Wineskins for Discipleship

Best Volunteer Tribute EVER

2009-11-24T11:05:00.001-05:00

This one's a bit old, but our office just enjoyed viewing it again. From River Valley Church and Rob Ketterling, this is the best volunteer appreciation video I've ever seen. They entered it into our film festival a couple of years ago, and we've been laughing ever since. So good.

For a Cause or for Christ?

2009-11-23T10:44:00.004-05:00

"The disciples didn't lay their lives down for a cause but for a person."

That's how Dave Buehring kicked off his talk on the Ways of God at our Kaboom Retreat (formerly zone leader/team leader retreat) this weekend.

For some reason, that one statement is really challenging me personally and challenging the way I lead my team. I fear that I have spent too much time motivating people to a cause- make disciples, advance the Kingdom, create culture, change a generation, etc. That's all good stuff, but it's not the ultimate goal, is it? Maybe I should focus a bit more on simply elevating the person of Jesus Christ.

Causes are good. Causes build fans and create evangelists. Christ is better. He builds communities of faith and creates martyrs. Not that we all want to rush out to the Colosseum to volunteer ourselves for lion dinner. But laying down our lives is one of the ways we follow Jesus Christ.

The disciples didn't lay their lives down for some great cause that had captivated their emotions and imaginations. They laid their lives down for a person who had already laid his own life down for them.

Why am I more cause focused than person focused? Perhaps it is more comfortable and easy for me to acquaint myself with and attach myself to a cause than to enter a messy and flesh-killing relationship with Jesus Christ.

Leadership List

2009-11-20T11:31:00.002-05:00

Thanks to everyone for all the fantastic leadership book recommendations. Someone asked me to post the books that I have already read, so I will do that now. Once I have developed my to-read list for 2010, I will post that as well.

What's on my shelf that I would recommend:

Now, Discover Your Strengths (Marcus Buckingham)- This book helped me determine what I should be doing, what I shouldn't be doing, and how to manage around the stuff I should be doing but stink at. This book is required reading for our Protege Program.

Courageous Leadership (Bill Hybels)- This book helped me determine my leadership style. It's also required reading for our Protege Program.

Spiritual Leadership (Oswald Sanders)- This one is probably my favorite. It was the first book I gave to my zone leaders (small group coaches) eight years ago. Classic. And also required reading for our Protege Program.

Next Generation Leader (Andy Stanley)- To the point with great insights. Required reading for Protege Program.

Gifted to Lead (Nancy Beach)- Leadership for women.

Becoming a Person of Influence (John Maxwell)- First book on leadership I ever read for the purpose of growing in my leadership of a campus organization at Louisiana State University. About 12 years ago. Wow.

Others I really like:

The 360 Leader (John Maxwell)
Developing the Leaders Around You (John Maxwell)
Leaders on Leadership (George Barna)
Fish! (Steven Lundin)
Tribes (Seth Godin)
Spiritual Leadership (Henry Blackaby)
A Fish out of Water (George Barna)
Five Dysfunctions of a Team (Patrick Lencioni)

Leadership Development Books

2009-11-18T21:22:00.002-05:00

What are your favorite books on leadership?

Each year, I pick an area of my job that I want to be intentional and strategic about growing in. One year it was discipleship and small groups, one year it was theology, one year it was preaching and communication, one year it was church history. In 2010, I want to refocus a bit on leadership.

NCC is growing and Team D (my discipleship crew) is morphing, and I need to be a good steward of the leadership responsibilities that have been entrusted to me.

So...if I were to read 12 books on leadership in 2010, they should be...

Jesus Spit

2009-11-17T14:25:00.002-05:00

Jesus was willing to get down into the mess of life. He touched lepers, befriended despised people, and hung out with notorious sinners. One of my favorite stories about Jesus entering into the mess is found in John 9. Jesus and the disciples encountered a man who was born blind, and the disciples asked for the reason he was born blind- because of his sins or the sins of his family. Jesus responds that the reason was neither because he sinned nor because his parents sinned; rather, the man was born blind in order to display the glory of God.

John 9:6-7
6 Then he spit on the ground, made mud with the saliva, and smoothed the mud over the blind man's eyes. 7 He told him, "Go and wash in the pool of Siloam" (Siloam means Sent). So the man went and washed, and came back seeing!

