Five Guiding Principles of Effective Ministry

From One Size Doesn't Fit All by Gary L. McIntosh, p. 80:

McIntosh says you should run every decision that you make as a pastor and as a church through this grid to make sure you are focusing on the right things:

1. The Principle of Visionary Leadership
   A church grows when decisions are made based on the intention of bringing new people into the church.
2. The Principle of Human Resource Utilization
   A church grows when decisions provide the staff, leadership, and resources needed to focus on outreach.
3. The Principle of "Open Doors"
   A church grows when decisions create opportunities for new people to enter into the life of the congregation.
4. The Principle of Incorporation
   A church grows when decisions spawn ways to incorporate new people into the social circles of the membership.
5. The Principle of Finance
   A church grows when decisions adequately finance local outreach activities.

You cannot lead if...

Over on Ja Cook's Don't Survive, Thrive! he has a great post about what disqualifies someone from being a leader. Not sexual blunders or embezzling (although, I'm sure those are also disqualifiers).

Ja's list hits close to home with things like...

• You cannot lead if you cannot love those you lead

and

• You cannot lead if you cannot lift others up to be better than you

and

• You cannot lead if you cannot last through trials and hurdles

Be sure to check out the rest.

Get-It-Done Guy's 9 Steps to Work Less and Do More

Today is a special day! Today is September 14, the date of the long-awaited release of the Get-It-Done Guy's book - 9 Steps to Work Less and Do More.

Think of this book as a VERY PRACTICAL 7 Habits for Highly Effective Hipsters.

Stever Robbins has a refreshing, fun, witty way of hitting each of his points home with clarity and practicality. Did I mention it's practical? Because you can actually take the steps he's advocating and transform your life's priorities and efficiencies.

I've only read a few chapters so far (you can get your sample chapters here - and also download some audio), but I'm definitely looking forward to reading the whole book.


Order Get-It-Done Guy's 9 Steps to Work Less and Do More on Amazon.com Today

Spouses Working and Resting in Sync

Here's a novel concept:

• Everything that benefits the family counts as work.
• Both spouses "work" the same hours.
• Both spouses STOP "working" at the same time.
• Make a schedule and stick to it.

Let me tell you why this is such a novel concept for me.

I'm a half-time pastor (I work Tues, Thurs, half of Fri), a part-time web designer, and a half-time stay-at-home dad. My wife is a full-time teacher.

For the last couple of years, I've struggled with feeling "useful" because I'm just sitting at home half of the time. My wife struggles with feeling "useful" because she's not as involved in the life of the boy as she'd like to be.

As a stay-at-home parent, I can keep the house moderately clean, feed the boy, take him to gymnastics, and blow off any real interaction with him while I watch shows off the DVR and surf the web the rest of the day. There. I've done my part. Right?

Then, when my wife comes home (remember, she's actually been working all day), she rests while I'm putting supper on the table. Then I rest while she's doing more teacher stuff. Until it's time for her to go to bed, at which time I may do some web design or ministry stuff or Facebook.

This fragmented arrangement, where we work and rest out of sync with each other, has sometimes led to self-doubt about our usefulness, resentments about us-time v. me-time, some mild labor disputes about who's doing more, reinforcement of workaholic tendencies, etc.

Now, imagine we did something different.

When my wife leaves for work, I start "working." I do the dishes (with the boy). I tidy up (with the boy). I do laundry (with the boy). I school the boy. I play with the boy (actually focusing all my attention on him when I interact with him). I shop (with the boy). I work through my GTD lists. I do web design when he's napping. I fix meals (with the boy).

When my wife arrives home from work, she pitches in with supper and child-rearing. We both continue "working" at the home and family until the boy goes to bed...

Then? We're DONE!

The rest of the time is rest time... connecting time, tv time, internet time, pleasure reading time, whatever.

This arrangement honors the dignity of all the work being done (inside and outside the home). It resolves the labor disputes. It draws a clear line between life and work. It puts your connecting time in sync.

I gotta tell you... now that we're doing this, our house is a lot cleaner; the boy is happier; we both feel more useful; and we both connect better with each other when we're working together and resting together.

Would it work for you? How could it work if one partner worked nights? Could this be a first step to healing a fragmented life?

Efficiency v. Effectiveness - CAGEMATCH!

