Tag: Church Leadership
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Prodigal Church
My thanks to Jared Wilson, not only for another thoughtful book, but for expressing many of the very things I would like to express. In his 2015 book, Prodigal Church: A Gentle Manifesto Against the Status Quo, Wilson has written a book I wish I had written.
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Authentic Church: Road to a Re-newed Reality
I have been mulling on something the late Francis Schaeffer said: “There are four things which are absolutely necessary if we as Christians are going to meet the need of our age and the overwhelming pressure we are increasingly facing.” No doubt that the Church, in our culture as well as other cultures, faces increasing…
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Bounded-Set vs Centered-Set
Some time back I posted a piece titled Numbering Those On the Ranch, exploring the concept of what missiologist Alan Hirsch refers to as a “centered-set” metric for evaluating a church. More recently I stumbled across a post by Bob Thune, of Coram Deo Church in Omaha, explaining his understanding of Centered-Set verses the more…
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Leading in the Construction of Christ’s Church
As one who has benefited from reading Jim Collins, John Kotter, Stephen Covey, and several other leadership gurus from the business world, I found this quote from Tony Morgan‘s Developing a Theology of Leadership to be a very helpful reminder and convicting corrective: It is true that we church leaders can learn from business leaders,…
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5 Things Church Members Wish Pastors Knew
Anyone who has ever served on a ministry staff for any measurable amount of time knows the twin realities of the incredible joys and the exhausting difficulties. Perhaps this tension is part of the reason why there is such large drop out rate among pastors and other ministry leaders in the American Evangleical Church. Ministry is a tremendous privilege,…
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Happier Elsewhere: Singing ‘Happy Trails’ to … Some
I appreciate the practical wisdom Ed Stetzer provides in a post titled: Why I Have No Difficulty Helping “Issue Christians” to Move On. Few seem to think this way in our consumerist church culture, where numbers are the only measuring stick of success, and faithfulness is but a tool to… well, numerical success – so…
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10 Warning Signs of an Inwardly Obsessed Church
Researcher Thom Rainer warns of signs of a church that is so inwardly focused that it has ceased to be the church of Jesus Christ and has become, at best, a museum to (assumed) past glories, in which the membership makes up the board of directors. Rainer writes: Any healthy church must have some level…
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Drilling Down
I have greatly benefited from being introduced to Tri-Perspectivalism. While it is an odd sounding word, as a concept Tri-Perpectivalism is reasonably easy to grasp. It is a multi-facted perspective, or looking at things from three distinct perspectives, rooted in the personality and offices of Christ: Prophet, Priest, and King. John Frame was probably the first to touch upon this…
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Mistakes
Steve Childers is Founder and President of Global Church Advancement. He is also professor of Practical Theology at Reformed Theological Seminary-Orlando. In a former life Steve was an effective pastor and church planter. A number of years ago I had the privilege of taking a doctoral class in church planting under Steve’s tutelage. I have…
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Living Together as the Church
The late theological statesman, Edmund Clowney observed: “If we lack interest in the church we lack what was for Jesus a consuming passion. Jesus loved the church and gave himself for it (Ephesians 5.25).” Jesus’ love for his church is evident throughout the pages of the New Testament. In Matthew 16.18 Jesus promises to build his…
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Questions of Prophets, Priests, and Kings
Some time ago I introduced the concept of Tri-perspectivalism, the recognition that every Church ought to reflect the three offices of Christ: Prophet, Priest, and King. Each person, or Christian leader, has a natural inclination toward one of these perspectives, but all three are equally necessary to reflect Christ in our Body. There are many questions that can…
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Mistaken Identity
Like many churches throughout the land, our church is entering into a season of officer nominations. As a presbyterian congregation, specifically, we are inviting the members of our congregation to submit the names of fellow church members who they believe fit the Biblical requirements, found in Titus & 1 Timothy 3, for the offices of Elder…
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Right People, Right Direction
There are two common maxims offered to pastors when entering a new ministry. Both are wise and true. But they are mutually exlusive: “Don’t change anything in the first year.” “If you don’t change anything in the first year, you will never be able to change anything later.” One way to resolve the tension is to…
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Putting a Bus Stop at Our Church
A generation ago it was not uncommon for a churches to have bus ministries. Volunteers would drive a bus to pick people up from around the community and shuttle them to and from the church. Jim Collins, in his best-selling book Good to Great, seems to suggest churches still need to get people on and off the…
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Reflecting Jesus in Christ’s Church
If, as most Christians profess, Jesus is indeed the only Head of the Church, it seems reasonable that Christ’s Church should reflect His personality in it’s ministries and structure. One way that Jesus is reflected in the ministry of faithful churches has been the recovery of a balanced Word & Deed holistic ministry. By balanced…
