Thom S. Rainer's Blog, page 350

Pray for Stanley Union Church

Location: Stanley, Iowa

Pastor: Phil Rownd

Worship Time: 9:30 AM (Central Time)

Fast Facts: Stanley, Iowa is a town with a population of 125 and Stanley Union Church is reaching the lost. The culture of this small church is changing. People not steeped in religion are coming in. Long-time church members are learning to trust people of other cultures who have come to Christ and now share their worship services. Pastor Phil praises God for a congregation that is warm and welcoming to guests and new believers.

Please pray for Pastor Phil and the faithful members at Stanley Union Church. Also pray for the church’s nursing home ministry and the residents that are served.

“Pray for . . .” is the Sunday blog series at ThomRainer.com. We encourage you to pray for these churches noted every Sunday. Please feel free to comment that you are praying as well. If you would like your church to be featured in “Pray for . . .” contact Steve Drake, director of pastoral relations, at Steve.Drake@LifeWay.com.

Four Ways to Improve the Worship Leader–Pastor Relationship

By Jordan Richmond

Worship leader: your pastor is the single most important professional relationship you have. He is likely your direct supervisor. He’s the one who will sing your praises, or defend you to a disgruntled church member (or even before a board of directors or elders). He’s also responsible for the entire worship experience. You may be the primary facilitator of music and media, but he’s ultimately in charge—and he’s usually the one taking the fallout when things go awry. You absolutely want a healthy, dynamic relationship with your pastor.

I’m grateful to still have both professional working relationships, and friendships with the pastors under whom I’ve served. Here’s what I’ve learned.

Start with Respect. Honor your pastor for the position he holds. Recognize that he’s attempting to juggle the needs of the entire congregation. Whatever difficulties you have as a worship leader, he has exponentially more. Don’t add to his headache. Like you, he is trying to do the best he can with his calling. Support him, defend him, publicly honor him.
Be a friend. Your pastor wants a good relationship with you, trust me. You are a reflection of his leadership. Besides the pastor, you are the most influential leader at your church. You certainly have the largest platform. He has enough negative pressure. He wants (and needs) solid, trustworthy people around him. Do you think he wants a contentious office relationship? Decide to be his advocate. A true friend is quick to forgive, quick to assume the best, keeps a confidence, and of course is fun to be around.
Exceed Expectations. Do everything with excellence. Discover his vision for a worship experience and seek to surpass it. If you mess up, don’t make excuses, but admit it immediately. Take complete ownership. At some point in the near future, you will want to take a risk and try something new. You are far more likely to be trusted with the freedom you desire if you have a record of excellence and integrity.
Accept his ideas and criticism graciously. Whether it’s an artistic suggestion or a personal rebuke of your job performance, your pastor will at some point articulate room for improvement. Hopefully he does this alone, or at least couches it gently (since we worship leaders tend to be pretty sensitive). Regardless, realize that his criticism is probably right on, and is coming from the person who most wants you to succeed. Again, your performance is a direct reflection of him. Don’t roll your eyes, sigh, or defend yourself. Treat it as valuable advice—like a consult you didn’t have to pay for—and grow from it.

We worship leaders can be artsy and high maintenance. Some of you have put a bad taste in your pastor’s mouth. You have some repair work to do. And I’m sure many of you work with difficult pastors. But you’re difficult too, so you’re even. Thankfully I’ve found that people tend to be gracious when you approach them in humility.

Whatever your current state, you can begin today to put these into practice. Not only will you enjoy the benefits of a healthy, dynamic, mutually beneficial, and edifying relationship with your pastor, your congregation will benefit from seeing the synergy between the two most visible and influential leaders in the church. Authentic friendships are highly attractive.

How have you witnessed a good relationship between the worship leader and pastor benefit the entire church?  Have you seen the negative affects of an unhealthy or strained relationship?

Jordan Richmond is the worship pastor of Cayman Islands Baptist Church in beautiful Grand Cayman. He has also served local churches in Florida and Kentucky.

The Main Reason People Leave the Church — Rainer on Leadership #003

Podcast Episode #003

Subscribe via iTunes

In this week’s episode, Jonathan and I continue our discussion on church membership.

Last week we talked about what church membership is and what it means to be a church member—how it’s not just having your name on a roll somewhere, but being actively involved in the ministry and function of your local community of faith. This week’s episode deals with NOT being a church member. Specifically the main reason people LEAVE a church.

In an earlier post, I listed the following reasons people leave a church:

“The worship leader refused to listen to me about the songs and music I wanted.”
“The pastor did not feed me.”
“No one from my church visited me.”
“I was not about to support the building program they wanted.”
“I was out two weeks and no one called me.”
“They moved the times of the worship services and it messed up my schedule.”
“I told my pastor to go visit my cousin and he never did.”

Do you see the theme there?