You may have noticed in my little blurb about me that "I'm on a journey toward becoming a more effective and efficient pastor."

Stephen R. Covey says:

"While you can think in terms of efficiency in dealing with time, a principle-centered person thinks in terms of effectiveness in dealing with people.”

I've too often made the mistake of trying to be efficient with people... putting the end results first or trying to make facetime as brief (i.e. efficient) as possible. Someone walks up to my desk to talk (about something actually important) and I've thought that I can "listen," check my e-mail, file papers, give "obvious" (duh!) answers, and still be effective. Um... no. Notsomuch.

Being efficient with people is not effective.

The goal here is to be efficient with time so you can take the time (however long it takes) to be effective with people.

This is something I've heard before (note 1, 2 previous entries on being fully present). But I find, as a naturally task-oriented person, that my default position is to ignore the relationship in the midst of getting things done.

Finally Back and Working Again

Thanks for your patience.

A lot has happened in the last month. I finished up my ministry in Wichita, KS (training, delegating, leaving notes and processes for the next pastor), sold our house, packed up the moving truck, and headed up to Chaska, MN. Whew!

We're mostly done unpacking on this end of things, and we're finally able to find almost everything (where is that Ergo baby carrier?).

On the work side of things, I've started meeting with Matt and Adam (the other two pastors in this new church planting project) every day. We've officially come up with a project name, applied for a Federal EIN, opened up a bank account, and have looked at office space for rent. We've been meeting people in the area and have had some great spiritual conversations with people. It seems that the people we've met are really open to talk about spiritual things!

A few notes on efficiency and effectiveness at this point:

1. Working with a team is more effective and eventually more efficient. We have better ideas and better execution when we're working together. But it takes much longer to process information and get into team mode on the front end. I'm assuming that it will all be worth it as we minister in our areas of giftedness and learn not to unnecessarily duplicate effort.
2. We don't have an office yet! There is no way to be really effective and efficient without room to set up office space. There's no place in my home for my books or files (or even my GTD inbox). So we've found office space that looks like it will work well (individual offices and a common work area). Now if we can just find enough money to rent it.
3. We have started to realize that we can't really be effective unless we have the right priorities and direction. So we are starting out this project with extended prayer, fasting, and worship times together with our families. In fact, this weekend we are going on a spiritual retreat to kick off our listening time (40 days of prayer and fasting for clarity on our core values and mission). If you are a praying person, I would appreciate your prayers as we seek to understand God's direction for this new church plant.
4. We can't be effective or efficient without communicating clearly. If we don't communicate our needs and desires, we are just setting ourselves up for roadblocks and frustration. This week we met with an area pastor from our denomination to communicate our needs and desires as a new area church. He was a little blindsided, because he hadn't heard anything about it. He didn't even know we'd moved into the area! But after a good deal of open communication, it really felt like we were on the same page. I think we will save lots of time and energy because we made the time to meet with him and communicate openly on the front end.
5. Exercise! I'm making time for exercise. And it turns out it helps me to think more clearly. Who knew?

Anyway, I'm back and posting again. We'll be starting a blog soon for our church planting project, if you're interested in following that. Keep your eyes open.

Fully Present - Fatherhood

One of the greatest gifts we can give to anyone is the gift of being "fully present."

You know the "fully present" person. He makes you feel like talking to you is the single-most important thing he could be doing right now. She makes you feel like everything you say is interesting. You feel heard. You feel valued. You feel... loved?

You know the other people, too. You're talking and they're glancing around. You're asking for input, and they make you repeat the question. They're looking at their watch, waiting for the next thing. Or they're nodding their heads, waiting for you to be quiet so they can make their point.

All too often, I'm one of the other people - I'm the one looking around, checking my watch, nodding my head, waiting for you to leave. I'm task-oriented, not people-oriented. And I've used that as an excuse long enough.

Last summer, we had a guy come over and give us a bid on sodding our front yard. I was the one at home taking care of my son. And the guy asks, "you got the babysitting duty today, huh?" I said, "yeah, I get to hang out with him in the afternoons."

The more I thought about what he had asked, the more rankled I got. I really should have blasted him: "I'm not babysitting. I'm fathering. I'm being a dad. I'm doing the single-most important thing I could be doing right now - spending meaningful time with my son. It's my singular focus to pass on my beliefs and values to the next generation, to help my son grow up into a mature, responsible, productive, godly man!"

