaching the longest sermon of all time, which turned into the Longest Speech Ever.  As I preached for 53 hours and 18 minutes and broke a Guinness World Record, we raised more than $100,000 to open up a men’s recovery home.  The story caught on and made it to NPR, Huffington Post, Fox News, and even made the top of the Drudge Report.

Of course, we know that God is the one truly at work, but these events got our name literally everywhere.  Everyone in our community knew about our church because we were dropping so many seeds.  The attenders of our church were proud of their church and happy to invite others and share all the amazing things that were happening.  When you are a church that is accomplishing great things and making a difference in the community, it turns out the people in your church love to talk about you.

So what can you do to get the press to cover you?  Well, you can buy tattoos, break world records, and open men’s recovery homes, but most of you won’t go that route.

Are there other ways?

Many of the fastest growing churches resonate towards very large service events.  Large service events are great opportunities to seek publicity from the press.  Remember, the local press is looking for stories to tell.  That is their job.

A great strategy I learned Rich Birch’s Church Growth Flywheel Online course is that you can look up past events that the press has covered and even find the writer in your community that has written previously.  If you approach them at the right time and if you have everything presented to them well, they will likely cover it again.  Many times, the real reason a church doesn’t get covered is not because the press is negative towards us, but we don’t organize our materials and send out press releases to make it as easy as possible for them to cover your event.

The goal should be to create a few press-ready, social-media events each year.  Here’s 4 quick examples of press-ready, social media events that churches have done:

Helicopter Easter Egg DropTrunk ‘R TreatNight to ShinePacking Large Quantities of Meals for Charity

All of these events create amazing visuals that is important when the press is considering covering an event. But even if the press doesn’t come, you create incredible opportunities for your attendees to post pictures on their social media accounts.  Over time, you can help teach your attendees when they post, to also post a next step to join them at your church in the future.

Now, if everything you ever do is with the intention to get the press to show up, you may need to ask what your real motivation is.  But most churches are trying their best to make a difference in the world, and it’s important your community knows that you are here for them.

The truth is that hosting, organizing, and leading press-ready events is a lot of work.  But it’s work that pays great dividends.

Large community events are a great way for people in your community to engage with your church family.   In fact, when we launched an internship program we asked for people to tell us why they attended theCross. There were several of them that mentioned the first time they ever heard about theCross.  Wouldn’t you know it, there were many answers but included in the answers was all of these:

The Tattoo StoryWorld Record SpeechEaster Egg Helicopter DropTrunk ‘R Treat

After attending one of these events, or hearing about these events in the press, they came to our church.  Not right away, but eventually.  And the more they kept coming, the more they experienced relationship with Jesus.  And now, they were ready to go deeper into learning some deep theology and practical applications about how to be leaders in our church.

I learned this truth: Sometimes people won’t come to a God thing, but they will come to a good thing. These events are good things that can ultimately be a bridge to a God thing.

Some people have said things like the world record speech and dropping eggs from a helicopter are gimmicks.  Truthfully, I didn’t care and I still don’t care.  Jesus said it’s our responsibility to let our light shine for the world.  And, if, through these “gimmicks,” I can preach the Good News of Jesus for 53 hours with the promise that every time His Word goes out it doesn’t return void, and if, on top of this, we can raise money for charity, and if few can provide a great family event in a time of great disconnection, and ultimately through it all get people connected to our church and to Jesus, then sign me up for more gimmicks.

Challenge: Plan 3 Large Service Events in Your Calendar for the Next 12 Months

 

Idea 5: Supply Your People with Invite Cards

You might think with all of the creative ways we’ve come up with already that this one is kind of boring and old-fashioned. But in a hyper-digital, saturated screen age, a physical invite card can stand out now more than ever.

If invitability is the key determining factor then supplying invite cards to give to your people is a must. 

I was listening to Carey Nieuwhof’s podcast, and he was interviewing Rich Birch.  Rich had interviewed hundreds of pastors of fast-growing churches and one of the churches he interviewed had seen explosive growth, one of the fastest in the country.  And Rich asked him, “What did you do?”  And he said, “It’s a little embarrassing, what we did this year was every week, we put invite cards on every seat in our auditorium for the entire year. We got aggressive with getting invite cards out in front of people.”

What percentage of invite cards actually end up in the hands of guests?  Probably not a lot, but when you bring an invite card home, most of the time you will stash it in a little nook or place where random things go.  Typically, if you are like me, this nook is a place that you pass by often.  Seeing this invite card will constantly remind you of your church, and not only make you more apt to go, but many will feel more obliged to give it to someone else as well.

A lot of churches typically will do invite cards for their big Sunday’s (Christmas and Easter) but why not every Sunday?  If you preach a new sermon series, why not every single sermon series?

The key is to help your people invite others.  If church growth is about how many invites are given, then let’s do our best to supply them with the seeds to throw.

