- I'm stoked about my friend Lee becoming the editor of our denomination's magazine! But in the midst of these changes, I'm thankful that he's addressing some hard core topics that need to be addressed by us in the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement - issues such as: racism, materialism, erroneous theology and praxis, excessive focus on prosperity while shunning those in need. Recently, Lee picked up an endoresment from Ed Stetzer. Ed blogs about Lee's prophetic voice in his LifeWay blog (read, he's SBC and respects the voice of Lee and many others in our movement - for that, I'm truly thankful!). Here's his post: Holy Ghost Housecleaning. Thanks Ed for crossing the lines of your movement.
- One of my favorite blogs to read is churchmarketingsucks.com. Recently they offered some free advise - Don't Offend Those You Hope to Reach. If you get hung up over the word "marketing" then I suggest "communication" - that's what marketing, in essence, is. And, hopefully, you're not offended with the word communication - Romans 10:14 (from The Message version) says, "But how can people call for help if they don’t know who to trust? And how can they know who to trust if they haven’t heard of the One who can be trusted? And how can they hear if nobody tells them?" I leave you with this question, "Does who you say you are match up with what others experience?"
- Leadership teams should always evaluate - I'm a big believer in evaluating what we're doing, why we're doing it, whether or not it's working and what we need to do next? Perry offers seven questions that leadership teams need to consider here. My favorite is this question, "What bothers us about our church?" - most aren't willing to ask that question - let alone answer it!
- Ron offers us 10 quick ways to lead like Jesus does here - my two favorites are #3 and # 6 - what are your favorite (by the way, #10 is my "ultimate favorite") - I hope you agree! To help you agree, see what Ron says in the post below.
- I've re-tweeted this, evernoted it & saved it in Google Reader - this MUST happen. Let me be very blunt (and perhaps a little R-rated) - it's imperative that
leaderspeople keep their pants on and their zippers zipped. It's also imperative that leaderspeople protect themselves, their families, their communities and the church. It simply MUST happen! If you don't click on any of the others above - PLEASE CLICK on this post by Ron Edmondson. Ron talks candidly about 7 ways to protect yourself from an affair. For some related reading you can read what Perry says here (be prepared!), here, here, here or here.
5 blog posts that have challenged me and you need to read!
Just wanted to put some extracurricular reading on your radar during the Christmas break...these are 5 blog posts that I've kept in my Google Reader feed to read and re-read several times - scan through them - there are some important lessons to be found.