But I didn't say any of those things. I only thought them later...

But over the last few months, I have come to realize that I have not been as "fully present" as I would like to be for my son. I have not been so fully engaged in the "single-most important thing I should be doing right now."

Too often, I'm content to plunk him down in front of the TV to watch Praise Baby! or Muzzy auf Deutsch (hey, they're inspirational and educational, right?). Or I'll spend an afternoon surfing the web (or writing this blog), hoping he doesn't bother me too much or require a great deal of my attention. He comes over to play, and I catch myself shrugging him off...

But I want to be "fully present." I don't want to be the (physically present) absentee father. I don't want to be another parenting statistic. So I've resolved to blog only when he's napping. I've decided to keep a @Play list of ideas for meaningful things we could do together.

How do you intentionally make yourself "fully present" for your kids?

Enforcing Your Schedule

Last time I was getting my hair cut, the stylist was talking (I think it's part of their formal training) about my family and my job and what I do, blablabla. And she said, "Oh, I could never be a pastor. Being on call like that all the time..."

I've heard that sentiment quite a bit. I think pastors are only on call 24/7 when they allow themselves to be on call 24/7.

Does this stylist really think she can call and get in touch with her pastor at 3am? And does she think her pastor will actually do something for her at 3am? Maybe if her pastor is some weird, codependent, people-pleasing, enabler with no sense of boundaries...

Just a couple of personal stories:

I had a member call around midnight once. The ringing woke me up (I had been in bed two or three hours already). I looked at the caller-id and saw it wasn't a family member. So I went back to sleep. I called the man back around 5:30am. I said, "I noticed on my caller-id that you called me last night. It must have been really important for you to call so late. So I'm returning your phone call." The man could hardly talk, he was so sleepy. And he never tried to call me late again. (That's me being a little passive-aggressive.)

A family transferred to Cornerstone from a different church. They are very active members with lots of energy and ideas. Unfortunately, those ideas seemed to desperately require my input every Sunday (my day off). Sometimes multiple times on Sunday. This went on for about three weeks [note to self: passive-aggressive behavior doesn't work with some people]. Finally, one Sunday when they called, I just said, "Look. Sunday is my day off and I'm trying to spend it with my family and not think about work (because a big part of the pastor's job is thinking). I'm excited that you have all these ideas, but if you need to get in touch with me, I'm available during the week. Please don't call me on Sunday unless you're dying." They seemed a little hurt and brought it up twice over the next couple of months, but they have never called me again on my day off.

Top 5 Ways to Enforce Your Schedule:

1. Publish your work schedule. Write it out on a chart. Put it on the church office door. Send it out to all the members. Give it to all the new and potential members in your Membership Class. When it changes, send a new one out to the members, so they'll have an updated copy. Download my most recent.
2. Don't publish your home phone number. Not even in the church directory. If you really think people may need to get in touch with you during non-office hours, get a cell phone. When you don't want to take business calls, just turn your cell phone off. Your spouse doesn't need to become your de facto secretary, constantly telling people to call you at the office or taking your messages.
3. Make exceptions truly exceptional. If someone is dying, break your schedule. Otherwise, keep it intact.
4. Be direct about your boundaries. Tell your church that they can't get in touch with you on date night. Tell people what you will and won't do. Tell them you're only willing to work 40 hours a week. If you don't tell them, they won't know.
5. Quit micromanaging. For the most part, let your church members make their best decisions and let it go. If you have to control everything and make yourself indispensable, people won't be able to make a move without your personal blessing. If you have created that pastor-dependent culture, it's your own fault when people are hounding you for input 24/7.

Some links to previous articles:

• Work Two Day-Parts Every Day
• Why I Do My Weekly Review on Monday
• Tuesday is My Pastor's Date Night

My Review Broke Today

So, in the middle of my weekly GTD review, a church member came in to my office very distraught that her daughter had been incarcerated and was being held without arraignment for a while because it is President's Day.

All that to say that my GTD review didn't get done today! But also to say that maybe I do need to remember that a big part of my job is to comfort the afflicted, and sometimes that can't wait.

I've been meaning to post on the weekly review for a while, because it is, IMHO, the single-most important factor in keeping the GTD system working properly.

That said, I want to point you to a new post on zen habits. It explains the review process nicely. And it makes a major case for going on to the last step of the review, into higher-level thinking and the goal review. Enjoy the post.