Strategically, it would be wise to think of at least four different physical invite cards to print out:

Christmas and EasterMajor Church EventsEvery New Sermon SeriesSit with Me Cards: Invite to come any Sunday

In addition, we can get creative around other ideas too.  For instance, if someone is going to have a baptism, that’s an amazing step in a person’s faith journey.  Maximize this opportunity by giving them tools to make the invite easy for their networks.  Here’s a few ideas:

Give special invite cards that they can pass outSupply the person a ready-made email that they can tailorShow them practical steps on how they can make their baptism a Facebook event

One other effective invite card could be what’s called an “Acts of Kindness” card.  I first heard about this from “Church of the Highlands.”  They have a website here devoted to this that gives tons of incredible ways to use these cards.

The idea behind these “Acts of Kindness” cards is that as you are being the people of God and doing kind acts in the world that you drop this card with it.  The card that Church of the Highlands uses has a nice personal message on one side, “Just something to show you God loves you.”  Then on the back you can supply a link to your website, an invite to come to your church, or whatever other important information you would like to get out into the community.

By supplying invite cards regularly you are not only resourcing your people well, but you are also reinforcing the fact that invitation is a common practice in the life of a follower of Jesus.

Challenge: Create an invite card for your next sermon series to give to your church attendees.

I hope those three ideas are helpful for you.

Make sure you subscribe to the blog to see Parts 3 and 4 coming in the next two weeks.

 

 

 

The post Part 2: 10 Ideas to Grow Your Church For Little to No Money appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.

Part 1: 10 Ideas to Grow Your Church For Little to No Money

IdeasdIf there’s a couple of things I have learned from pastors is that they have a mutual desire to grow their church and to be wise stewards of their finances.  Over the next month, as more and more churches will be emphasizing getting back to worship in the church building, I’ll be writing a 4-part blog series packed with practical ideas to help you grow your church for little to no money!  Not only this, but each idea will also issue a challenge to complete.

Be sure to subscribe here to the blog to get the latest updates.

Here’s my promise to you: these ideas will be clear and practical, not vague things like “care more” and “be nicer” and “preach better.”  While those things certainly help, I’m going to assume you already do those things.

Today’s blog will introduce why church growth is important along with the first two ideas.

Why is Church Growth Important?

We are called to remain faithful to the Gospel, but we also have a call as God’s church to be fruitful.  God is passionate about growing His kingdom and He uses the local church to be His expression in this world.  This expression can and should take many forms, but every expression of Jesus should be pursuing faithfulness and fruitfulness. God has called us to be faithful, but there are also many commands that God calls us to be fruitful.  To me it is not an either/or, it’s a both/and.

Many pastors claim that they want an “Acts 2” church.  If that’s true, one of the most often-overlooked qualities about this church was their ability to grow and pivot rapidly.

Just look at the statistics of this church:

Acts 1:15: Prior to Pentecost, it started with 120 peopleActs 2:47: They added 3000 and also were adding daily those who were being saved.Acts 4:4: The number of men alone grew to 5000. Where there are 5000 men there are likely 10000 more women and children.Acts 5:14: A multitude was added. At this point, they couldn’t even count.Acts 21-22: Tens of thousands of Jews believed from Jerusalem.

By the end of the book, in a period of about 20 years, there were an estimated more than 100,000 people that were a part of the early church.

Church growth sometimes has a stigma attached to it.  Get rid of the stigma and begin pursuing church growth.  Every single number is a person who has a story and God cares about every person and every number.  1 Timothy 2:4 says: God desires all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.

Every church’s context is different, but I also believe that too many of us will blame our context or our demographics or something else, when the reality is we need to look inward and ask, “Is there something that I can do, that our church can do to change this decline?”

Often, stalled churches push back on the idea that growth should be a priority for pastors. Obviously, growth isn’t the only sign of a healthy church – there can be fast growing churches that aren’t healthy. The challenge for any size church whose numbers are at a standstill – is to refrain from criticizing the growing churches around you. Don’t write off the fact that there are some practical, simple things you could do that would allow you to share the gospel with more people.

A Lifeway study found that the majority of the churches that are actually growing aren’t growing faster than the communities they are in. 

94% of all churches in North America are losing ground If a church is growing by 3% that’s considered breaking even.Only 6% of churches are growing faster than their communities.80% of churches are plateaued or declining.

Over time, the message and influence of Christ has been losing ground and it’s time for the church, the physical representation of Jesus in this world, to take back God’s ground.

Church priorities can’t only be about increasing numbers, but leaders should absolutely be thinking about that growth. At the end of the day, churches who are passionate about spreading the message of Christ should want to proactively do more to reach people.

I am passionate about churches playing offense, not defense.  Growing a church requires action.  Yes, God is at work, and we trust in His power, but the fast-growing churches have lead pastors and staffs that are action-oriented.  Especially in light of the coronavirus pandemic, which has seen estimates of 30-40% of practicing Christians stop attending worship, either in-person or online, the mission field has never been as large as it is right now.  Rather than focusing on that obstacle, churches that play offense see this as an incredible opportunity.

We cannot just sit back and let status quo continue.  We have the greatest news in the world and God has called us to share this news with others.  It’s time.

Out of all the practical ideas I will share with you, this first one could have the greatest financial cost, but it’s pennies to the dollar for how important it is.

