We the church love to lift people who can preach, sing, lead and administrate on a pedestal. We see the teachers, the leaders, the prophets, the evangelists and the pastors as those with the ultimate gifts for the church. However, there was a gift that was given to the world many years before there was ever a teacher, a preacher or an evangelist. It was the creative gift.

God the creator showed His creative genius when he created the world. He showed His creative genius when He designed man. He showed His creative genius when he formed Eve! I believe that creative gifts are directly from the throne room of God.

We see in the book of Exodus that God is giving Moses the law. There comes a point before anyone makes any sacrifice to the Lord. Before any worship occurs and before the law is put into effect that God tells Moses that those with creative gifts are to work their creative genius on the tabernacle of God. God singles out two men who are what we would call creative. In fact the bible tells us that these men were filled with the spirit of God and it was that same spirit that gave these men these gifts.

As a church it is up to the leaders to make sure there is a creative element to that church. God is a creative God and He has given people within that church creative gifts. These gifts aren’t to be just used for the once a year event, or for the week of VBS, but these creative gifts are to be front and center of any church. God gave special instructions to make sure that those with creative genius were allowed to create. I believe God desires the creative people He has sent to your church to be allowed room to create.

Pastor, identify those creative people in your church and empower them to excel in the gifts God has given to them and to your church!

One of the hardest disciplines for the modern preacher is to preach the full gospel. The gospel is so vast and wide that even 50 years of preaching would not be able to cover every detail of the incredible grace and love of Jesus Christ. However, for many preachers they become comfortable with one part or subject of the gospel and that becomes the focus of their ministry. We are not talking about faith preachers nor name it or claim it preachers, but the stable sound in doctrine preacher who has given his life to the calling of God.

The writer of Jude desired to just give the incredible message of Salvation, yet being a full gospel preacher meant while Salvation is front and center of the gospel, it is not the only part of the gospel. There were issues springing up in the churches in the first century that had to be dealt with. The people in the churches had received the life-giving spirit of Jesus Christ. They had become the redeemed, the chosen, the elect! Their souls had been saved from sin and death, yet a theology had arisen that said because of the power of the grace of God, it was okay to keep on living immoral lifestyles.

Yes, every preacher has his niche, but the servant preacher realizes that there are topics that are uncomfortable to preach, yet must be preached.

There are many who fall into the trap of just preaching Salvation, yet holiness is just too uncomfortable for their seeker friendly crowd. On the other side there are many who fall into the trap of just preaching holiness that a seeker will never consider entering the doors of their church. Christ didn’t die for just half the gospel, He died so that men and women could hear the full life-changing gospel of Jesus Christ.

Just as Jude stepped out of his comfort zone to deal with holiness issues, so to must we preachers step outside of our comfort zone and realize we have been called to declare the FULL gospel. It is only the full gospel that will ultimately change lives and it is only the full gospel that the Lord has anointed us to preach!

One rotten apple can spoil a bag of good apples. It’s an age-old proverb of wisdom. No one ever argues with it, everyone is in agreement that the damage that one piece of rotten fruit can do to many pieces of healthy fruit.

The problem is not believing this piece of wisdom, but identifying when an apple is rotten before it starts to destroy other apples close by. So often we only realize that an apple is rotten aftr it is too late.

John wrote about this problem to his friend Gaius. For the church which Gaius pastored had fell foul to one rotten apple. This apple came in the name of Diotrephes. A man who desired to be the leader and sort to eliminate anyone who he thought was a threat to this leadership. When preachers would come from out-of-town he would encourage people to not be welcoming. He gossiped about and accused men of God all in an effort to help himself. This man was truly a rotten apple. He had influenced others and now people had a bad taste in their mouths about church, leaders and even the gospel of Jesus Christ.

John urges the people to not let this rotten apple influence them, but instead discern what is right by what is good. If someone is trying to influence people to act in a way that is contrary to the life of Jesus Christ, then that person is a rotten apple, and follow John words of advice, stay well clear! In fact run for your lives because if you are not careful the rot will spread and before you know it, you will also be a rotten apple.

Who are you spending your time with? Who are you listening to? Who is influencing you? If you are finding yourself becoming gossips, becoming negative, becoming bitter or always finding fault, chances are there’s a rotten apple not too far away. Run from them and follow what is good!

For some it’s the sight of a starving baby, others it’s the reality of human trafficking, yet some get moved when they see their neighbor struggling with their yard work or a work colleague struggle through an on going sickness.

We are all wired differently, yet our make up is the sense. While compassion may not be everyone’s strongest point, there is no doubt that there are certain things in life that pull at our heart.