Here are the five ways I recommend closing the back door in churches:

Inform church members.
Raise the bar of expectations. 
Mentor members.
Train members. 
Encourage people to be in small groups.

Episode Sponsor

You can pick up your copy of I Am a Church Member at your local bookstore or online retailer. At many retailers, churches can also get a bulk case of 20 for $5 per book to use in their churches.

Feedback

If you have a question you would like answered on the show, fill out the form on the podcast page here at ThomRainer.com. If we use your question, you’ll receive a free autographed copy of I Am a Church Member.

Resources Mentioned in this Episode

I Am a Church Member  by Thom Rainer
The Present Future  by Reggie McNeal
Simple Church  by Thom S. Rainer and Eric Geiger
Mentor  by Chuck Lawless

Friday is For Freebies – Samson, Nehemiah, and I Am A Church Member

This week’s giveaway includes something for practically everyone.

First is a signed copy of my new book I Am a Church Member. Based on an idea originally taken from this blog, I Am a Church Member discusses the attitudes and responsibilities of church members. I address in detail what congregations should really be focusing on—praying for church leaders, being a functioning member, treasuring church membership, and more.

Six chapters with these titles include study questions to guide the discussion:

I Will Be a Unifying Church Member
I Will Not Let the Church Be About My Preferences and Desires
I Will Pray for My Church Leaders
I Will Lead My Family to Be Healthy Church Members
I Will Be a Functioning Member
I Will Treasure Church Membership as a Gift

Next is the DVD leader kit for Samson: A Life Well Wasted, a new study by Chip Henderson. Samson explores the life of Samson in Judges 13-16 and offers six ways we can waste our lives if we’re not focused on our God-given purpose. Hot-button cultural issues from dishonesty and anger to daddy-issues and sex are discussed. Samson offers encouragement and practical ideas for making God-honoring decisions and avoiding regret for what could have been.  The leader kit includes:

Member Book
Leader Guide with step-by-step instructions to leading discussion, including insightful questions that will help encourage authentic community
DVD-ROM with 6 discussion-starting videos
Promo Video
E-mailable biblical articles to dig deeper
A playlist of music to accompany the study

The final item this week is another DVD leader kit. Nehemiah: A Heart That Can Break by Kelly Minter is a 7-session Bible study for women. Nehemiah’s heart was so broken for those in need that he left the comfort of his Persian palace to help them. Like Kelly’s other studies in the Living Room Series, you’ll find authentic Bible teaching, recipes, and a relational approach. Nehemiah also includes 7 video sessions and real-life ways to put feet to your faith. Are you ready to let God break your heart for a hurting, lost world and move you in compassion to be the hands and feet of Jesus? The kit includes:

Member Book with recipes and leader helps
DVDs for 7 group sessions averaging 20 minutes in length and including short interviews with people living out what God has put in their hearts to do

To enter the giveaway, tell us about your favorite moment so far of 2013.

The deadline to enter is midnight CDT this Saturday. We will draw one winner from the entries on Monday morning.

Special Note: Both Chip Henderson and Kelly Minter were instrumental in the development of Bible Studies for Life, a new curriculum line launching this fall. You are invited to join us on Wednesday, May 8, from 12:00—12:30 p.m. CDT as four pastors share their hope for how small groups can play a big part in addressing needs in the church and how LifeWay’s new series, Bible Studies for Life, can help.

By entering, you acknowledge and accept the terms of the promotion.

Three of the Scariest Headlines I’ve Read Lately

Every time I stand in line at the grocery store, one thing is always clear: we are under attack. You know what I’m talking about. Dozens of magazine covers flank us on all sides and scream sex, success, and selfishness. Take, for instance, these three headlines from popular magazines published this month:

Nine Ways to Be Married — More takes a look at open marriage, threesomes, and the perks of living together without a license.
Secrets to a Happy Marriage: Get a Little Bit Divorced — Good Housekeeping says a “faux divorce” can strengthen your marriage.
Benefits to Being a Single Parent — Parents says the great thing about being a divorced parent is getting every other weekend to yourself.

While not every article in these magazines is bad, some of them very clearly hurt, not help, those who are influenced by them. And while some would argue that articles of this nature are merely “art imitating life,” these magazines do more than reflect the culture around us—they often direct it—and the parents, children, and families in your churches are the targets.

Wise church leaders understand the messages that influence the people they serve, and they encourage people to live differently in light of who Christ has called them to be.

The honest truth is that the people in your church are reading magazines. In fact, studies show that 92% of Americans read magazines. For young adults under 25, that number is 96%. Whether they read them in print or online, we cannot deny that the vast majority of people and families in our churches are influenced by the magazines they read. Why not, then, serve these families with messages that build them up instead?

At LifeWay, we are working hard to provide great, compelling, and encouraging magazines formed by biblical insight for your church family. And to help, we’ve developed an affordable ministry rate that makes it easier to share these magazines with all your people. You can find out more here.

