We have a new meeting each week and it has become my favorite meeting.

Meetings are valuable for teams.  It is certainly possible to have too many meetings, too long of meetings, and probably the most common error is to have a lack of meetings.

Realizing our growing team needed additional “glue”, in January I initiated an all-team meeting called Momentum.  It’s a Monday morning meeting to start the big MO.  This meeting is for 3 things:  Inspiration, Celebration, and Communication.  It’s very positive and we avoid doing “heavy lifting”.  It may be my favorite meeting because it’s also our shortest meeting.  Great meetings don’t need to be long.  They need to be well planned and effective.

It’s great to start our week with Momentum.

What is your favorite meeting?  What do you think are components of an effective meeting?

Public ministry requires an audience.  What we do in public ministry is for the benefit of others.

First, your audience may be only one.  In fact, that is enough.  God has called us to look for “the one” and share His love and life with them.  Look for an audience today and begin to do ministry.

Secondly, your audience may be a small group or a large group of hundreds or even thousands.  But whether it is one or 10,000, ministry is not ministry if you are just doing something – preaching a message, leading a bible discussion, singing a song, or just talking to the crowd.  Ministry is only ministry when you connect with someone.

I saw someone recently “leading worship”.  Their intentions were right, and I’m sure their motives were pure, but they weren’t effectively doing ministry.  They were playing an instrument and singing a song, but there was no connection with their audience.  Even though worship ministry must be focused on the ONE we worship, if you are leading others to Him, you must first connect with your audience and take them there.  You can’t lead someone anywhere if they are not WITH you.

Think about this: Simply doing something in front an audience is not ministry.  Whether it is many or a few, make a prayerful and intentional effort to connect with them through prayer, verbal communication, eye contact, body language, emotions, and facial expression.  Help them to know and feel you’re in this together.  Ministry is not ministry if you’re just doing something.  Make sure you are connecting with your audience.

How do you get inspired and get really creative? The best way for me to create is to get around other people. I think that everyone has wonderful creative ability and I have a gift to help others tap into that ability. When I am by myself, my ideas tend to dry up, but when I get around other people, a spark happens and I begin to light up with ideas. This is called creative synergy. The first time that I was exposed to this term was through our worship team leader, Brandon Divine. He taught our team that God can work creatively in exponential ways when two or more people are gathered together creating. (Hmmm… makes me think that Jesus was onto something when He was talking about the power of people coming together in Matthew 18:20.) My advice: when you need that BIG IDEA for your next project, try getting some other people in the room and let the ideas fly!

Leave a comment: How do you get inspired and get really creative?

Just as the sky and sea are blue, The BLUE Experience is an opportunity for you to explore the heights and depths of leadership.  BLUE will challenge you to reach for the potential God has for your life and to dive deep to form your character.  Join us for our very first BLUE Experience on March 7 at 6:00PM.  For more information or to register visit the Welcome Center or visit us online at www.churchatchapelhill.com.

Often people like to disguise gossip as a concern.  Let’s expose this idea because God sees gossip as a very serious offense.  Look at Romans 1:29-30.

²⁹They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, ³⁰slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents.

God places gossip right there with envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice and God-haters.

Yet gossip has many participants.  Why?  Because gossip is simply “casual or unrestrained conversation or reports about other people, typically containing reports that are not confirmed as true.”   Yet even truth (concerns) being reported by the wrong people to the wrong people becomes gossip.

Sharing concerns with people who cannot “fix the problem” becomes an act of gossip.   When you have a concern, find the person who can help you, and can solve the problem.  Don’t let your concerns become gossip.

As a servant leader, remember that problems (concerns) go up, and praise goes down.  Bring your concerns to the person above you.  Take your praise to the people under you.

Be careful!  Sharing your concern to the wrong people may be … gossip in disguise.

I am connected.  Everywhere I go, I can get online, check email, send tweets/texts and make phone calls.  Modern technology has made me über-connected to the world around me.

I am connected.  I find myself surrounded by opportunities to network, make friends and fill my time with relational opportunities.  It seems like I get a dozen new friend requests on Facebook every week.  This number grows exponentially month to month.  The more connected I get, the more opportunities to connect to more people.  This is a salesperson’s dream.

But am I connected?  Both of these previously mentioned things can be very helpful, but also very distracting as I try to quiet myself and get alone with God.  I find the words of Jesus in John 15 echoing in my overly-connected consciousness:

“Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. ⁵I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.”  (John 15:4-5 NIV)

Even though we live in a connected society, let’s be careful today that we don’t lose the most important connection in this life.

Leave your response: What is the biggest distraction from your ability to stay connected to Jesus?