It's a great story with amazing theological richness about the ways God displays his glory, but here is the idea that has grabbed my attention more than anything else in this passage:

How many times did Jesus have to spit in the dirt to make that mud?

Jesus Christ, the son of God, bent over the ground spitting and spitting and spitting into the dry, dusty ground of 1st century Palestine to make enough mud to cover this man’s eyes to deliver him from blindness. How long did he spit? How much did he have to spit? What were the people around him thinking? He was willing to lower himself to the ground, hover over the dust, and spit until he had mud to bring new vision to his life.

It’s a picture of a leader who was willing to enter into the mess.

Make Disciples

2009-11-16T17:26:00.002-05:00

For the past few weeks, we've been exploring this idea that community is messy-- and that it's in the midst of the mess that God brings change to our lives.

Some of you are reading this today and you are on the verge of giving up because you are tired from carrying the mess. You question your leadership. You question the point. You are tired and confused and frustrated. You feel burned out and think the lack of growth in your group is the result of a flaw in your leadership. My encouragement to you:

Stay the course.

What you are doing is fulfilling the role your Creator gave you to do. You are completing the mission your Lord and Savior has charged you to do. When he gave his last command, the Great Commission, he said, “Go and make disciples of all nations.” He didn’t say go find disciples. He said go make disciples. That means it is work. And that requires us to embrace the mess and enter the mess.

Let's remember our mission is to make disciples...not simply find them.

Wading Through the Mess

2009-11-13T11:57:00.002-05:00

For a few weeks, I've been writing about dealing with mess when it happens in group. There's no formula for navigating it, solving it, or fixing it. But here are some best practices that can guide us.

1. Acknowledge the mess
It's best to acknowledge mess when it happens and not be afraid to call it what it is. Paul told the Philippian church, “I plead with Euodia and I plead with Synteche to agree with one another in the Lord.” Imagine being one of them when that letter was read to the congregation. When mess happens, admit it. Some of us have a tendency to want to ignore it and hope it goes away on its own. That won't happen. Don’t let an elephant linger in the room.

2. Identify the kind of mess
Second, it might be helpful to identify the kind of mess you are encountering. Is it a sin mess? Relational mess? Life mess? Often, it’s some combination of two or maybe even all three. Identifying the kind of mess will keep you from feeling immediately overwhelmed.

3. Have the right perspective.
Three, have the right perspective. Mess is not the end of your group, it’s the catalyst for something great in your group. Sometimes you have to take a big step back to see the bigger picture. Let me pause on this one because I believe our perspective makes all the difference.

I talk about metaphors from the engineering world quite a bit so let me shift gears and give you illustration from the world of art that I blogged about here, Perspective: Mess or Masterpiece?

Sometimes you have to take a big step back in order to see God’s perspective on what is happening in your group. Perspective can transform the mess of our lives into a masterpiece of God’s transforming power. To say “pray and read your Bible” seems like a very trite and predictable thing to say, but it’s true because that’s how we get God’s perspective. I am convinced that God wants to give us wisdom and discernment about the people he has entrusted to us and on the situations we find ourselves in.

If you are like me, there is a tendency for you to see everything that happens in your group—both good and bad—as a reflection on your leadership. So when sin happens or conflict happens or bad things happen to my group members, my immediate instinct is to assume something is wrong with my leadership. When the sin mess that eventually turned into relational mess happened in my group, I immediately thought, “What did I do wrong?” Now, I think looking at your own leadership is always a good thing. But sometimes, it’s not a matter of “what did you do wrong?” but of “what did you do right?” Sin happens. Conflict happens. Life happens. Mess happens. People don’t necessarily sin or get into petty arguments because you are a bad leader. It could be that you are a great leader and you have created an environment in which God can bring those things to the surface in a safe environment in order to deal with them. When mess happens, you might be exactly where God wants you to be as a group. The question is what he wants to do and how he wants to work.

4. Ask good questions.
In every mess you face, there is what you know and there is reality. And there is often a vast chasm between the two. Suspend judgment and fill the void of what’s known and what’s reality with good questions. Asking good questions also allows you to go beneath the surface mess and discover the roots of the mess. In every mess, there is often a deeper mess that God might want to expose and use to bring growth.