People will be influenced by something. As leaders, let’s work to make sure it’s something good.

Notable Voies – May 2, 2013

How to Build Community in Your Church — Daniel Darling

Yesterday on my blog, I wrote about the importance of unity in the church. Much of the unity in a church comes from a sense of community among the members. Dan shares five easy ways you can promote community in your church.

 

I’m Not Wired That Way Either: The Extrovert’s Excuse — Matt Mikalatos

I tend to write a lot about introverts here on the blog because I happen to be one. So consider this equal time for the extroverts out there.

 

Your Optimism Might Be Stifling Your Team — Liz Wiseman

Liz explains how too much optimism from a team leader might actually stifle morale and productivity.

 

Playing It Safe — Darryl Dash

Darryl expounds on how Jesus’ famous parable of the talents shows that how we live, and what we do with what God has given us, is really an indication of what we believe to be true about God.

 

Want to Grow in Your Faith? Share it! — Aaron Armstrong

As the old adage goes, practice makes perfect. Aaron shows that it could be applied to evangelism as well. While we may never perfect evangelism, the more we do it, the better more we will grow in our faith.

 

Media Consumption in 2013

Four Ways to Create Unity in Your Church

In last week’s post about an autopsy of a deceased church, one of the characteristics was the members had “more and more arguments about what they wanted.” This selfishness both created and sustained one thing no church can tolerate very long and survive: disunity.

It is very common for pastors and church members to desire unity and even talk about the importance of it. Beyond desire, though, should be a plan to foster unity in the local body. Unity can be very hard to achieve and it never happens on its own.

Ultimately, only the Lord can bring unity to His people. Here are four ways to help foster unity in your church.

Preach on it. I don’t mean mentioning unity on occasion, or talking about it during the Lord’s Supper. I don’t even mean bringing it up when you know of a disagreement in the body. I mean preach on unity regularly, emphasizing why no church will accomplish God’s mission without it. Preach a series on the goodness and pleasantness of unity (Psalm 133:1) or how unity contributes to peace in the body (Ephesians 4:3).
Talk about Jesus’ emphasis on it. In John 17, we find the longest recorded prayer of Jesus. Over and over in the space of only three verses Jesus emphasized unity, saying, “May they all be one, as You, Father, are in Me and I am in You. May they also be one in Us, so the world may believe You sent Me. I have given them the glory You have given Me. May they be one as We are one. I am in them and You are in Me. May they be made completely one, so the world may know You have sent Me and have loved them as You have loved Me” (vs. 21-23). If unity is important to Jesus it should be important to us.
Model it. You cannot lead your church to be unified if there are broken relationships in your own life. What you live, people learn. The old saying, “More caught than taught,” is perhaps more true for pastors than most. People expect the pastor to model the behavior of a fully mature disciple, and pastors should. This seems clear in Paul’s challenge to “follow me as I follow Christ.”
Get everyone on the same page—literally. In recent years, many churches have given small group leaders and Sunday School teachers the option to choose from a range of Bible studies. This has been beneficial to many, and I don’t mean to demean that option. However, if your church is struggling with unity, consider using a single Bible study tool as one way to help facilitate it.

Using a single Bible study can help promote ongoing conversations between small-group members, leaders and family members. Creating biblically centered conversations between parents, teens and children is easier when everyone is studying the same concepts at the same time.

One of the many things I am excited about at LifeWay is a new ongoing Bible study series that gives churches the option of getting everyone on the same page. The new series, called Bible Studies for Life, has been developed for every age in the church so everyone will study the same biblical concepts at the same time making home-based as well as church-based discipleship more accessible.

How would our churches change if we joined Jesus in His prayer for unity? What if churches were actually operating in unity? What if members were striving together, constantly, to fulfill the mission of God?

We might just see a move of God like none of us has ever seen.

10 Things I’d Like to Say to My Pastor

By Chuck Lawless

As I get older, I think often about people who have influenced my life. One of those influences is the pastor of the only church I attended before I myself became a pastor. He served as my pastor during my teenage years, and he led the ordination service when I became a pastor at age 20.