However, some do a good job of ignoring these emotions, others just sit there and feel sorry for those situations, while a limited few decide they must do something about it. It is this later group who are the ones who have the compassion to be world changers. 

I think compassion ministries have become a fad in a lot of churches. While this is a good thing as a lot of good is being done, by worry is that as soon as reaching out to our communities doesn’t result in church growth it will become like every other fad, and just die!

Tomorrow is Saturday May 14^th. Just another Saturday to most, yet for a few it is a day to reach out and serve our community. The Help Stamp Out Hunger food drive is taking place, where across the country if you leave a bag of groceries by your mail box, the mail man will deliver it to your local food pantry. In our county ServeFest is taking place, this is where local churches get together to help serve our community for one day in different community projects. For me I will be volunteering at the school my wife works, where they will be hosting a community outreach to their local neighborhood.

While this is all good, I wonder what would happen if the collective church would really start to embrace the things that pull at peoples hearts on a daily basis. Not adding more ministries to a never ending schedule, not just schedule one day a month or a year, but started to empower and mobilize the people who make up the church to start to reach out on their own accord when they see a need. To be the hands and feet of Jesus day to day. To learn to do good and stamp out injustice when we see it. The world would change overnight, that is what would happen!

Of course in all reality the church is made up of imperfect people, reluctant to step out of what they have always know and people who can be very self absorbed, of which I know I am one; so this today is only a far fetched dream. Yet I have discovered in my life that dreams do come true and my dream is to see a church that hurts for others just as much as it hurts for itself.

I suppose it could all start with just leaving a bag of groceries for the mail man to pick up!

Isaiah 1:17

In my experience I have found that May & June are the time people tend to transition most. As a ministry leader and then as an associate Pastor I learned and recognized that this time of year was the time when volunteers quit, people wanted to try new things or people left the churches we were at. However, it was also a time when new people would come on board, new volunteers would be found and your ministry was the new thing people wanted to try.

For any leader this is a bitter sweet time. Transition is hard. Change can be difficult and sometimes you feel people are making the wrong decision in their transition. Yet transition is something every ministry has to embrace. Big churches, small churches, urban churches or rural churches all experience it.

However, I encourage you to embrace this time. Transition shows health and life. Your body transitions and changes because it is alive. The trees and plants transition during this time because they are alive and so the church, which is the body of Christ, will transition and change because it is alive.

This doesn’t mean everything should change and everyone should move on to other things, but it does mean when you see a change in the wind or a new season arriving embrace it and work with it because more than likely God is moving the pieces around to perfectly align you for a new fruitful season of blessing.

However, to any non-profit organization and especially to a church, volunteers are the key to health, growth and ultimately achieving your goals or vision.

The secret I believe to good volunteers all centers on those that lead them. Sometimes this is paid staff, but most often it is one volunteer leading another volunteer.

I think one of the toughest tasks when it comes to volunteers is finding leaders to lead them. I constantly ask myself, could this volunteer be a potential leader? Does this person have what it takes to motivate, schedule, train, and recruit other volunteers.

There are so many factors involved in choosing a volunteer leader, but there are two I value above anything else. They are commitment and consistency. Before I look at ability, past records and would they be a fit I want to make sure they are committed people and they are consistent in their commitment.

It is no good having the best people if they are not committed people, they will flake out on you. It is also no good having people as leaders if they are committed but do not have to time to be consistent. When choosing leaders you need to know that they will be there when they are suppose to be and they won’t desert you when it gets tough.

Yes you may have to pass on people who are better qualified or have more ability, but in the long run you will have a team of leaders in whom you can trust and will help you complete the vision in front of you.

My blog took a back seat as others things had to take priority, but blogging is something I love and helps me as a leader and follow of Jesus Christ as much as anyone who reads this blog. So here we go, back in the swing of things.

Lately I’ve been thinking about the people I need around me so that as a church we can be everything God has designed us to be. I think the biggest headaches and anxieties a leader has, concerns the leaders around him or her. In a perfect world the team you have around you will all get on. They will have your back and you will have theirs. You will be able to be totally open and honest with them and they won’t think anything less than you. Everyone will work for the cause and there will be complete harmony!

Anyone who has lead leadership teams is probably saying, ‘in your dreams!’ Well, yes that is my dream. However, for that dream to happen, you have to have the right people around you, and you as a leader have to be prepared to invest time in those people.