5. Talk to the right people.
Next, talk to the right people. Know where you can go for support, guidance, and assistance. There is a big difference between getting help and spreading gossip, so make sure you are going to people who can actually come alongside you to help your clean, navigate, or tend the mess. Who is a coach, a pastor, a trusted friend who can help you know how to engage the mess?

And know that some messes require professional counseling. When your group begins to revolve around the mess of one person, the mess has become toxic and requires professional attention. You don’t just stand around and watch a hazardous waste spill and hope it will clean itself. You call in professionals.

6. Communicate a Biblical goal.
Every mess is an opportunity for growth and every mess is an opportunity to bring glory to God. That’s how we try to approach the messes we encounter in our community.

Here’s the difficult truth—not every mess will have a happy ending. In fact, as my husband Ryan and I were thinking about a lot of the messes we had encountered, I realized that I had been less than stellar in how I handled many of them. And even fewer had nice, clean resolutions.

But even if the mess doesn’t completely resolve, we can always learn something and we can always grow.

7. Commit to the Process
Finally, commit to the process. It’s going to require transparency, commitment to people, leadership, care, time, prayer, digging into the Word, and discernment. The question is, are you willing to fight? Not fight the mess…but fight in the midst of messy environments to become the answer to Jesus’ prayer in the Garden that his followers be one? To fight for community? To fight to fulfill the commandment of Jesus to make disciples?

Sacred Roads Winner!

2009-11-09T23:23:00.002-05:00

AND...we have a winner for the free leader kit of Sacred Roads: Exploring the Historic Paths of Discipleship. Theresa Haskins-- small group leader at Northside Christian Church in Virginia. (Winner chosen by random.org)

Congratulations, Theresa!

Stay tuned for more Sacred Roads updates and free stuff in the future.

If you just can't wait and want to order a copy for yourself, go to the Threads store.

Inspectors vs. Engineers

2009-11-07T12:13:00.002-05:00

When mess happens in groups, it's messy. That's the profound kind of statement that I get paid the big bucks for at National Community Church. And my follow up comment isn't much better. There is no formula I can give you for dealing with the mess. Every mess is different. Every leader is different. And the variables at play in any given situation are endless.

Instead of recommending a formula, let me suggest a posture: be an environmental engineer instead of a compliance inspector.

Compliance inspectors conduct audits and tell you what’s wrong. It’s easy to point out messes and deliver opinions; it’s much harder to be an engineer that creates environments where the mess can be transformed into something good.

Compliance inspectors focus on the problem; engineers focus on the solution.

Compliance inspectors care most about outputs; engineers care most about inputs.

Compliance inspectors write up reports on how well you are following the rules; engineers draw up plans for making environments better.

Engineers look for solutions, and as a small group leader, you are an environmental engineer—you are creating environments that foster spiritual growth. And that sometimes means cleaning up the messes. Sin messes might need to be cleaned—like a hazardous waste spill. Relational messes need to be navigated. Life messes need to be tended—to be cared for.

It’s not the job of the leader to eliminate and eradicate mess from the small group; that’s the job of the Holy Spirit. The job of the leader is to create an environment in which people can best see, engage, and respond to the work of the Holy Spirit. Your job as a leader is to engineer an environment where transformation can happen.

Wesley's Discipleship

2009-11-04T12:35:00.000-05:00

John Wesley had a pretty hard-hitting approach to discipleship. In many small groups today, structuring the meeting time around the following questions would be frightening to many members. But if you want to challenge your people to deeper community and more focused discipleship, try these questions:

Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am a better person than I really am? In other words, am I a hypocrite?
Am I honest in all my acts and words, or do I exaggerate?
Do I confidentially pass on what was told to me in confidence?
Can I be trusted?
Am I a slave to dress, friends, work or habit?
Am I self-conscious, self-pitying, or self-justifying?
Did the Bible live in me today?
Do I give God time to speak to me everyday?
Am I enjoying prayer?
When did I last speak to someone else of my faith?
Do I pray about the money I spend?
Do I get to bed on time and get up on time?
Do I disobey God in anything?
Do I insist on doing something about which my conscience is uneasy?
Am I defeated in any part of my life?
Am I jealous, impure, irritable, touchy, or distrustful?
How do I spend my spare time?
Am I proud?
Do I thank God I am not as other people, especially as the Pharisees who despised the publican?
Is there anyone I fear, or dislike, or criticize, or resent? If so, what am I doing about it?
Do I grumble and complain constantly?
Is Christ real to me?

