From Golf Team To Football Team...

Yesterday's post contained an excerpt from an interesting book I've been reading-- Church Unique by Will Mancini. This selection from Church Unique completes the thought I posted yesterday:

What the church really needs is a strategy that helps them function more like a football team than a golf team. A football team shares one score based on the coordination of highly diverse functions—there may be forty-six individuals with forty-six performance indicators, but there are not forty-six different goals. The singular goal is to get the ball into the end zone.

A strategic plan can easily divide a team by giving each player a different goalpost.

How exactly does this happen? Here is why a strategic plan with multiple goals inhibits synergy:

* Too many goals threaten to make any one goal unclear. Would we rather have 46 goals that no one remembers or one goal that forms the ever-present gauge on you “dashboard of ministry?”

* Too many goals weaken the connection between the goals and the larger vision. Do we want workers who are excited about the big picture as they go about their daily ‘bite-sized” tasks? Imagine your volunteers as brick makers. Do you want every brick maker focused on “bricks-per-hour efficiency,” brick yield loss, brick compression strength, mortar viscosity, etc., at the risk of not envisioning the beautiful cathedral they are building?

* Too many goals make it harder for people to have shared goals. How can our leaders all point in the same direction on cue, as we navigate ministry together (like the choreography of a school of fish darting through the water)? How do our goals inadvertently create competition for the same limited resources?

* Too many goals inhibit good decision-making on the front line of ministry. Do we have a lot of goals because we are trying to compensate for a lack of trust and communication? Are we releasing competent people on the front line of ministry, or are we dictating decisions from the leaders' conference room?

Time and time again, I see more goals equaling more confusion. Well-intentioned church leaders think they are building a ladder to greater achievement. What they really are building is a chute that flushes synergy down the drain.

The Silo Builder...

I've been reading Church Unique by Will Mancini. I've found it to be one of those books that substantially stretches my thinking. Here's an excerpt from Church Unique that I heavily highlighted:

Church leaders know what organizational silos look like. What defines success for staff members? The answer is, “Butts in seats in my ministry area!” Many churches use nickels and noses as the only measure for success. This primary measure of worship service attendance gets translated down into the ministry departments. The result is a golf team mentality where team success is measured by adding up individual scores at the end of the day. Quiet competition simmers underneath the calm surface of most staff meetings with individual ministries trying to “out-drive” the others.

When a strategic planning process is introduced into an environment where real teamwork is already challenged, the plan itself becomes a silo builder that reinforces the concrete walls between ministry areas. This is the second fallacy of strategic planning: the “Fallacy of Accountability.” As multiple goals are developed for each separate ministry area, the expectation is that staff and volunteers will experience better coordination, with clearer responsibilities. The false assumption behind this practice is that more goals will help people work better together. Exactly the opposite is true. More goals typically create a more fragmented approach as each leader focuses solely on their responsibilities and outcomes. In an effort to provide positive steps of accountability within ministry areas, the church misses out on synergy between all ministry areas.

Leaping Lizard...

The local news anchor in this clip has a melt-down as a result of his encounter with a leaping lizard. Warning: I watched this while drinking a Diet Coke with vanilla from Sonic and almost spewed through the nose.



Too funny!

Sitcom Map...

Some industrious person with lots of time on their hands went to the trouble of mapping the fictional location of most of America's sitcoms. See if your favorite sitcom made it to the map.

Don't Force Spring...

"There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven..." Ecclesiastes 3:1

Every planet on the solar system has seasons. On Venus, seasons are very short. On Uranus, a season can last for 20 years.

You might feel like you are in a prolonged winter. And you might be correct.

- You are praying with few answered prayers.

- You’re reaching out to someone for Jesus, but they show no interest.

- You’re working as hard as you can and seeing minimal results.

If you’re in winter and waiting for spring, remember God also works in the winter. During the cold months, the roots of trees and plants grow deeper and stronger. In this season, God is often doing an unseen work preparing His creation for spring.  During winter, God does more internally than externally.

It is helpful to remember: "You can’t have spring without winter."

How has God worked during the winter seasons in your life?

Love vs. Lust...

The Granger Community Church came up with the following video to help answer the question,"Is there a difference between love and lust?"