As a young preacher who thought he knew it all, I sometimes judged my pastor critically. Now more than 30 years later, I am still learning how much I don’t know about pastoring and ministry. Here is what I’d like to say to my pastor today:

Thank you for preaching the Word. You could have preached anything you wanted. I wasn’t raised in church, and I may not have known if you were preaching something wrong. Every week, though, you taught the Bible. You used humor and illustrations, and you did it well as you took us to the Word. I believe the Word today because you and the church you led gave me that grounding.
Thank you for allowing me to make pastoral visits with you. We didn’t do it often, but I still remember when we did. It was the church’s “visitation night,” and we visited people who had first visited the church. I watched you interact with others, share the gospel with them, and pray for them. I could not have known then that some day I would be a professor of evangelism at a seminary!
I did not fully appreciate all you did. I saw you primarily during Sunday services and midweek events. I knew you were at the church during the week, but I didn’t know all you did. Nobody told me about the hospital visits, the personal counseling, the deathbed waiting, the critical phone calls. I did not understand that you walked beside church members from birth until death.
I did not know the sacrifices you made. I didn’t know how many nights you were unexpectedly called to minister in an emergency. I suspect that sometimes your vacations were interrupted, though you never made a big deal of that. I remember your working late into the evening to help volunteers working on church building programs. Only years later did I realize how much you gave of yourself for the congregation.
I apologize for not praying for you as I should have. I prayed for you, but only when you faced a health issue or a tough church situation. I didn’t pray for you regularly. I received the blessings of your ministry without returning offerings of prayer for you, your family, and your work. I trust you forgive me for that.
Thank you for leading the church to give to missions and ministry. I didn’t understand all the details then, but I remember your calling the church to support missions and ministry through our denomination’s giving process. When I began pastoring, I did the same because I had seen that modeled. For the last seventeen years, that same denominational giving program has helped to pay my salary.
Thank you for baptizing me. Sure, it was part of your responsibility as pastor. Sure, I didn’t fully comprehend the meaning of believer’s baptism at age 13. Looking back, though, I have grown to appreciate what baptism means. You played a role in that spiritual marker in my life, and I’m grateful for that.
You gave me my start in ministry. You invited me to preach when I was 16 years old. Then, you invited me to do it again even though my first sermon was horrible. In fact, I can only hope that those early sermons (recorded on cassette tapes) have since disappeared! Still, though, you allowed me to grow and learn.
My dad became a believer a few years before he died. You told me to pray for my family as soon as I became a follower of Christ. My dad would not become a believer until many years later, but God answered those prayers. Thank you for challenging me to pray persistently.
I wish I had said thank you much earlier. My guess is that many of us took your ministry for granted. I might be late in doing so, but I thank you for being my first pastor.

What stories do you have about a pastor who positively influenced your life?

Chuck Lawless currently serves as Professor of Evangelism and Missions and Dean of Graduate Studies at Southeastern Seminary. 

You can connect with Dr. Lawless on both Twitter and Facebook.

 

What Would Churches Do with More Money? Ten Answers from Two Perspectives

In an informal survey, I asked two groups of members in churches the following question: “If your church budget receipts were to increase tomorrow by 50 percent, what would you like to do with the extra funds?” So that there would be clarity to my question, I asked them for the current level of budget receipts, and then added 50 percent. So a $100,000 budget becomes $150,000. A $50,000 budget becomes $75,000. A $500,000 budget becomes $750,000. You get the picture.

The two groups I asked were simply divided between paid church ministers (pastors and others) and laypersons in the church. Their responses were similar, but interesting in the ways they were different. Each person could name up to three responses, but no more than three. They are ranked below in order of frequency of responses.

Pastors & Other Paid Ministers


Laypersons





Missions beyond our community
Ministry in and to our community
Start new churches or campuses
Upgrade existing buildings
Pay down debt
New building
Upgrade sound and lighting
Increase pay of existing staff
Add staff
Increase social media presence




Add staff
Missions beyond our community
New building
Upgrade existing building
More and better program materials
Increase cash reserves
Pay down debt
Ministry in and to our community
New church vehicles
Upgrade sound and lighting

Here are a few of my observations:

In every case when a staff member mentioned increasing pay of existing staff, he or she was specific that their salaries were fine. They just knew of others on staff who were underpaid according to the ministry responsibilities they had.
There were three items on the list of the paid ministers that were not on the list of the laypersons: start new churches or campuses; increase pay of existing staff; and increase social media presence.
There were three items on the list of the laypersons that were not on the list of the paid ministers: more and better program materials; increase cash reserves; and new church vehicles.

So what do you think of these two lists? What would be your top three choices?

Pray for Glen’s Creek Baptist Church

Location: Versailles, Kentucky

Pastor: Justin Rader

Worship Times: 11:00 AM (Eastern Time)

Fast Facts: This 212-year old church averages just under 100 in morning attendance. Pastor Justin Rader wants to lead the church to be an outwardly focused congregation. Please pray for their mission trip to Honduras this July and for their recently formed Men’s Ministry. The last three years have been difficult. While they have witnessed God’s healing hand, Pastor Justin needs prayer for wisdom in serving families that remain in pain.

Website: http://www.glenscreek.net

“Pray for . . .” is the Sunday blog series at ThomRainer.com. We encourage you to pray for these churches noted every Sunday. Please feel free to comment that you are praying as well. If you would like your church to be featured in “Pray for . . .” contact Steve Drake, director of pastoral relations, at Steve.Drake@LifeWay.com.