Types of Messes

2009-11-04T09:42:00.002-05:00

Small Groups are messy. It seems to me there are three major types of messes that we face when leading people. Categories can be a bit limiting because they always break down, but I think they can also provide some helpful language and distinctions for thinking intentionally and strategically about appropriate ways to respond to the specific mess we are facing.

Sin Messes
Sin messes happen between an individual and God, but they enter into your group experience because people are sinful. You discover someone in your group is having an affair. Or engaged in unethical business practices. Your small group becomes a safe place for people to confess addictions or habits that are destructive.

Several years ago I led a small group that I was convinced was the most perfect group God ever put together. I couldn’t believe it—it was full of young, smart, likable, energetic, and attractive twenty-somethings who seemed eager and hungry to grow in their relationship with God. We had great discussions about the Bible and great community life throughout the week. I was convinced that God could change the world through us. Until I got a phone call from my co-leader. He prefaced the conversation with this: “Are you sitting down?” He proceeded to tell me that two single individuals in the group—one of whom we were raising up as a potential leader—were sleeping together. In fact, they had been living together without our knowing. That was just the beginning. We discovered other mess in the lives of our group members and a lot of it was this very type— sin mess.

Relational Messes
The second type of mess is the kind we encounter most often in group life. It’s relational mess. The kind that happens in the group between two individuals. Or three. Or four. Or between your whole group. It includes the talking messes—you know, like the long talkers, no talkers, off-topic talkers, narcissistic talkers, extra grace required talkers, theologically divisive talkers, weird talkers, trash talkers. It’s the mess of conflict or disagreement or personality clashes. It’s the mess of agreeing to agree on doctrine and agree to disagree over opinion only to learn that you disagree over what’s doctrine and what’s opinion. It’s the mess that predictably and inevitably happens whenever you put more than one person in a room together.

It's the kind of mess that happened to me not too long ago when some individuals in my group really began to open up and share hurts, fears, and disappointments. One individual confessed to the group that they only prayer she had been able to muster recently was, "God, what the hell are you doing?" I was proud to lead a group that created such a safe place for someone to be that vulnerable. Until another person in the group spoke up to condemn the language that had just been used. Relational messes-- the friction that occurs between people-- is the one we face most often in groups.

Life Messes
Then there is life mess. This is the kind of mess that happens to individuals in your group that is totally unrelated to their group experienced but completely affects your group experience. Think of sudden deaths, divorce, cancer, a job loss. It’s the kind of mess that happens because we live in a broken world, and, in healthy groups, when one member suffers, the whole group suffers.

It's the kind of mess that happens in our groups here on Capitol Hill every two or four years. Lost elections-- which result in lost jobs. Sometimes, a group contains those on the left side of the political aisle and those on the right side of the political aisle, and the election cycle can mean significant change for those people. Some lose jobs while others get promoted. It's a challenge for a leader to rejoice with those whose lives are changing for the good and to simultaneously mourn with those who face loss.

Often, these messes are interrelated. Relational messes lead to sin messes. And life messes lead to relational messes. We'll talk next about some ways to address mess when it happens in group.

Mess and Transformation

2009-10-30T08:15:00.003-05:00

Where people exist, mess abounds. Which means that small groups are messy. I live in a world where mess abounds. My church is about 60% single and under the age of 35, and many of them work jobs that have political overtones or undertones. The three issues I find myself addressing over and over again: 1) appropriate relational and sexual boundaries, 2) how to approach alcohol Biblically and responsibly, and3) how to navigate tricky political issues with people whose passions and jobs are fueled by them.

I’ve discovered the hard way, and I’m beginning to discover in a hopeful way, that mess and transformation are directly proportional. There is always a link.