Idea 1: Build A Guest-Friendly Homepage

In light of the global pandemic, churches began to rethink about their online expression. Rather than taking away people from the in-person gathering, a great online expression can actually lead to a growing in-person gathering.

While we still have much to learn about the long-term effect of online ministry, one of my convictions is that the answer for doing online church well in the future is definitely more and not less. Quite simply, this is where people “live” today and we have to “live” there as well even if we don’t understand the full ramifications yet.

Brady Shearer, church and technology guru says many visitors will check out your website first before they check out your church in person.   Your church’s website is the frontline for your entire ministry.  It’s your most important marketing tool.  It’s where first impressions are formed, where you get discovered, and where new visitors are introduced to you.

Church growth starts with a great first impression.  Decisions are made about your church based entirely on your website.  And once a poor first impression is made, it takes considerable effort to undo it. 

Sadly, most church websites make miserable first impressions.  To make a point, Brady’s team conducted an extensive case study that analyzed more than 1000+ church websites from 30+ different countries.  All 50 states are represented.  For more on Brady’s study and accompanying statistics, visit here.

His team concludes that there are 5 simple elements that a homepage of a website needs to pass.  The homepage is very important, because if the homepage isn’t right, they’ll quickly go away.

A primary focal point.Responsive design.Reasonably quick load times.Zero stock photos of people’s faces.Easily accessible new visitor info.

Based on that, 96.2% (970 out of 1008) of church websites fail the first impression test.

8 out of 10 failed more than one of those 5 things.

Let’s look at each one of those elements.

1. 76% (765 out of 1008) of church websites failed the primary focal point. 

What is a primary focal point? A primary focal point is the part of a website that you see first.  It’s where your eye is drawn when you see a website for the very first time.  According to a study from Google, website designs with “low visual complexity” were found to be most appealing to users.

“The feel” of the website is the main driver of first impressions…in fact, researchers have found that 94% of people when talking about “feel” is the design of the site and not the actual content.  You can have great content but if it doesn’t feel right, you’re likely going to fail.

By the way, according to his team, the primary focal point of a church that wants to grow should be an “I’m new” button. 

2. 40% (603 out of 1008) of church websites did not have responsive design. 

In 2017, worldwide mobile traffic accounted for 52.64% of all Internet traffic.  If your church’s website isn’t responsive (meaning it doesn’t adjust its size and structure based on the dimensions of the device it’s being viewed with), you’re creating a frustrating experience for the majority of the people visiting your site.

According to Adobe, nearly 8 in 10 consumers stop engaging with content that doesn’t display well on their device.

3. 38% (386 out of 1008) of church websites fail the speed test

If your website loads in 3 seconds instead of 2 seconds, 2 times as many people will leave your site without visiting another page.  As if that’s not enough, mobile pages that are 1 second faster experience up to 27% increases in conversion rates.  And if you still don’t think it’s important in July 2018 Google announced they that page speed will be a ranking factor for mobile searches, meaning that if your site is slow loading it will impact where you rank on Google searches negatively.

For 9 quick tips on how to improve your website speed, visit here.

4. 32% (320 out of 1008) of church websites contain stock photos 

Photography is an amazing way to introduce your church to a potential new visitor and make a good first impression.  On the other hand, using stock photos that include the faces of real people that do not attend your church is disingenuous and deceptive.

It’s like a restaurant putting up pictures of another restaurant’s food.

Along with this idea, did you know that the second most visited site on a church webpage is the staff page?  When people visit your site, they want to know who you are. They’re looking to get to know the faces that make up your church—the people who will be welcoming them in when they show up on Sunday morning. They want to literally know who the people representing your church on staff actually are!  A page devoted to highlighting the who of your church staff is essential.  It should feature big, vibrant pictures that are engaging.  Why is this important?  Because knowing the names and faces of the people who represent your church helps make a visitor more comfortable.

Your website, especially your homepage and your staff page, should be an extension of who you are.  The look and feel of your homepage should be consistent with what they would find if they were to attend in person.

5. 62% (622 out of 1008) of church websites do not have easy to find new visitor information

Most websites didn’t make any effort to acknowledge potential new visitors on their homepage.  Attending a new church for the first time can be uncomfortable and unfamiliar.  To make things easier, dedicate a portion of your church’s homepage (ideally, a very prominent portion) to acknowledging and welcoming potential new visitors.

When was the last time you thought about your website from the perspective of a first-time guest?

Many people will check out a church online long before they check out a church in real life.

Here’s a basic question. Did you build your site mostly for your attenders, or for your first-time guests?  If it’s only for your attenders, why?

Challenge: Take some time to analyze your homepage according to these 5 elements.

 

Idea 2: Pursue 5-Star Reviews

Just about everyone is using Google.  Research shows that it accounts for 94% of mobile searches and 70% of desktop searches.  In addition, 97% of consumers search for local organizations online.  46% of all searches on Google are local.  88% of searches on a mobile device call or visit the business within 24 hours.

Knowing these statistics, then, we need to do whatever we can as churches to get ourselves seen on the front page of Google.

