Sailors, Saints, & Sinners

Elder Selection

When you read the New Testament you see that Paul started a bunch of churches but he always worked to establish elders in the individual churches (Titus 1:5 — “…appoint elders in every town, as I directed you.” ).  Since our beginning in 2002 we have had Elders who along with the staff oversee the direction and resources of the church.  The Elders’ wisdom, prayers, encouragement, and accountability are invaluable to me and to the strategic direction of our church.

All that to say that the time has come for Elder selection at Rock Bridge.  7 of our 11 Elders have terms that expire in December (all seven are eligible to serve another 3-year term).  To be considered for the position of Elder, a person must be nominated by another church member.  So if you would like to nominate someone to be an Elder, please read the qualifications below and prayerfully submit a name to elderselection@rockbridge.cc, along with a brief statement as to why you think they should be considered.

Elder Qualifications:

• Titus 1:5-9
• Been a member of Rock Bridge for at least one-year
• Serve on a ministry team, participate in a small group, tithe
• Be nominated by another church member
• Be willing to serve as an Elder
• Go through a selection process headed by the pastor and other Elders
• Be affirmed by the church

Healthy Tension

I’m learning more and more that certain things have to exist in a healthy tension with one another and that going to far in one direction disrupts the balance needed in an organization (or a life for that matter). 

Grace & Truth:  Jesus modeled this tension perfectly by confronting people with the truth which often made them candidates for His grace.  Paul worked hard to combat the legalism of truth without grace while James worked against the extreme of grace that breeds liberalism in behavior (faith w/o works is dead).

Control & Growth: Rick Warren said that you can either structure a church for control or growth but not both.  I believe many churches are too controlled by man and not by God.  The structure of many churches sets them up so they can’t grow because they cannot make decisions without involving everyone under the sun and cumbersome committees.  Too often the church staff is held responsible for the church’s “success” but not given the authority to take steps toward success.  I guarantee when the first church went from 120 to 3000 people in day there was a lack of ‘man’ control so God could bring growth.  However, having healthy and wise accountability and having enough control so decisions are not made in a vacuum is equally important (see Acts 6:1-7).

Clarity and Certainty:  We would love for things to be certain and for the Bible to address every situation under the sun, but that is not how life works.  Waiting for until you are certain something will work will probably leave you waiting way too long.  I’m learning that the level of certainty surrounding most decisions way less than 100% (which we’d like to have), but that you can be clear in the face of uncertain.   We can’t wait for certainty (which we’ll rarely have) before taking clear action.  We can let the clarity of our values, vision, and God’s Word guide us to take action based on finite information with faith in an infinite God.

Church growth & Church health:  Is it all about the numbers?  Often times our interest is more in the statistics of a church over the spirit in that church.  Numbers and growth are important because they represent souls and people for whom Jesus died for and loves; however, a church can be big but unhealthy. Usually though, health will produce growth. Numbers can be a sign of health but they only tell part of the story.  The question is really what is going to be the bottom line: numbers or health? 

Timely Words

Last week at Staff Retreat Jason Wilson, the Executive Pastor of NewSpring Church spoke to our team.  His words and message were so timely and on the mark.  Here are the highlights …

Based on 2 Timothy 1:7

1) God has given us a spirit of power–

• Easy to forget God’s power
• There is power in submission
  • Change is okay: it happens and it has to happen for the church to grow
  • Don’t be married to a title, office, or a position
• As a church staff, it is a privilege to be part of God’s salvation process.
  • We get to help people see Jesus correctly
• Don’t be afraid to try new things or even to fail … not failing, not trying hard enough
• Don’t be afraid to lead … have power!
  • God’s vision is not cloudy or unclear — be clear!