Sometimes mess is the byproduct of growth. When systems are working properly, there will be a messy byproduct. For example, if a car is running, there will be exhaust. It’s the natural and expected byproduct of a working system. Several years ago, a young man attended a small group training class that focused on the need for transparency among leaders. He decided to put that into practice. Which meant he had to confess to a pastor that he struggled with same-sex attraction. The growth in his life—a desire to be more transparent—resulted in some messy byproduct—a confession that had to be engaged. Because he learned and grew, mess came out. The good news? The mess led to transformation. That young man grew through the mess and today serves as a sought-after leaders in the group ministry at his church. Mess is the byproduct of growth.

Sometimes it works the other way around and mess can be the catalyst for change. Mess happens and it causes people to grow as a result. Think about compost piles. They don’t do their job unless trash is heaped on them regularly. Several years ago, a leader met with me to let me know he was stepping down from leadership and submitting to spiritual authority for accountability and growth. He confessed that he had been hanging out with his small group one night and had a bit too much to drink. The result was behavior inappropriate for a Christ-follower, much less for a leader. He submitted to a process of accountability and growth which catalyzed spiritual growth in his life, and his transparency and response actually caused those around him to respect him more. Mess happened, which catalyzed a growth moment, and transformation happened. Today, he's back in leadership with more maturity and more respect from those he leads.

Mess is the byproduct, the catalyst, and the environment of transformation. Mess means that change is happening, is right around the corner, or will happen if we engage it correctly.

Lessons From the Pig Farm

2009-10-29T12:24:00.002-05:00

I learned an important lesson about dealing with messy community and messy discipleship at a pig farm in southern Louisiana. When I was a graduate student in the biological engineering department at Louisiana State University, I took a class called bioreactor design. Bioreactors are used to grow cells and tissues and are systems that transform raw materials into useful products. The class focused on understanding the variables and catalysts of the reactions that transformed inputs into productive outputs—like turning chemicals into medicines and wastewater into wetlands. It was about designing a system in which transformation was catalyzed.

Toward the end of the semester, each of us was required to participate in a project that brought together all the principles we had learned. While the majority of my classmates were designing systems that working with snazzy equipment and studying reaction kinetics for cranking out important products like pharmaceuticals, I was sloshing through the mud and poop of Ben Hur Research Farm every day to take samples from the treatment lagoon at the swine animal feeding operation. In other words, I was drawing samples of pig crap out of a pit.

Here’s the deal. Pig farms stink. I mean, they stink really badly. And most of the farmers treat the waste in treatment lagoons. My goal was to reduce the stink. My project was to determine the variables and kinetic parameters (width, length, depth, retention time, flow, volume, etc) for the reactions in the lagoon that broke down the waste and converted it into useful product—fertilizer—and to come up with new lagoon designs that maximized those reactions. Does that make sense? All this pig poop was being flushed into a alagoon…and I had to make it less stinky.

But here’s the deal—I quickly learned I couldn't do anything to directly address the stink. Instead, I have to focus on creating an environment in which the stink was most effectively and efficiently converted into a useful and beneficial product. The point was not to focus on the stink but to focus on the environment. To design an environment that fostered change and maximized transformation.

In the church, we tend to want to focus on the stink. The sin, the mess, the conflict, the “whatever” that we perceive to be inhibiting growth and community. And we think if we point at it and say firmly enough “stop” that it will go away. Or we try to ignore it away. In reality, we need to approach things like that bioreactor design class. Acknowledge that mess (poo, crap, bad stuff) is a natural by-product of life and work to create environments that catalyze change.

FREE TICKETS! to Lead Now

2009-10-29T12:10:00.004-05:00

There are lots of free giveaways here on Wineskins for Discipleship this week. In addition to the free leaders kit of Sacred Roads, we are giving away tickets to the Lead Now event (in Dallas and over 40 satellite locations) next week!

I can't believe I get to be a part of such a stellar lineup of speakers! This conference is unique in that it focuses almost exclusively on missional living in our world today. Even the small group track focuses on being the light of Christ in our communities rather than hiding that light in the homes where our small groups meet!

I’m going to give away two Conference tickets to the 10th person who emails me. Be sure to put “LeadNow’09 Tickets” in the subject line. So what are you waiting for? Send your email now!! I’ll announce the winner as soon as they winl.

If you don’t win, don’t worry you can Register Here.