How do we do this?

When a person is searching for a church on Google, right below your church name is a place for a visitor to read reviews about your church.  In Google’s algorithm, the businesses, industries, and even churches with the most reviews usually rise to the top.

In past research of our visitors from church, somewhere between 15-20% of our first-time visitors first heard about us not from a friend, or in the community, but from a Google search!

Here’s a snapshot for us of a month prior to coronavirus of what was happening on Google alone.

2891 people found us on Google96 asked for directions510 visited our website51 called us

If people are using this platform and if reviews are important to rising to the top, it is poor stewardship to not invest in pursuing 5-star reviews. 

Why in the world would we not put some time and intentionality into our Google page, the reviews, the pictures, etc.?

Do you think that it’s unbiblical and consumeristic and a little bit weird to have people rate and review churches in the same way they would rate and review the burger at the local burger joint?  So do I.  My advice is to get over it.  It’s happening, whether you like it or not, and you might as well use it for your advantage.

Not only is this a low-money investment (It’s free) but it’s also one of the lowest time-investment ideas as well.

My suggestion would be to reach out first to your staff, then to your key leaders and volunteers, then to your regular attenders, and ask them to write a 5-star review for your church.  While you ask them, ensure them the reasoning behind this is because we want to reach more people for the purpose of glorifying God.  Make it easy for them by providing links for them to go directly and write their 5-star review.  The whole process should take a person between 1-10 minutes.

Also, I would keep a close eye on your staff.  If a staff member has an issue with writing a 5-star review for your church, that could open up some really needed and candid conversations.

And why stop at Google?  Ask for Facebook reviews, Yelp reviews, and anywhere else your church might be found online.

Challenge: Find out how many reviews your church has on Google. Make a goal to double this in one week and act on it.

 

There are two ideas to help get you started.  Stay tuned next week for Part 2 and future weeks for Parts 3 an 4.  Subscribe to the blog to ensure you don’t miss any.

Do you have an idea that you have implemented that has helped you see church growth?  Email hello@redletterchallenge.com and let us know!

The post Part 1: 10 Ideas to Grow Your Church For Little to No Money appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.

3 Things Pastors Should Stop Apologizing For

Congratulations pastors and church leaders!  You made it through Easter!  This is no small accomplishment!

If you are like me you experience a wonderful joy from the weekend Easter experience, but then, only one day later, Monday, reality looms that the next Sunday is only 6 days away.  In fact, in my experience, the Monday following Easter has been one of the most difficult emotional days of the year for pastors.  After expending a lot of strategy and execution, using a lot of time, thought, and energy, it feels like a monumental task to do it all again 6 days later.  And then 7 days after that.  And then start planning for Christmas.  Too soon?

As I reflect on being a pastor, the Easter weekend sums up ministry pretty well.  It is both a very rewarding and a very difficult career.  Knowing that you are making such a tangible difference in the Kingdom of God is a great blessing.  It’s a blessing to be on the front lines.  Seeing God move powerfully despite our own weaknesses will never get old to me.

But it’s also difficult.  Pastoring a group of “Christians” that is largely fickle in their faith and having to deal with the reality and consequence of sin all around is no simple task.

One of the saddest things I’ve found in ministry though, is when we fire at one another.  It’s already a difficult enough job fighting off the evil supernatural powers and those who don’t believe in Jesus.  When the harsh words, criticisms, and hurtful musings of those who are in the church come at pastors, it’s even more difficult.

Even worse, is when pastors fire at one another.

I know firsthand from my own experience that there are way too many pastors that have to spend way too much time defending the way in which they lead the church that God called them to and entrusted them with.  Some conversations about how to lead God’s church are helpful and fruitful, but not all are.  Sadly, I’ve seen way too many pastors, including myself, that can waste time in pointless conversations that deter them from the true mission of Jesus.

In this blog, I want to share 3 things pastors should stop apologizing for.  In doing so, I hope this frees up just a little bit more time for you to do the work God has called you to do.

But before I give you the three, here’s the assumption I’m going to make about you:

You love Jesus.You believe in the Bible.You pray.You are educated and trained to become a pastor.You are doing your best to bring heaven to earth.You care about the people you serve.You have been called to pastor a church.You have been gifted by the Holy Spirit.You deeply care about the collective church.You teach sound doctrine.You have sought God for the vision of your church.You trust that Jesus is in control and the gates of Hell will not prevail against His church.You are living above reproach.

That’s a lot of assumptions, but if those things are true, stop wasting time apologizing for these things:

The Size of Your Church

There is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to the size of a particular church.  I struggle when I read authors or hear pastors say that a church is supposed to look like this, be like this, or act like this.  The goal of the Church is to glorify God. 

God has created both pastors and every person in our church in a unique way.  He’s also called each pastor and church to a certain community.  The community in which a pastor serves often times has a direct impact on the size that the church will become.

We glorify God when the Church becomes the fullest and greatest representation of Jesus that we can be in this world.  We need churches of all sizes, shapes, and colors.  Every size has advantages and disadvantages. 