From time to time I will review a book that I have recently read and share it with you.  The following is my official review of Primal: A Quest for the Lost Soul of Christianity.

I love the books that Mark Batterson writes.  He is a brilliant author that will captivate your attention and imagination.  Primal is no different; it is a great book.

The book is very simply laid out with an introduction and four main divisions that correlate directly with the “greatest commandment” found in Mark 12:30.  He challenges us to love God will all our heart, soul, mind and strength.  Could there every be a more rewarding way to spend our lives?

Here are some of the highlights of the book for me:

pg. 17 – “When you give your heart to Christ, Christ gives His heart to you.”

pg. 35 – Concerning personal finances: “Establish an income ceiling.  Enough will never be enough unless you determine how much is enough.”

pg. 80 – “Obedience will open the eyes of your understanding far more than any commentary or concordance could.”

pg. 83 – “The goal of knowing the Bible is knowing God.  Anything less is bibliolatry.”

pg. 113 – “Creativity breeds change.  And change threatens the status quo.  It’s far easier to find something wrong with something new than to admit something is wrong with the old way of doing things.”

In closing, you will enjoy reading Primal.  Batterson has a way of taking you to another place and time with his writing.  He will transport you from your ordinary life and lift you up to the stars with inspiration, then leave you will the ability to make your ordinary life, extraordinary.

Today, January 22nd, marks the 37th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in the case Roe v. Wade. This federal case overturned all existing state laws and legalized abortion at a national level. The Roe v. Wade decision held that a woman, with her doctor, could choose abortion in earlier months of pregnancy without restriction, and with restrictions in later months, based on the right to privacy.

While the law has been in place for some time, our nation is divided on this moral issue. Most fall into one of two camps, Pro-Choice or Pro-life. Even our most recent Presidents disagree.

Here’s a heartbreaking statistic for you: In just 37 years, nearly 52 million unborn children have been aborted. A law protecting the “privacy” of women has legalized the killing of our nation’s future. Imagine, we may have put to death great poets, pastors, scientists, or even one of our next Presidents.

Today, 200,000+ Pro-Lifers have traveled to Washington, DC. and will March for Life along Constitution Avenue, up Capitol Hill to the Supreme Court, and to the Congress. They’ve come together to collectively make their voice heard, “Overturn Roe v. Wade!”

My prayer: “God, forgive us for what we’ve done. Give us the courage to stand up for what is right. Remove the blinders from our nation’s leaders. And bring healing to the women who have made this mistake.”

Feel free to add your thoughts below.

Who says, “you can’t do it that way?”  Matthew says, “with God all things are possible.”  What are the possibilities for you to create something new, to navigate through your storm, or to simply change your world?

I was invited to my 2 year old granddaughter’s pre-school class today for doughnuts.  We sat at the short table in the tiny chair and played with playdough.  Macie took blue playdough and pressed a Christmas Tree form into the soft dough.  Ta da!  A very interesting BLUE Christmas tree.  It broke the rules for trees but she didn’t care.  She created it anyway.

The teacher set up bowling pins and gave Macie a ball.  She realized the object was to knock down the pins.  So… rather than rolling the ball, she considered other possibilities.  First, she threw the ball at the pins and then she kicked them down with her feet.  She accomplished her goal by considering other possibilities.  Nobody in the room told her that she couldn’t do it THAT way!  She just did it… and laughed.

Sometimes it’s important to consider in prayer all the creative possibilities.  Maybe God has possibilities that haven’t been revealed to you yet.  And, don’t let man’s religion, tradition, man-made rules, and “we’ve always done it THIS way” stop you.  You don’t have to do it like everyone else.  During this time of fasting and prayer, ask God to show you what is possible.  He may tell you, “You CAN do it that way!”

The phrase, “I have a dream…”, rings familiar in the ears of millions of Americans.  Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is honored today, not only for his famous speech, but for the life he lived.  To have a dream for your life is an aspiration that everyone should strive for.  Dr. King shared his dream and gave his life for it.

What makes a great dream?  Great dreams are not defined by recognition, wealth and glory.  Great dreams are birthed out of an insatiable desire to benefit and help others.  It is not only the accomplishment of an event, but the contribution to society.  It is not about making headlines, but about making history.  What is the end result of your dream?

Scripture says in Philippians 2:3-4,

3Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. 4Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Each of us have the potential to reach great heights with God.  A great dream in God’s eyes is about laying down selfish dreams and picking up selfless dreams, just as Jesus did.

If your life could be summed up in a speech and it started with, “I have a dream…”, what would fill in the rest of the quotations?