Main Conference Site is at Irving Bible Church :: 2435 Kinwest Pkwy :: Irving, TX 75063

See The List of 40+ Remote Host Sites Here

Messes of Biblical Proportions

2009-10-27T12:41:00.003-05:00

Community is messy, and it's been that way since the beginning. Let's just think about some messes of Biblical proportions.

God created. Everything was good. Butthree chapters in, mess happened. Eve disobeyed God, encouraged Adam to join in the mess, and sin mess happened. Fingers got pointed and relational mess happened. The inevitable results of sin are proclaimed and life mess began.

Then we move to Cain and Abel. I would say jealousy and murder amount to mess.

Noah—built a huge boat to house the few remaining fragments of creation mess that God wanted to maintain. Later, he got himself drunk and his sons discovered him naked. Which resulted in some family breakdownMess.

Then there was Abraham claiming that his wife was not his wife and navigating water resources rights with his nephew, Lot. There’s Isaac and Rebekah playing favorites with their sons Jacob and Esau, thereby producing life-long (and history-altering) sibling rivalry. Then Jacob favoritism to his own son Joseph, which resulted in another family meltdown.

Let’s fast forward a few hundred years to Moses. I like to think of Moses as the first small group leader in the Bible—but look at these people he was charged with leading. They don’t follow instructions. They complain. And they forget the miracles they see in a matter of hours- they are completely ADD. It’s a mess.

Fast forward a bit more to David. I think of David as the second small group leader in the Bible. In 1 Samuel 22 we read about David running for his life and then hiding in the cave of Adullam. Then Scripture tells us that he was first joined by his family. And then he was joined by men who were in trouble, in debt, or just discontented. Great. Talk about a dysfunctional group. First of all- family. Then add on the Extra Grace Required people in the form of those who were in trouble or in debt or just plain discontented. Mess. How many of us feel like that’s our small group? Right? And think about David's other messy relationships. David and Saul. David and Uriah. David and Bathsheba. David and the prophet Nathan. David and his son Absalom. Okay, pretty much David and everyone.

Skip over to the New Testament. Jesus was born in the mess of a stable—a cave where animals were kept and fed. Placed in a stone feeding tough. Jesus called 12 men to follow him- fisherman, tax collectors, political revolutionaries—who bickered over who was going to be greatest in the Kingdom.

In Acts 15, the apostles had to meet in Jerusalem to sort out theological mess. Paul and Peter had issues. Paul and John Mark had issues.

The majority of writings in the New Testament are there because the early church was messy. Look at the church in Corinth—all the stuff that was happening there. Incestuous affairs, lawsuits, divorce and separation, idol worship, big egos, doctrinal fighting, sexual promiscuity, people getting drunk while celebrating communion. And you thought your small group was messed up.

And yet...in the midst of the mess...

As we read these stories, we see the hand of God writing his own story in them and through them. Emerging from the mess is the fingerprint of God writing the hope of the Gospel and the story of redemption in history.

Proverbs 14:4 has become one of my organizing metaphors in regards to group life:

Where no oxen are, the manger is clean, but much increase comes by the strength of the ox.

You can have a clean barn with no animals in there. But you aren’t going to get much done without animals.

You can have a tidy group as long as no one is in it. But community requires that we show up. And showing up means bringing our mess.

Small Groups are Great...?

2009-10-26T15:03:00.002-05:00

Small groups are great...and then the people show up.

Once upon a time we heard a pastor give a stirring message on the theological, ecclesiological, and practical importance of life in community and we left with a newfound conviction that small groups are great. An announcement was made from the pulpit about the need for new small group leaders, and we decided to put our convictions into practice because we were convinced both spiritually and experientially that small groups are great. We courageously attended leadership training classes and left with a passion to change the world through the greatness of groups. We saw our group promoted in print, in word, in pictures and we approached the night of our first meeting with a holy anticipation. Small groups are great!

And then people walked through the door.

It might not happen on the first night. It might not happen in the first month or even in the first year, but at some point, our well-tended "great" group experience begin to fall apart. The chairs are set, the snacks are ready, the lesson is prepared, the service project is planned... we are doing everything we need to do as a leader. And all of a sudden, we realize that there are some things no one ever told us about leading small groups. The nice thoughts about growth and friends and transparency and community fade into the newfound realization that groups are messy.

What do you do at that moment? The moment you realize that groups are messy will become the defining moment of your leadership.