We need megachurches.  We need large churches.  We need medium churches.  We need small churches.  We need house churches.  We need coffeehouse churches.  We need micro-sites.  We need new churches.

We. Need. Them. All.

More importantly, the world in which we serve needs them all.

Nowhere in the Bible will you see the size that the church should be.  Shy away from discussions that seek to compare church size or tell you what size you should try to attain.  Simply be the expression of Jesus God has called you to be in the community in which you serve.  Focus more on being faithful to your unique calling and gifting to your unique context and let everyone else waste their time discussing the proper size that a church should be.

The Style of Your Church

For decades the church, especially along denominational lines, has argued about how to appropriately do worship.  We have called these arguments “worship wars.”  Traditional vs. Contemporary?  Or maybe we combine them both and create a Blended service?

Which style is right for you and your church?  Is one better than the other?

One of the best things I did when I planted theCross in 2011 was I gave my core group a survey asking them about the future church we were going to start.  I asked them to tell me what style of church they would prefer.  But then I flipped the questions and asked them what style would be best to reach our target of young, unchurched families.  Many times, the answers were different.  Looking back, having them process this was very helpful in creating buy-in for creating a style of church that was likely outside of their comfort zone.

I’ll say it again: God has uniquely made you and wired you. And God has put you in a unique context.  Ask these two questions.

How has God gifted me? What gifts are unique to our church?What is the style of church that would best serve the community in which we have been called?

Processing through these two questions will create many different answers as to what style of church is best.

We need traditional.  We need liturgical.  We need hymnals.  We need organs.  We need modern.  We need contemporary.  We need blended.  We need guitars.  We need drums.  We need skinny jeans.  We need robes.

We. Need. Them. All.

For the church to be the greatest and fullest expression of Jesus, there is not one-style-fits-all.  No matter what style of church you have, my plea to you is simple: whatever style of church you employ do it to the best of your ability. 

The Strategy of Your Church

Sadly, I foresee many arguments and debates over the coming years between pastors about the strategy of their churches.  When coronavirus forced a global shutdown in our world, it gave us a good opportunity to look at the strategy in which we employed at our churches.  For many of us, to be a church moving forward would require a new strategy.  If I mentioned worship wars in the style of your church earlier, the bigger debate going on right now is the strategy of online church.  Many pastors are still asking if online church really is church?

I have some convictions about online church, namely these two:

The old “normal” way wasn’t working nearly as well as many want to think it was.As you look at the trajectory of our world, I’m very convinced the answer for the church moving forward is “more online, not less.”

Smartphones, Amazon, and social media aren’t going away. Not having any online answer will make you more like Blockbuster in a Netflix world. I’d rather be putting more energy, time, staff, and budget into being on the innovative side of this than playing defense and hoping that things go back to the broken way that they were. If you are married to your methods, you could soon be divorced from having a church.  The strategy of your church can, and likely, should change over time. 

Having said all of that, I still genuinely believe in the in-person gathering.  I believe it is vital to the health of the future church.  I don’t have all the answers, and no one does, about the long-term effects of online church and how to appropriately steward it best.  But to reject it, or even worse, to call out others who are seeking to glorify God by using this avenue, is not helpful.

We need churches that thrive in worship.  We need churches that thrive in outreach.  We need churches that thrives in preaching.  We need churches that thrive in women’s ministry.  We need churches that thrive in men’s ministry.  We need churches that thrive in student ministry. We need churches that thrive in children’s ministry.  We need online church.  We need online worship.  We need in-person church.  We need in-person worship.

We. Need. Them. All.

Here’s something I’m convinced of: our nation, and likely our world, has never needed more strategies of church employed than right now.  The mission field in our own backyards has dramatically increased in just 12 months.  A lot of self-identifying “practicing Christians’ have run for the hills and are nowhere to be found.  Estimates are anywhere between 30-50%.  The generation that I have personally seen most affected are the families with young children.  Not only does this mean that the amount of “unchurched” has never been as high as it is right now, but also the future of the church (youth and children) is in great jeopardy.

My one plea to you when it comes to strategy is to play offense, not defense.  The churches that will “win” in the end are not the ones who are playing prevent defense, but rather, they are pulling the goalie and living with a sense of urgency.  For more on this, check out this blog centered around the question: Pastor, Is Your Church Playing Offense or Defense.

I know enough pastors to know that, based on the above assumptions, it’s not our goal to “steal sheep” from another church. Yet, this is the narrative often said of those whose churches are growing.  Pastors, if you are playing offense reject that label and keep chasing the lost sheep and employing the unique strategy that God has given to your church.

The Answer: Continue to Be Faithful Stewards 

In a recent blog post, I wrote about 4 uncelebrated traits of highly effective pastors.  My final trait was the word “stewardship.”  This is not a word that gets tossed around too much outside of the annual “stewardship series” at churches.  But stewardship is much more than giving.  It’s bigger than an annual sermon series.

Pastors, all God asks of each of us is to simply steward what He puts in front of us.

I love the way that Peter says in 1 Peter 4:10: “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace.”