Documents, Processes, and Worksheets (oh, my!)

Here are updated links to some of my processes and worksheets. Feel free to use them as you deem fit. They are registered under a Creative Commons License: Attribution, Noncommercial, Share-Alike – CreativeCommons.org

Time Management:

• Time Log (MSWord) - No Longer Available
  
• Time Log (PDF) - No Longer Available
  

Personal Vision Workbook (now a book):

• Personal Vision Workbook
  

Sermon Planning:

• Sermon Series Planning Worksheet
• Sermon Planning Calendar (MSWord) - Sample Filled-out
• Sermonic Year Planning Checklist

Keeping a Time Log - How Depressing

When I was going through the Ministry Advantage Pastor's Coaching System, my personal coach wanted me to do a 1-week time log. For five consecutive work-days I set my timer to go off every 15 minutes (during "at-work" time) and wrote down what I had been doing during those last 15 minutes.

Then, in a second column, I had to categorize my time by roles - "pastoral," "administrative," "visionary," "evangelistic," "secretarial/notmyjob," "janitorial/notmyjob," "rescuing/notmyjob," "games," etc.

I did not like what I found. But they tell me that awareness is the first step to recovery.

I must say that the point of this exercise was NOT to show the utter disaster of my time management skills (although that was a healthy side-effect). My coach was really trying to help me figure out my pastoral role. Was I doing the things I was hired to do, or could these things be done by someone else?

It was really easy for me to rationalize it out from day to day and say, "I'll just do it myself. I want it done right. I don't have time to train anyone, anyway. Who else would do it?" And then I end up mailing out the weekly sermon CDs. For a year! What was I thinking?!!

Do a 1-week time log. You may be surprised at what you find. But awareness is the first step to recovery.

Time Management Quote for the Day

From The Stewardship of Life by Kirk Nowery:

Traditional approaches to time mamagement deal with sgementation, prioritization, implementation and the like; but the bigger question when it comes to time management is not the degree of practical efficiency but the measure of spiritual effectiveness. If we are to be truly wise stewards, we have to ask: What is really going to matter at the end of our earthly days? When we answer to God for our lives, what will be of greatest value?

Begin with the real end in mind...

Tuesday is My Pastor's Date Night

My wife and I are both PKs (pastors' kids - for those of you who don't know). And both of our shiny, happy families disintegrated when our pastor dads left our pastor's wife moms. Her family split when she was six; mine finally tanked when I was in seminary.

Needless to say, we both learned a lot about pastor's families. Mostly what not to do. I'm shocked I'm a pastor. And my wife is shocked she's married to one.

So, when we were first getting serious about being in a relationship together, we put some safeguards in place to keep us from the kind of non-relationship that destroyed our parents.

One of those is date night. Ever since we've been married, we've always taken one night per week for date night. It usually means dinner out and a movie in. But sometimes it means Taco Bell and a trip to Barnes&Noble. The point is that we are intentionally making special time for each other on a weekly basis.

When we had our firstborn, it was a little harder to have date night. But as soon as he was old enough, we set up a babysitting co-op for Tuesday nights with a couple of other young families. So now we have date night 3 out of 4 Tuesdays (it's our turn to babysit the other week).

My church knows about date night. They know not to call me on Tuesday evenings. Ever. I put it on my work-schedule that I share with all of my members. And I enforce it. It makes its way into sermons (when I preach about the Sabbath, I talk about date night; it helps people see Sabbath in a relational way and reinforces my date night boundaries).

Not only is date night good for my sanity and the strength of my marriage, it's good modeling for the other families in the church.

Pastor's One Minute Job Description

In Kenneth Blanchard's classic One Minute Manager, he talks about having One Minute Goals so you (and your supervisor) know what you're about (and not about). Something that you have prominently displayed so that you can review it in about One Minute every day.

One of the biggest problems facing a pastor is that there is virtually no agreement on what a pastor's job description is or should be. Your denomination thinks your job is to promote denominational programs, values, and initiatives (and get your paperwork in on time). Your church thinks your job is to visit everyone (especially the elderly (especially those in the hospital)), preach good sermons, do some janitorial work, be good at fundraising (but not always talking about money), do a lot of Bible studies with the lost, and make sure the next generation doesn't leave the church. You (straight-out-of-seminary-smartypants) think your job is to "equip the saints for the work of the ministry," give yourself "continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word," and "go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them..."