 2)  Spirit of self-discipline:

• Be an example of a Christ-follower; model church membership to the congregation
• Is your heart connected to the vision?
• Must manage your schedule well
  • Nobody knows where you are spiritually but you — take responsibility!
  • Neglect can set in
• Honor God with your body

3) Spirit of Love

• Your responsibility to love the church.
• Ministries must work together; vision of the church comes before vision for a ministry department
• The church cannot do everything
  • Put aside personal preferences
  • Do less for more impact
  • Organizations get more complex as they grow and with the passage of time; have to fight to stay focused on what matters
• Love your calling
  • Never say, “That’s not my job.”
  • People are our job.
  • Ask yourself, “What did I accomplish for Jesus today with the “spirit” He has given me?”
• Have each other’s backs … be loyal to each other.
  • Don’t let doubt fester
  • If you are in the presence of criticism or gossip or negative talk about the church or another staff member and you do nothing, then you are a product of dissension.
  • Keep short accounts.
  • The staff’s job is to love their pastor (then why did they put me into a wall at Andretti racing??)

Great Week

This past week I was in Dallas, TX for a Leadership Network event called Next Generation Leadership Community. It was one of the best things I have attended as a pastor.  The people in that room were amazing and I learned so much.  The 3 mentor pastors really spoke into my heart for 2 days and I am pumped that I get to do this 3 more times in the next year!!

One area I am working on in my leadership growth is trying to be around other pastors … kind of an “iron sharpens iron” thing.  But the neat thing is it is not all about pastoring and leadership … it is about personal health, your walk with God, and being a “whole” person.  Awesome stuff!!

We’ve got Staff Retreat this week and I’m PUMPED to hang out with our team.  We’ll work, pray, AND have some fun!

Stretching the Staff

I’ve been blogging about our staff right now and how we’re being challenged and stretched.  While this is uncomfortable, it is healthy.  It’s like changing your work out routine — you have to change it to stimulate new growth and bust through plateaus.  Otherwise, you’ll be doing the same weight, the same number of times for an indefinite period of time.  When you vary your work out, the next day your muscles are screaming at you but you know that the temporary pain will bring long-term gain. 

This is where our staff is.  We got pretty good at leading a church in one location with about 1000+ people.  Now the dynamic has changed: two locations with more people.  Our workout has to change.  We’ve got to grow as a staff.  Here’s some things that are “stretching” us right now:

• Giving up control and learning to delegate.  In the military, we called it “delegating authority, but never responsibility“.  That is a tension that has to be mastered as a leader.
• Recruiting and developing volunteers who share the vision, values, and DNA of the way we do things at RBCC.
• Being a “team first” staff that can conflict in a healthy way for the good of the team.
• Doing “less” for “more” impact.  I do less as a pastor/leader now than when the church first started.  This doesn’t mean I have more time on my hands, but it does mean that my time is more focused.  When we first started RBCC, I was like a 75-watt light bulb; now, I try to be more like a laser. 
• Putting people (including ourselves) in the right position.  Part of our staff reorganization is putting people in the right position.  It’s like a football coach deciding that someone should play defensive back instead of wide receiver.
• Prayer - we must spend more time in prayer, allowing God to mold, stretch, and grow us. 

Back to the Basics

Today was a GREAT day for our church.  We had awesome crowds, great prayer time to close the FORGED series, a good Inquirer’s Lunch with a lot of people who were previously unchurched or de-churched, and a great SuperBowl Party for our students. 

As easy as it should be to simply celebrate and pat ourselves on the back, we will not be doing that this week at RBCC.  Instead, we will be taking a “round turn” (Navy slang) on how we operate and do ministry.  I’ve let some of our most basic and most important standards slip.  I’ve been seeing signs of this “slippage” for about 2 weeks now.   This week we’ll make some course corrections, get back to the basics, and filter everything through our core value of excellence.

God has blessed our church with so much and wants to do so much more that complacency is just not an option (while excellence honors God and inspires people). The stakes are too high!!

Leadership Development

Earlier this week I mentioned leadership development in a post.  This subject is getting a lot of attention in our church and our prayers right now.  Aaron will be working more in this area as he transitions out of small groups in a few months.  But what do I mean by leadership development?

Most churches have a plan for how someone becomes a “member” of the church with the end result being the person is on the church roll, maybe in a group or class, and perhaps serving on a ministry team.  We are talking about a process to help church members assume increased responsibility either in a small group context, over a ministry team, or in the church as a whole.  For example, I lead a small group but there was a time in my life when I only participated in a small group.  Over time I was able to begin leading a small group because of certain skills that I developed and certain passions I have for Christians community.  We are asking the question, “How do we help church members who have a passion for a particular ministry develop the skills to lead certain aspects of that ministry?” 