Here's the scary news: small groups are messy because groups are made up of people and people are messy. Community is messy because it’s about broken people hauling their brokenness and stink and baggage and moving in with you.

Here's the good news: mess might be exactly where God wants you to be to become the person and the community that he created you to be.

Mindy Caliguire: Leading From a Healthy Soul

2009-10-24T09:52:00.004-05:00

These are notes from Mindy Caliguire's (check out her site here) talk at the Willow Group Life Conference.

Matthew 16:24

v.26- what good will it be to gain the whole world but forfeit your own soul.

I once thought that the most important skills for leading a small group included things like good listening skills, knowledge of Bible, welcoming people, willingness to guide people, communication skills, measure of spiritual maturity, etc.

Those things are important, but today my answer about most important qualification for small group leaders has changed. One quality that a leader must have if the group is going to be effective in transformation. The leader must be leading from a healthy soul.

What is a healthy soul?
Saved and alive. It has been brought to life. Whether you realize it or not, your soul has the capacity to have a quality of life. It requires nourishment.

Do you know yourself? There was a symptom that indicated that my soul was not well and I ignored it. I went through a season where I had become totally out of touch with the woman God had created me to be. Because I ignored that, I was sidelined from my own life and ministry for a season. In hindsight, this was a way God was dealing with my heart...saying it's not so much what you do for me but who you are with me.

We must recover the importance of the redeemed soul.

Following Christ should not result in a diminishing interior life, but sometimes the demands of leadership results in that.

Symptoms of Neglected Soul

Apathy
Judgemental spirit
Insomnia
Anger
Fear
Isolation

Symptoms of Healthy Soul

Joy
Confidence joined with Humility
Safety
Purpose
Energy
Attentiveness

Are pace of life and healthy soul indirectly proportionally? Mutually exclusive?

We should allow the health of our soul to guide the pace that we keep. Allow your pace of life to be submitted to how God is leading you. We may need to do make some radical changes in our schedule. Biblical simplicity: God is our focus and we allow everything else to emerge from that relationship.

David Johnson: Real Formation for Real People

2009-10-24T08:43:00.002-05:00

These are notes from David Johnson's (from Church of the Open Door) opening talk at the Willow Group Life Conference.

Real change can be hit or miss.

Ron Sider notes that most evangelical Christians are not different from the culture in the following areas:

in money
sexual ethic
racism
divorce

Philippians - work out your salvation through fear and trembling-- not work for your salvation but work out your salvation.

To encourage spiritual formation, we typically tell our people to

Get into a group
Get involved in spiritual disciplines

These are standard answers and good answers. But you can be doing these things but still not be transformed. So what is the key?

Here are three I've thought of:

1. We have to be authentic
2. We have to be courageous
3. There has to be grace

If there isn't an environment of grace people will never find the courage to be authentic.

Matthew 5-- Blessed are those who mourn. There are 9 Greek words for the concept of mourning. This one has to do with authenticity-- Blessed are those who start getting out here (into the open) what is going on in here (in the heart, in the secret places of life). Basically, it's blessed are those who quit pretending.

"I refuse to live in the dark anymore, I'm going to live in the light of what is true of me." People who live like that are being changed. Because they are courageous and authentic.

Grace is the only thing that has ever given us the courage to bring out in the light what we tend to hide in the dark. What if we knew there would be grace and healing about that thing we just can't talk about?

Win a Free Sacred Roads DVD Kit!

2009-10-23T23:27:00.004-05:00

Hey-- want a chance to win a free leader kit of Sacred Roads: Exploring the Historic Paths of Discipleship, my new small group study published by Threads? The leader kit includes a member book, a DVD with video clips to jump start discussion in your small group, and a CD-Rom with leader helps, music, audio files, and more.

Winning is easy. All you need to do is post an entry on your blog, Facebook, or Twitter telling your readers about this Threads giveaway and linking them back to this post. Then, come back to this page and post a comment linking to your social network post. We will randomly choose one winner from those who posted to receive the leader kit.

Let the games begin!

Shoe Box Trip

2009-10-23T13:28:00.002-05:00

I love Operation Christmas Child! Pack up a shoebox full of toys, candy, socks, shirts, toothbrushes, and anything else you can stuff in and send it to a kid around the world for Christmas.

