Josh Hunt's Blog, page 224

The future belongs to the curious

Leadership author and trainer Mark Miller was listening to the 2012 TED presentations when he noticed that most had a trait in common: the talks had been prompted by a question beginning with why. “Why do children with rare diseases have to suffer?”—Jimmy Lin, a computer geneticist “Why can’t we look for ancient archaeological sites […]

What is a Disciple?

MANY PEOPLE THINK all Christians are disciples of Christ. But while all Christ’s disciples are Christians, not all Christians are disciples. To clarify, let’s define these terms. Typically, we think of Christians as church-attending believers in Christ saved from hell and bound for heaven. While this is true, Christianity’s founder and foremost authority, Jesus of […]

UNLIMITED PRESENCE

“I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Can you imagine the impact those final words must have had on the first-century disciples? The emotional roller coaster they had experienced in recent days had been turbulent. They had been grieved by the crucifixion of the one they believed to be the Messiah. […]

Quality questions create a quality life

Speaker Anthony Robbins observed, “Quality questions create a quality life. Successful people ask better questions, and as a result, they get better answers.” I have found that to be true. In fact, I don’t think it would be an overstatement for me to say that questions have changed my life and become the markers of […]

How to get 90% of your worship attendance in groups

At North Coast Church, our entire ministry is built around sermon-based small groups. Think “lecture-lab,” with the weekend sermon being the lecture and the weekly small group being the lab. When we launched the concept nearly thirty years ago, we knew of no other churches using our model. (There might have been, we just didn’t […]

Questions Challenge Mind-Sets and Get You Out of Rut

Too many people have flat-lined mentally. They’ve become stagnant. How do you fight against that? By asking the same question my friend Bill used to ask me: “When was the last time you had a good thought for the first time?” Asking questions is a great way of preventing mental laziness and moving ourselves out […]

Unlimited Resources

What would you do if you were as powerful as Superman? What would you do if you had three wishes? What would you do with a gazillion dollars? Questions such as these often introduced childhood games that called for us to imagine that we have immeasurable strength or wealth. Usually our first answers were selfish […]

Sermon based groups create spirited discussion

When I first entered the ministry, I dreamed of communicating God’s Word so powerfully that people would mull it over and discuss it during the week. I envisioned impassioned discussions of the deep theological truth I’d presented in the sermon. I must have been smoking something. If truth be known, for most of our congregation […]

Questions Give Us a Different Perspective

Too often, as leaders, we get fixated on our own point of view and spend our time trying to convince others of our opinions instead of trying to find out theirs. As English novelist and politician Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton asserted, “The true spirit of conversation consists in building on another man’s observation, not […]

Unlimited Mission

“A royal ambassador is one who represents the person of the King at the court of another.” My memory of childhood events is sometimes hazy, and I may not have the exact quotation, but I can remember thinking how wonderful it was to be a Royal Ambassador. The R.A. program is an organization for boys […]