I remember when we first planted our church; I believed the Lord gave me a word. He said, ‘surround yourself with people who believe in you and believe in what I have called you to do, one out of two isn’t good enough’. This word has come back to my mind over and over again. I have seen the people who are most effective have been the ones who believe in both me as a leader and the vision of where we are going. The people I have found myself hitting my head against the wall have been people who either didn’t completely believe in me but believed in what we were doing or believed in where we were going but still had questions about me.

When you have people who believe in both you & your vision, you have people who you will be able to dream with, laugh with, enjoy time with and most important lead your church or organization with.

Remember, one out of two isn’t good enough!

Every week I seem to meet someone who has either stopped going to church or become disillusioned with their church or denomination. The biggest reason most of the time is because of the way a leader or pastor has treated someone.

Normally I’d be skeptical, but having seen this kind of treatment up close and even experienced some of it myself it makes me wonder have we lost the art of pastoring?

Every month I get a ton of mailers & emails telling me about the next leadership conference that is a must to grow your church, finance your church, lead your staff and start your next campus. However, I can’t even remember a conference that would talk about being a pastor.

When I read my bible, I hear the words of Jesus to His disciples, I hear the words of Paul to the churches, I hear Peter, James & John through their letters and what I hear is the heart of a shepherd. People who realize that leadership is important, but pastoring (or shepherding) is essential. Just think about the parable of the lost sheep for one moment. I mean, how many leaders and pastors today would leave the 99 to go after the 1?

I have a feeling that in trying to grow the church, we have focused so much on becoming a good leader that we have stopped training pastors. Those ones that have drifted are left in the wilderness and we have focused our resources, time, energy and finances on the 99.

I believe it is time for a return of pastoring, once we learn how to pastor, then we can learn how to lead!

4. Loving & Giving is so much better than Taking and Receiving

For me 2010 was the year where I found the gift of giving to others. From stretching my own personal finances, to giving to families in need, to giving my time and energy, to loving my spouse at a whole new level to also finding a depth of love for my creator, 2010 was a great year.

I remember the day I said to one of our team members Jill that I wanted her to put together some food baskets for families in need, but I wanted them to be extravagant. Her resposne was great, and the feeling of hearing her plan to extravagantly give brought me goose dimples.

The weekend I planned for my wife in New York to celebrate our fifth wedding anniversary made me feel like I was a kid going to Disney world was my impatience to surprise her. That will go down as one of the top five weekends of my life!

The feeling of giving up TV time to go through a book study with one of my friends gave me so much joy.

Putting my tithe check into the Generation Church basket each week flooded my heart with such contentment knowing that I was not a financial burden on the church (trust me I have felt like that on staff at churches before) but I could contribute to it’s stability.

Looking at the people of Generation Church knowing that I have a love for them that goes far beyond and sense of empathy or compassion I have experienced before.

The incredible thing I have experienced in 2010 is that while I have really discovered the joy of loving and giving, I have now realized that there is so much more in me, and the more I extend my loving and giving the more I receive back!

2010 taught me that it really is better to give than receive!

1. What God has planned will come to pass!

On September 19^th 2010 Generation Church was birthed. It had been a journey of around 18 months and on this day we saw the reality of what seemed only like a dream.

The biggest problem with dreams is that they are full of fantasy. Rarely do dreams actually turn out the way we dream them. Generation Church was no different. I spent nights lying in bed at night wondering what our launch service would be like. I imagined hundreds of people coming through the doors, putting extra chairs out, running out of room, people choosing to live their lives for Jesus Christ, then August 22^nd happened!

I look back on August 22^nd as one of the biggest highs of the year, yet at 10:30am on that Sunday morning it seemed anything but a high. August 22^nd was the day of our second preview service. Our first one had attracted over 60 people and I was hopefully of a half decent crowd. Yet at 10:30am there were about 15 people, and that included the band. By the end of the service at 11:30am, 20 people had showed up. Yet as I drove home I had this incredible feeling that the vision God had for Generation Church was starting to form.

Our first preview service was full of people from other churches, people whose lives had already been changed by the life-giving message of Jesus Christ. Now on August 22^nd these church people had gone back to their churches and all that was left was our core team (about 12 at the time, of which 4 were on vacation) and a few people who otherwise would not be in church that day. After talking with some of these folks, I discovered that God had deeply impacted their lives that day and that is when I realized that God was really in this thing and Generation Church was not an Alex Penduck fantasy, but a plan God had devised before this world was ever formed and we had the privilege to be part of it!

If God has spoken something to you, do not be dismayed, disgruntled or question him, if he has said it, it will come to pass! It may not look like what you imagined, it may not start out how you thought, but it will happen and the way it happens will be exactly how God had planned!