Threads and OCC are sending one young adult or young adult leader on a mission to impact the hearts of needy children with a simple gift and the powerful message of salvation through Jesus Christ. Check out http://www.threadsmedia.com/sendme and tell us why we should send you on a shoe box distribution trip! The winner will be chosen based on their compelling story. I would love to go myself, but I'm not sure I could win the compelling story contest. I know I've got some blog readers who could, though!

Perspective: Mess or Masterpiece?

2009-10-22T22:02:00.003-05:00

In the movie Clueless, Tai asks, "What's a Monet?" And the budding young art historian Cher responds, "It’s like a painting, see? From far away, it’s OK, but up close, it’s a big old mess."

Georges Seurat took the messy form even further, blending art, the science of optics, and color theory into neo-impressionist forms of pointillism or-- as he preferred to characterize it-- chromoluminarism.

Up close, it's a mess of dots.
Step back a few paces and the picture comes into view as the eye optically mixes the colored dots into new colors.

And step back further to get the complete picture.

Mess or masterpiece? Perspective makes all the difference. And that holds true when we face mess in our community life, as well. The Church-- the Body of Christ-- the Family of God-- is composed of a bunch of dots all jumbled up together. And it often looks like a complete mess. And yet when God is holding the brush, the mess somehow transforms into a masterpiece.

When we encounter mess in our small groups, ministries, Sunday School classes, places of community life in our churches, the first thing we need to remember is perspective. How does God view the situation? What might He allow to emerge from the mess? Perspective can transform the scattered fragments of our lives from mess to masterpiece.

** Oh yeah, and I checked off another life goal today. Got to see Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte up close...and a few paces back...for real in person.

Shenandoah

2009-10-22T21:36:00.003-05:00

Ryan and I took off at the beginning of the week for a quick vacation in the Shenandoah mountains. Vacation for us included the following:

13 miles of trail hiked
10 hours of Settlers of Catan played
4 hours of movies watched
2 bears sighted
Lots of meat (a few pounds) and 1 apple pie consumed

Friendly black bear

Friendly Deer
Great scenery

You Thought Your Small Group Was Crazy

2009-10-16T19:40:00.002-05:00

When Paul wrote his first letter to the church at Corinth, he had to address some pretty messy and sticky situations. Think about it-- incestuous affairs, lawsuits, divorce and separation, idol worship, big egos, doctrinal fighting, sexual promiscuity, people getting drunk while celebrating communion, etc.

And you thought your group was crazy. The reality is that community and discipleship are messy. It's always been that way. In fact, Paul wrote the majority of his letters to churches that were experiencing messy situations, and he was willing to step into the mess and embrace what God was doing in the midst of it. He realized that mess could be the catalyst for, the byproduct of, and the environment for transformation.

We could learn from the way that Paul frames his response. He begins his letter to these crazy people by saying, "I cannot stop thanking God for all the generous gifts he has given you" and he ends the letter with, "My love to all of you in Christ Jesus."

Thoughts for the Day

2009-10-16T19:38:00.001-05:00

These are random...but two favorite things I read today:

“Jesus had a habit of collecting disreputables; he called them disciples.” (Mike Yaconelli, Messy Spirituality)

"Anyone who claims to know all the answers doesn't really know very much." (Paul, letter to the church at Corinth)

Tools for the Tour Guide

2009-10-13T14:41:00.002-05:00

We need fewer spiritual travel agents and more spiritual tour guides. It's easy to sit in a comfortable climate-controlled office and tell people where to go, how to get there, what to do once they are there, and what they might see. It's totally different to change into the hiking shoes, strap on the pack, and go on the journey with people.

Sacred Roads is about exploring the historic paths of discipleship. Walking the roads of spiritual growth and picking up ideas along the way. Tools for the Tour Guide-- a recent blog series-- gives ideas and resources to those who are leading, guiding, and interpreting for others. Small group leaders, discipleship pastors, Sunday School teachers, etc.

In case you missed them, here are the posts:

Sacred Roads: The Adventure of Discipleship
Historical Amnesia
Making Disciples Relationally
Making Disciples Experientially
Making Disciples Intellectually
Making Disciples Personally
Making Disciples Incarnationally
Making Disciples- NEXT