To help your imagination, think about this:

• How could a church member grow to become an Elder? A staff member? A campus pastor of a Rock Bridge multi-site?
• How could a host team member grow to become the leader of the entire Host Team Ministry?
• How could a high school senior grow to lead a small group for middle schoolers?
• How could a children’s ministry volunteer grow to oversee an entire department within the children’s ministry?
• How could a student ministry group leader grow to become the Student Minister over a Rock Bridge multi-site?

Fight the Right Battles

Great story in I Samuel 25 where David almost fights the wrong battle with a guy (Nabal) who refused to feed him and his men.  Well, Nabal’s wife, Abigail, intervenes and basically tells David that the reason he is so successful is that he fights the right battles, instead of getting distracted by less worthy battles.  This story is so cool and so right on for church leaders and planters.

There will always be more battles to fight than we have the time, energy, and ability to fight.  The key is to fight the right battles — the one’s God has designed, equipped, and (through the church) organized us to fight and to win.

Here are some battles that are probably not worth the effort:

• Trying to defend or justify the vision of your church to people who just don’t get it and don’t want to get it (i.e. the people who want to debate music styles, Bible translations, dress codes, use of technology, etc.)
• The people who criticize or question your church yet have never attended it
• The struggling church that wants to blame your church for their problems
• The parent who believes their kid’s problems are a direct result of the church’s children/student ministry
• The person who keeps contacting you to tell you they are praying for you because you baptize people in the “Name of the Father … Son … and Holy Spirit” (true story)

Here are some battles that are probably worth fighting:

• Keeping the vision alive and vibrant in your church.
• The core doctrines of the faith
• For opportunties to share the Gospel to more people
• The person in your church who has their own agenda, who is a gossip, who is living in blatant & unrepentant sin
• For yourself: your walk with God, your family, your time

Halftime Score

With one week to go before we make our 3-year pledge commitments for The Next Step Campaign we got some incredible news and momentum today.  We got together a group of people (about 100 families) in the church to make their pledges early.  This “advance” party consisted of staff, elders, ministry team leaders, small group leaders, highly involved church members, and anyone who responded to a bulletin announcement.

Last Sunday this group of 107 families got together and pledged $2,410, 598 over the next 36 months to the campaign!!!!!!  Talk about putting points on the board and being ahead at halftime … WOW!!!! When our top Rock Bridge “security” forces repelled into the Wink (that’s right, we had people repel into church today) with that number, the place went wild with celebration, excitement, and anticipation. 

Next Sunday (November 18th) is the second half and just like any sport, A LOT can happen.  Victory is within reach and our goal of doing the construction and renovation “debt-free after three” years is now very attainable.   Pray hard this week as hundreds of others in our church ask God to reveal to them their part in resourcing the vision God has given this church.  We are moving out with God and next Sunday our church takes The Next Step!!

Today’s testimony is the perfect example of how God will make a way for all of us to participate, for all of us to “step up” and “step out” in faith with God.  Here’s a summary:

• Single mom living paycheck to paycheck.  Began a personal relationship with Christ since she began coming to Rock Bridge 2 years ago.
• Wants desperately to participate in the campaign but had no idea how.  Asked God to show her and “reveal” a way for her to give.
• A few weeks ago her neighbor saw her taking her trash cans to the street for pick-up and offered the use of his dumpster so she wouldn’t have pay for “trash service.”
• Prayer answered!! She will pledge her “trash money” to The Next Step campaign!!!!!!
• Instead of sending trash to the dump, she’ll be helping send people to heaven … that’s what it’s all about!!

Great Conference

Last year a few of us attended the Churchplanters.com conference hosted at Mountainlake Church in Cumming, Georgia.  This is an incredible conference for those interested in starting a church OR for those needing inspiration and encouragement to do big things for the kingdom. Shawn Lovejoy and his team do a great job with this!!

Feb. 18-19 2008 is the date for the next conference.  We’ll be sending some of our team to it.