Being a pastor is about stewarding your unique skills and talents, the gifts and resources of those in your church, and also the needs of those in your community.

Because of these things no church will look the same.  Stop apologizing for the size, style, and strategy of your church.  When God looks down on you, He says, “Well done, my good and faithful servant.”

Being a pastor is hard enough.  I know and you know that we stumble, we fall, and we sin. Rather than casting stones and doubts, let’s work towards healthy conversations with one another.  Let’s have grace for one another.  Let’s trust one another.  Let’s pray for one another.  And finally, let’s be grateful for the opportunity to be a part of something bigger and remember the promise of Jesus in Matthew 16:18b: I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.

 

 

The post 3 Things Pastors Should Stop Apologizing For appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.

The 4 Whispers of God that Pastors Must Declare!

In the middle of the 40 days of Lent leading up to Easter Sunday, many use this time of the year to practice self-examination.  The best examination of yourself comes when you view who you are in light of who God says you are.

On a particular Monday morning during my solitude with God, He downloaded an entire worship experience into my head. He led me to change a lot of our regular service. It was a risk, but it turned out to be one of my favorite worship experiences of my pastoral ministry. We were in a series called “The Voice of God.”

Throughout the series, I taught that God is still speaking. The problem is that we aren’t listening. It’s not that we can’t listen to Him, but we’re listening to everything else. We probably won’t hear God if we don’t turn down the volume of all the other sounds around us.

The enemy, the devil, shouts at us so that we hear his voice loudly and clearly, but he shouts from a distance because he doesn’t want to come near us. The Bible teaches us that the devil is prowling around like a lion seeking whom he may devour. He’s on the move, wanting to shout a quick lie at us and move on to the next person. He doesn’t want to be near us, but he wants to be heard so that he leaves a lasting impression.

On that Monday morning, I felt like God told me to declare over my church 4 simple, but powerful redemptive truths.  I didn’t hear God’s audible voice, but I knew those words were from God.

The title of this particular service was “The Whispers of God.” I talked about the reasons God whispers to us, and I declared four whispers over them. These are basic truths, but some of us have been so overwhelmed by all the lies of the enemy.  As simple as these redemptive truths are, I was shocked at the feedback from the worship service.  It just reminded me as a pastor that we don’t need to overcomplicate things.  Just simply remind your people what God is whispering to not only your church, but to you today.

“I love you.”

This is the most basic of the redemptive truths, but we always need its transforming power. The enemy comes to us and shouts, “God could never love a person like you!” But that’s not true.

In Jeremiah, God tells us that He loves His people with an everlasting love.  In Romans, we learn that God demonstrated His love for us, not when we were perfect and had our lives fully together, but while we were still sinners. His love is an everlasting and unconditional. The love that God has for you is different from any other kind: it’s perfect. Jesus loves you.

This is the redemptive truth I hear most often in my solitude with God: “I love you.” As a pastor, He wants me to remind people that His love reaches them wherever they go, and nothing can separate them from His love.

“I forgive you.”

For many of us, our lives are filled with guilt and shame—baggage from our past. Many of us have learned to live with it. We wish it would go away, but it hasn’t. Some of us are still beating ourselves up over foolish, destructive decisions we’ve made or current bad habits and addictions that are eating us alive. The voices we heard as children (and maybe as adults) told us we’re unloved and unlovable. We feel defective, and we tear ourselves apart. As we condemn ourselves, the devil is right there to kick us even further down.

The truth is that God’s grace is big enough to cover your shame and forgive your guilt. The psalmist reminds us, “As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.”

Rather than continually being beaten down by our sins, the apostle John tells us that when we confess our sins, He forgives us.

I want you to know that Jesus has already forgiven you. Confession is agreeing with God that we’ve sinned, that He has already forgiven us, and that we trust Him to give us wisdom and strength to make better choices.  To read more on the surprising benefits of daily confession, click here.

“I choose you.”

It’s one thing to be forgiven by God, but many of us still believe our past disqualifies us from being a valuable instrument in the present and the future. What we’ve done is too horrible, too wrong. God may forgive and use someone else, but not us—we’re too far gone. The enemy loves to remind us that we’re not qualified. He’s not wrong—by ourselves, we’re not worthy—but he leaves out the amazing truth that God has qualified us by the blood of Jesus. Our past doesn’t have to define our future in God’s kingdom. And actually, God often uses the pain from our past to give us new purpose—our greatest impact comes out of our deepest pain.

The truth is that Jesus says, “You did not choose me, but I chose you, and appointed you to go and bear fruit.”

“I’m coming back for you.”

It’s easy to lose hope. We live in a world where the enemy shouts words like cancer, bankruptcy, divorce, pandemic, terrorism, mass shootings, bulimia, addiction, and abandonment, and we’re left wondering, “God, where are You in all of this?” To be honest, I don’t know how to answer those questions. But I trust that God’s ways and thoughts are higher than ours, and even if I can’t fully see the picture right now, I believe that any temporary suffering won’t compare to the glory that one day awaits those that believe in Jesus. That’s His promise.

