The Team God Has Given You.

The number one reason pastors leave the ministry is discouragement and the biggest struggle that leads to that discouragement is the difficulty in leading congregations to follow the pastor’s God-given vision. I don't know of a single pastor who has not faced this at some point in his ministry. 

We must remember that God is the head coach and pastors are the offensive coordinators.  They get to call the plays but the Lord sends those He wants on the team.  As leaders we know our job is to "equip the saints" but many times much of the equipping has already been done by the time they arrive to the church.  The Holy Spirit has already given them gifts, God has blessed them with talents and abilities, each has a certain personality type, everyone has their own love language, their passions and many bring much life experience with them when they come.  While certainly there is a place for more learning and training, much of the equipping has already been done. 

Corporately, the church has one mission:  the great commission.  But individual churches may have specific ministries.  It is through these different ministries that we are given the opportunity to carry out the Lord's mission.  This is also why many times what works in one church may not work in another.  God has a specific purpose for a specific group of believers in a specific location.

Equipping the saints-at-large is helping them to discover how God has made them and uniquely gifted them—their specific place in the body, so to speak—and how this all comes together and is to be used in God's plan.  There is no greater feeling than knowing you are doing what God created you to do.

 
The Lord knows what kinds of players He needs to run His offense for your team.  When you have a team full of tight ends and run blockers and you try to run a spread offense there is not a lot of victory.  Have you ever taken the church through a complete discovery process?  There are several different ones out there and we are currently putting together our own to help the churches we serve.

Democracy: The Beginning of the End

Long have we felt that the United States has the best form of government in the world.  Oh it is not perfect but it has always been leaps and bounds ahead of the rest..... in our opinion.  Now in our form of democracy, we elect those who represent us but the people are supposed to have the final say...boy has that changed.  The majority of the people in several states have voted in laws only to have the high court trump them.

Democracy really was doomed from the beginning.  We the people have always gone astray even from the very beginning.  When the Founding Fathers created the constitution and other documents that this country was supposed to be governed by, most if not all had one thing in common, their moral standard and guideline was the bible.  So long as most of the people used the same standard to live their lives, then democracy worked pretty well.  When that changes (changed) democracy begins to become worse and worse.

For the believer the times will get harder as the government begins to redefine more and more issues that God has already defined.  This will put the true believer more and more often on opposing sides of our government.  Will the church's presence shrink even more or will we fight?

In scripture the people always got off the right track and never returned on their own.  Will God raise up someone to lead the people back one more time or is this it?