It's really easy to fall into the trap of trying to make everyone happy all the time. But there just aren't enough hours in the day. If you try to be all things to all people, you'll end up losing your sanity, spirituality, family, sobriety, or will to live (or a combination of all of them).

In Ron Gladden's book 7 Habits of Highly Ineffective Churches, he describes a situation where he was half-time pastoring in a multi-church district. And the small church wanted him at their worship service every week. He was able to refer them back to a mutually-agreed-upon job description that revealed the priorities of the position. His point is that every time we say "yes" to one thing in ministry, we necessarily say "no" to something else. We must be sure we are saying "yes" to the right things.

I created a One Minute Job Description just over six years ago. It has served me very well. I laminated a bunch of copies and put it on my wall at work, on the mirror in my bathroom, on my bedside table, and on my computer. I shared it with my church board. My only regret is that it doesn't include an evangelistic component (quite the oversight). Here it is:

Goal 1: to get as close to God as possible through daily Bible study, prayer, and meditation, putting aside all things that destroy my relationship with Him.

Goal 2: to produce one sermon by Friday of every week. Each sermon will be biblical, interesting, relevant, balanced, and Christ-centered.

Goal 3: to train and equip my church board members to be effective leaders in their various areas of responsibility so that they can train and equip all church members to live a life of faithful service to God.

This has really helped me to remember the essentials. It's what I'm paid to do. Everything else the church gets out of me is a bonus.

Personal Vision Workbook - 7. Core Values

The following is from my Personal Vision Workbook. Read the introduction and legal stuff.

--------------------

Our personal values determine what we do and how we do it. Personal values are essentially priorities statements. They are 4-8 things that repeatedly show up in your life. If someone were to follow you around for a week, they would be able to say 4-8 things about what you value most in life. One of King David’s values statements says:

“The law from your mouth is more precious to me than thousands of pieces of silver or gold.” - Psalm 119:72

David was saying that if it came down to a choice between obeying God or getting rich, it was a slam-dunk decision.

It’s often easy to say we value certain things, even when there’s no evidence that it’s a real priority in our behavior. What values do you consistently exhibit in your life?

Complete the following sentences:

My character traits that I value the most are…

It really bugs me when others aren’t…

Some of my core convictions about people and relationships are…

Here's a sample list of some possible core values:

Justice, Honesty, Service, Family, Being Real, Teamwork, Worship, Hard Work, Friendships, Pioneering, Leadership, Simplicity, Humor, Music, Respect, Helping the Poor, Obedience, Excellence, Mentoring, Details, The Big Picture, Practicality, Evangelism, Prayer, Listening, Healing, etc.

Choose 4-8 values and write them on the Personal Vision Statement.pdf

Personal Vision Statement - Purpose, Values, and Vision

My Personal Vision Statement was developed over a few days of intensive prayer, reflection, and directed personal and group work at a CRM ReFocusing Leaders training event in 2004. It has changed very little over the last two years. This document has provided considerable guidance and accountability for my priorities, keeping me on track for the things I know are really important in my life and ministry.

If you'd like to go through a similar (simplified) process to come up with your own Personal Vision Statement, you can buy and use my Personal Vision Workbook.

My Purpose
I exist to live in childlike dependence on God, growing and maturing every day, letting people see His hand at work in my life.

My Core Values

• Excellence – honoring God and inspiring people
• Authentic Relationships – intentionally deepening with family and a few close friends
• Visionary Leadership – listening, dreaming, obeying, mentoring, and leading the charge
• Team Ministry – completing gifts, sharpening, challenging, inspiring, holding accountable
• Pioneering – trying new things, starting new ventures
• Church Planting – expanding God’s kingdom through new, mission-driven churches
• Practicality – doing only those things that work
• Worship – publicly and privately honoring God as Creator, Redeemer, and Lord

My Vision
My vision is to live a balanced life of love and service to God, my family, and my community.

I am called to place my family above my vocation, to be a loving and accessible husband and father, ministering to my family’s needs and demonstrating God's love in tangible ways.

I am called to lead a team of pastors to plant a growing church in a North American city and to facilitate a healthy, growing network of church plants that glorify God and prepare communities for Christ’s soon return.