Throughout the Scriptures, we see a God who is near to the brokenhearted, the fallen, and those who have lost hope. He reminds us, “I will never leave you or forsake you.” Even when you don’t feel His presence, you can be sure that He’s working in you and for you. He’s preparing a place for you. Perhaps you don’t hear this whisper often enough because you don’t see it happening in your lifetime. The reality is that Jesus could come back at any moment, and when He comes back, it’ll be a great day of celebration for all who believe in Him.

This is our future:

 “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved.”

Challenge: Which of the four whispers did you need to hear today?  Think of someone who needs a word of encouragement. Share one of the four whispers with them.

This excerpt was originally found and modified from Being Challenge: A 40-Day Challenge to Be Like Jesus.  For more devotions like this, download a sample here or buy the book here.

If you’d like to view the video of this service, check it out here.

The post The 4 Whispers of God that Pastors Must Declare! appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.

The 4 Uncelebrated Traits of Highly Effective Pastors

In the course of the last year, as church buildings began to close, as crowds that came back to worship were diminished, and as mental unhealth of pastors was skyrocketing at never before documented levels, I began to wonder if there aren’t deeper characteristics of pastoral leadership that no one is talking about.

Pastors are often celebrated for their talent, charisma, influence, the size of their following, and the vision that they are able to cast.  Rightfully stewarded, each of these things should be celebrated. Each of these are seen on the outside.  But are their qualities and traits that no one will ever celebrate or notice that actually help pastors become more effective leaders?

We are only days away from the one-year anniversary of the beginning of the coronavirus shutdown in America.  With no invitation from pastors and no warning signals from the outside, overnight we were forced to completely rethink the way in which we led our churches. This past year has collectively seen pastors create more plans than ever before, pivot like never before, and innovate in ways they never would have imagined.  The past year has certainly been the greatest test on pastoral leadership that I’ve ever witnessed.

As we continue to lead our churches in changing times, as important as pivoting, innovating, and results are, here are four highly important characteristics of pastoral leadership that no one will ever thank you for:

Following

How do you know if you are a leader?  The easy answer is to see if anyone is following you.  Leaders produce followers.

But, in order to lead anyone spiritually, the first and most important step is to realize that you are a follower first.  As you lead a church, may you remember that Jesus is the Head of your church.  As important as you are to your local church, take comfort and solace in the fact that this is His church.  Believe in His promise that He issued before Peter and the disciples, “On this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.”

The apostle Paul would lay this out simply in 1 Corinthians 11:1: Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ.

Ask yourself this question: if everyone in my church imitated me, imitated my personal devotional habits, treated others the way I treat others, served in the same fashion as I serve, and gave the same percentage that I give, what would be the end result?  Are you truly worthy of following?

It’s really hard to lead others to follow Jesus if you are not following Him first.  Follow first.  Lead later.

When it comes to a relationship with God, the natural and greatest flow is that any of our “doing” for God would flow out of our “being” with God.   It is natural then, when it comes to leading, the best leaders are great followers.

The other thing about placing yourself as a follower is you will better understand those that follow your leadership.  One of the great characteristics of leaders is to understand and empathizing with your followers.  To understand and empathize with a follower you must be a follower yourself.

 Availability

Pastors are busy.  We have a lot to do and not much time to do it all.  The answer for the majority of us is to try to get better at multitasking.  This is a noble pursuit but a dead end.  The only thing you are doing by multitasking is diverting your attention from truly accomplishing any one of your tasks well.

Jesus is the example here.  My favorite story to show his availability is found in Mark 5.  Literally, as He is on His way to raise a 12-year-old dead girl back to life, the hem of His garment gets touched by a woman who had been bleeding for 12 years.  This woman had spent everything she had and was at the end of her rope when she reached for the edge of Jesus’s rope.  This woman was in the midst of a violently pressing (non-social-distancing) crowd.  Rather than plowing forward and rejecting the rules and traditions of the day, Jesus stopped every single thing that He was doing to single out this woman.  Not only did He physically heal her, but His words to this woman also healed and restored her value on the inside.  One touch of the garment of Jesus was enough to heal all of the uncleanliness of this woman!

It’s easy for us to just want to plow forward and check off the many tasks before us.  It’s wonderful to serve God and have a big mission.  But in God’s economy success comes when you combine your availability with God’s ability. 

God doesn’t need able men and women.  He needs available men and women.

You need to worry less about having the ability.  The truth is that you have a God inside of you, through His Holy Spirit, who is truly able.  Worry less about your ability and focus more on your availability.  You can have all the ability in the world, but if you are never available, if you never answer the call, it won’t matter.  The times in my life where I have felt the closest to God are the times where I have pushed myself to take steps of faith not knowing where they would lead, but simply making myself available to God, and those are the moments where He’s shown up in incredible ways.

God works more through the available than the able. 

Is your schedule so chalked full of tasks and meetings that people become another task, another interruption for you?  Keep your eyes open to what God is putting before you right here, right now, today.  Be available.