I appreciate the very effective way in which Granger uses media to connect God's eternal truths to our culture.

Are You A Good Christ...

This recent post by Francis Chan knocked my socks off.

I think it's time we stop asking ourselves the question: "Am I a good Christian?" We live in a time when the term "Christian" has been so diluted that millions of immoral but nice people genuinely consider themselves "good Christians." We have reduced the idea of a good Christian to someone who believes in Jesus, loves his or her family, and attends church regularly. Others will label you a good Christian even though your life has no semblance to the way Christ spent His days on earth. Perhaps we should start asking the question: "Am I a good Christ?" In other words, do I look anything like Jesus? This question never even entered my mind until a friend of mine made a passing comment to me one day.

Dan is a long time friend of mine. In fact, he's the pastor who performed my wedding. He was talking to me about a pastor named Von. Von has been working with youth in the San Diego area for decades. Many of his students have gone on to become amazing missionaries and powerful servants of God. Dan described a trip to Tijuana, Mexico with Pastor Von. (Von has been ministering to the poor in the dumps of Tijuana for years). Dan didn't speak of the awful living conditions of those who made their homes amidst the rubbish. What impacted Dan the most was the relationship he saw between Von and the people of this community. He spoke of the compassion, sacrifice, and love that he witnessed in Von's words and actions as he held these malnourished and un-bathed children. Then he made the statement that sent me reeling:

"The day I spent with Von was the closest thing I've ever experienced to walking with Jesus."

Dan explained that the whole experience was so eerie because he kept thinking to himself: "If Jesus were still walking on earth in the flesh, this is what it would feel like to walk alongside of Him!" After that discussion, I kept wondering if anyone had ever said that about me-"The day I spent with Francis was the closest thing I've ever experienced to walking with Jesus." The answer was an obvious "no." Would any honest person say that about you?

What bothered me was not that I hadn't "arrived," but that I wasn't even heading in the right direction. I hadn't made it my goal to resemble Christ. I wasn't striving to become the kind of person who could be mistaken for Jesus Christ. Isn't it ironic that a man can be known as a successful pastor, speaker, and CHRISTian even if his life doesn't resemble Christ's?

1 John 2:6 "Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did."

When John made that statement, he wasn't speaking about how to be a church leader or even how to be a "good" Christian. He merely stated that anyone who calls himself Christian must live like Jesus did. So how did Jesus live? You could make a list of character traits to compare yourself to, but it would be far more beneficial to simply read through one of the Gospels. After you get a bird's-eye view of the life of Christ, do the same with your own. Are you comfortable with the similarities and differences?

It's easy to get caught up in the pursuit of "success" as American church-goers define it. The thought of being well-known and respected is alluring. There have been times when I've been caught up in the fun of popularity. I've even mistaken it for success. Biblically, however, success is when our lives parallel Christ's. Truth is, there are many good Christs that you'll never read about in a magazine. They are walking as Jesus walked, but they are too focused and humble to pursue their own recognition.

May we make it our goal to someday have someone say of us: "The day/hour/15 minutes I spent with ______ was the closest thing I've ever experienced to walking with Jesus."

As Christians in America, we often complain about how antagonistic people are toward Christ. Personally, I'm not sure that Americans are really rejecting Christ. Maybe they just haven't seen Him.

Try to be COMPLETELY honest with yourself right now. Is the following true of you?

You passionately love Jesus, but you don't really want to be like Him. You admire His humility, but you don't want to be THAT humble. You think it's beautiful that He washed the feet of the disciples, but that's not exactly the direction your life is headed. You're thankful He was spit upon and abused, but you would never let that happen to you. You praise Him for loving you enough to suffer during His whole time on earth, but you're going to do everything within your power to make sure you enjoy your time down here.

In short: You think He's a great Savior, but not a great role model.

The American church has abandoned the most simple and obvious truth of what it means to follow Jesus: You actually follow His pattern of life. I pray for those who read this post- that we don't become cynical or negative toward the church. Instead, let's make a personal decision to stop talking so much and begin living like Jesus. Then we can say as the apostle Paul, "Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ" (1 Corinthians 11:1). My guess is that you've never had someone say that to you, and you've never said it to anyone else. Why not?