Imagine a pastor who serves faithfully at a church for 20 or 30 or 40 years, and is well-loved by the congregation. Then in their final months when engaging conversations about succession, feelings get hurt, things are said in the emotion of a moment, and they leave their church feeling dejected and pushed out.
Read MoreWhen a pastor is retiring or transitioning, and a successor is being considered--there are typically three common types of transition. Sometimes a church can strategically choose--other times the decision is thrust upon them and pre-determined outside the control of the leaders. But those transitions typically fall into one of these categories …
Read MoreWe’ve already acknowledged that pastoral succession is the elephant in the room of many church elder or board meetings. So what is the right time to begin talking about succession? Let’s look at seven signs.
Read MoreSuccession is the elephant in the room of every church with a pastor that is in their mid-50’s or older. The pastor doesn’t want to bring it up too soon, because he or she fears that the just mentioning the word will bring it on faster than they would like. And the Board or Elders don’t want to bring it up, because they don’t want to give any indication they are trying to push the pastor out.
Read MoreIt’s time to quit being frustrated by people’s irregular attendance and embrace it! Churches that are winning are finding ever-better ways to keep their members engaged even when they aren’t there in person.
Read MoreIn whatever method you find to “do” church – it can be both missional and attractional. It can be about both sending and gathering. It can be about equipping your people to be a difference in their homes and workplaces. And it can also be about putting on an attractive weekend service that makes it easy for your members to invite the people they care about the most.
Read MoreIt’s not that people aren’t pursuing their faith. There is a growing percentage of people of faith in our communities who love God the best they know how—they just see the church as completely irrelevant. It does not even cross their minds to go to a church service to figure out the next spiritual step they should take.
Read MoreIt felt like every week had to be better than the week before. Like a hamster on a wheel, the amazing series or event or production that we did last month or last year is gone all too quickly, and the only lasting impact is that now we have to do better on the next one.
Read MoreEach new model tells us why the way we are doing church isn’t working or isn’t good enough. We are told how all the previous model were fads and the newest one is going to replace all of them. We are told we need to change everything, go back to the drawing board and do something different—because everything we’ve done in the past was misguided, ineffective and possibly even sinful.
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