Consistency

We live in a highlight society.  In golf, “drive for show, putt for dough,” is the often-heard phrase.  In the couple of months when professional golf was shut down last year, Bryson Dechambeau became the hop topic.  Apparently, through working out multiple times a day and drinking 6 protein shakes a day he bulked up 25 pounds in two months to hit the golf ball 25 yards further. While we may celebrate this human accomplishment (and as a guy that tries to be good at golf, Bryson, you impress me), everyone in golf knows that it is the putter that makes the biggest difference in winning and losing.

In baseball, we celebrate the home run.  More important than hitting a home run 1 in 10 times would be to hit 10 singles in a row.  In fact, 10 singles in a row would score 7 runs and leave the bases loaded.  One home run gets you one run and on SportsCenter, but 10 singles in a row will win the game.

One more analogy from the restaurant world.  A couple of years ago, the 11th rated fast food burger in America was the “Big Mac.”  And yet, despite this, McDonald’s was the highest grossing fast-food restaurant.  In fact, to prove their dominance, their combined revenue was greater than 2, 3, and 4 combined (Starbucks, Subway, and Burger King).

Why the success?  It’s certainly not the quality of the meat.  The burger itself is nowhere near the top.  It’s not their customer service.  Typically, they are rated the worst in the business.  Most people believe it is due to their consistency.  You are going to get the same consistency from a Big Mac in Orlando, FL than you would in Omaha, NE.

How does this translate to the church world?

One thing I have noticed is that typically the inconsistent person will be praised for doing something rather ordinary while the consistent person goes unnoticed.  We praise someone for losing a lot of weight in the beginning of the New Year, but say nothing to the person who maintains a healthy weight year-after-year.

As we lead churches, whether it be staff or volunteers, it’s easy to recognize someone who took a first step or who was gone for a while and returned to take a step in the right direction.  But what about the people that keep showing up, time and time again?

For instance, I remember that in our church there was someone who was always known for being late.  Everyone noticed.  It was tangible.  One day when this person showed up on time, they were congratulated, celebrated, and praised for it.  The odd thing is everyone else in the room showed up on time that day.  And they were far better at showing up on time every other meeting, but nobody celebrated their consistency.  Who are the consistent servants at your church that could use a nice encouragement right now?

When I think of consistency, I think of Jesus.  Hebrews 13:8 says that Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  While circumstances may change all around us, God doesn’t change.  And we don’t have to either.  Our methods, styles, and plans may need to be adjusted.  But who we are and what we do doesn’t have to change.  You are still the same person and pastor that God has created you to be.

The greatest pastors know the benefit of consistency.  They are faithful with what they have in front of them.  They put in the time that they need to accomplish what God lays before them, and they go out there and play their part.  And they do it day after day, week after week.  They continue to put in the reps day after day and eventually see God do incredible things.  When we combine our finite power with His infinite power, God can turn our singles into home runs all day long!

Stewardship

I once heard pastor Craig Groeschel talking about what he would want people to say at his funeral about himself.  Kind of morbid, huh?  But it’s a really cool exercise.  One of the things that stuck out to me is when he said, “I doubt anyone would say it out loud, but I hope everyone there would feel that I had been a good steward.”

Usually the only time “stewardship” ever gets mentioned in church world is when we talk about the annual “stewardship” series.  Stewardship is bigger than just an annual sermon series.  From the beginning of time, God has called us to steward His creation.  And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”

At the root of it, our first command was to steward what God had given to us.

Peter would say it really succinctly as well in 1 Peter 4:10: “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace.”

How are you stewarding what God has given to you?  Not just the financial part, but the gifts, talents, people, and resources that He is putting in front of you?

The truth is that we all have unique skills and talents.  Similarly, we all have different gifts and people that come into our world.  Just like the parable of the bags of gold found in Matthew 25, Jesus is most interested that we put to use what He’s put in us.  If He gives you anything, you are called to take what He gives you and to steward it well.

Our eyes may be drawn to big numbers, large followings, glitz and glamour, but God simply asks us to steward what He gives to us.  It’s our job to take whatever He gives us, whether in the eyes of the world it is big or small, and to maximize it for His kingdom.  While looking at results, reports, and numbers are important, it’s vitally important as well to do a regular assessment of what God has given to you and strategize how best to steward it all for His glory.  Here’s a few questions that you can ask personally, and also, collectively for your church.

What gifts has God given to you?What talents has God given to you?What people has God surrounded you with?What needs are in the community that you serve?

When you match the talents, gifts, and people that God has put before you with the needs of the community around you, I doubt anyone will say that you were a good steward, but everyone will feel it.

Those are my four.  Do you have others that you would add to the list?  Which one comes easiest to you?  Which one could you use help with?

Pastor, I want to celebrate you today for things no one else will tell you.

Thank you for being a follower of Jesus first.Thank you for being available.Thank you for your consistency and faithfulness in ministry.Thank you for stewarding all that God has given you well.

Well done!

And if you are not a pastor and you have read this far, why don’t you write a handwritten note to your pastor, or send him/her a quick email thanking them for one of these traits that likely no one else before has ever verbalized.

The post The 4 Uncelebrated Traits of Highly Effective Pastors appeared first on Red Letter Challenge.