Are you a young Christian leader? Work with them? Check out Mark Sayers’ 4 rules.
Here are the four rules:
Rule 1. Turn Up.
Rule 2. Understand the Back End.
Rule 3. Don’t want it.
Rule 4. Work on your weak spots.
Tag Archive - leadership
4 Rules That Every Young Christian Leader Should Know
Simple and Obvious
Avril Lavigne once sang: ‘Why’d you have to go and make things so complicated!’ I don’t think she was singing about leadership, yet I think one of the things we often do in leadership is overly complicate things. Likewise in communication.
Check out this useful blog post from Steven Furtick: Simple and Obvious. This is applicable in many contexts, but none more important than the gospel of Jesus. Keep it simple, keep it obvious, keep repeating it. Check out this simple gospel outline.
Bill Hybels Addresses Speaker Change at The Global Leadership Summit
Check out the Bill Hybels‘ gracious response to a speaker pulling out of the recent Willow Creek conference. The leadership lesson from his response is probably even more valuable than what the Starbucks CEO would have added to the summit. Check it:
What do you think? What do you learn about leadership? What do you learn about grace?
Andy Stanley on exploiting your strengths
“Your fully exploited strengths are always of far greater value to your organisation than your marginally improved weaknesses.” Watch the clip:
(h/t Matt Perman)
No broken people allowed
1 Samuel 22:2 stood out in my readings yesterday (need a reading plan? check this): “And everyone who was in distress, and everyone who was in debt, and everyone who was bitter in soul, gathered to him. And he became captain over them. And there were with him about four hundred men.” (ESV) It’s in the context of David fleeing from Saul as he tries to kill David. I love it. All the bothered, bankrupt and bitter join David’s team. This isn’t a crack team, far from it. It’s a bunch of broken people.
I love the fact that this motley crew of fellas are ultimately formed into a pretty lean mean fighting machine under David’s leadership. I don’t want to overly allegorize, but perhaps there’s a lesson here for Christian leadership. Sometimes in Christian ministry we set the bar so high for participation on a ministry team that we only allow those who’ve got it all sorted out to be part of the action. That’s dumb.
Don’t write off the bothered. Don’t write off the bankrupt. Don’t write off the bitter.
David pulled together a killer team because “the LORD was with him”. But David is only a shadow of the reality to come in Christ. On Jesus’ team, it’s only broken people allowed. He didn’t come for the healthy, but for the sick. He’s a pretty good captain!
Next time someone doesn’t measure up to your list of requirements, perhaps you could think again.
Global Leadership Summit
Last week I went to the Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit. There was lots of good leadership wisdom to glean and it was good to spend time with Willoughby peeps.
I live tweeted. Check below (in reverse order) for some quotes, summaries and pics:
Youth Ministry Vision Talk
Casting vision is an important aspect of leading a youth ministry. The following are 6 tips I sent to a friend who asked for some advice in writing a vision talk for his youth group kick-off talk. (I’m guessing they are applicable in any ministry).
- Keep it big. Help people see the size of the vision.
- Keep it small. Help people see how they can be part of it in their own way.
- Don’t tackle too much. You might refer to each purpose, but you wouldn’t want to explain each in length.
- Remember your audience. Have something younger have something older. eg “if you’re in yr 7 it might look like this”, “if you’re in yr 12…”
- Remind people of the gospel. The cross of Jesus ought to drive all of our preaching and ministry.
- Get people pumped!
1 warm fuzzy to the first person to name the location of the Thai Restaurant in the above picture…
C.J. Mahaney Podcast
Sovereign Grace have just begun a new podcast: Leadership Interview Series. It’s particularly aimed at Pastors in thinking through Christian leadership, but is beneficial for all listeners. Josh Harris is the host along with Jeff Purswell and C.J. Mahaney (he’s now blogging).
I’ve only listened to the first few minutes, but the show notes have links to some great books and resources. I look forward to learning from CJ’s cross-centred wisdom.
Click here to subscribe in iTunes.
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