Near and Far Faith

Cherie cut Rory's hair this week. It's only her 2nd hair cut, but I found myself cringing as Cher took her 1st stab at being a Stylist. It was time for a change. She looks bigger, doesn't she? It's amazing how change that makes us cringe in fear ends up making us actually look more grown up in Christ.

We're (Cher and I) building up our foundation. As we look down the road, we see a great need to have a team surround us to pray for God's direction. So this week we're building up that team by sending out some personal correspondence to some of our closest supporters - people that we know will be honest, will actually pray for us, and will rally with excitement or heartache. The pressing of this need on us is greater and greater as we see God move in ministry.

So Sunday we concluded Go Home, our 1st ever local retreat. I just wanted to tell you a little bit about what we did and perhaps you might gain some inspiration in one way or another. I hope so, since we've never done it before and I'd love to save you some trouble.

Overall it was a huge success and we'll do it again. It was risky from a chaotic standpoint to do it the same week as our Vacation Bible school (our summer children's program), but it really worked to our advantage. Each day the 14 students that participated in Go Home worked with the children from 9-12 and then we headed off to Habitat for Humanity's Blitz build. Every night was a bit different, but mostly there was some acoustic worship and Bible study. Here are a few lessons we learned:

Go Habitat! Habitat for Humanity hooked us up. Their policy is typically that each student under 18 needs a chaperon, but they worked overtime to find tasks that we could do around their work sites. It included everything from moving building materials to moving rocks to moving gabage. Lots of moving. To the students, it may have seemed menial at times, but the tasks they jumped on freed up the more skilled workers to get more done. We also happened to land Go Home during their Blitz build, which is where they throw extra effort towards marketing and get more people there. This helped create a team environment greater than usual. The students stepped up and few of them complained at all.

Build in free time. So this is no surprise, but over schedule a week-long activity and you'll have a mutiny on your hands. We let the students choose what we were doing, what songs we worshipped to, even parts of the schedule. It let them own the event a bit and they bought into it for the duration.

Come down hard. This is one I should've known, but didn't put into place. Two things I will definetely do differently next retreat (whatever it is) is to remind the V-Staff (volunteer Staff) of their authority to send students home. The V-Staff stepped up for Go Home and let me sleep at home most of the week. But occasionally when I left the building, they were disrespected. I have always made it clear to our staff that I will back them up when they have to make hard decisions, like sending students home from an event, but it's never really had to be practiced. It's well known that students are looking for boundaries and will push to find them. I believe in freedom of restriction for the most part so that the students learn responsibility, but when the few rules that are in place are disrespected, you and you're staff need to come down hard in love.

Turn your leaders loose. Devin and Amanda, two of our Student Leaders, stepped up huge this week and confirmed for me this principle. They did everything form help plan major parts of the week to handle some tough relational disputes, and they hit it out of the park. I've been trying to teach students to be responsible and treat them like adults - because they deserve it - but it was awesome to see it come together.

So if you're thinking of keeping things cheap (we charged $125 per student, or $25 per day) and local, learn from this. Flex with the economy (that's not in a recession).

Steven Furtick had a great post yesterday that truly echoes with my heart. The field will tilt, but what are we tilting towards?

Ok, this one I have DOWN! I've noticed, and not just in my life, that the passion that great leaders share is accompanied not by the need for organizational help. They surround themselves with people that fill their weaknesses and many times, organization is one of them.

What's awesome about this is that it's ok. Leaders don't need to be amazingly organized. In fact many of the leaders that I've been around that are anal about the organizational aspect are not great leaders at all.

What must consume us as great leaders is a sensitive passion for the vision and goal. Vision casting often goes hand in hand with someone else who's greatest strength is administration. Leaders cast the big goal and all it's details out in front of an audience and then we must learn to step back and let others lead us through the terrain of our weaknesses.

The hang up comes right there... letting others lead us. I believe in a team leadership mentality, where we are all equal in quality as members of the team, but not in every area that necessitates the goal. One of two failures often consume us if we miss this principle: isolation due to thinking we can organize it all ourselves, or complete failure to reach the goal because we didn't invest the time in finding the right people to fill our weaknesses (probably because we don't have any).

A great leader admits a lack of organization and finds someone with that strength in their top 3 abilities and allows them to lead. I've found lately that allowing others to lead often means shutting my trap.

Last night I asked God to get me up when He wanted me to. Usually that's an excuse for sleeping in (don't lie!), but this morning at 6 Tate woke up... and went back to sleep. He never does that. In fact he's been getting up really early for a few weeks now. The spirit was loud... I got up. I got to meet my other neighbor - which never would have happened if I hadn't gotten up that un-godly early .

I've noticed in the great leaders of today that publicizing their weakness, which goes against an entire generation's view on leadership, never mind the culture itself, creates a bond with their audience that is unmatched. I want to follow someone that has been there and screwed up - because if you want me to go there, chances are that something's going off kilter and I want to know that I'm not the only mutant.

The mentality that clergy are closer to God and thus have a better life makes me want to puke. That's like saying because I'm a mechanic I have a nicer car, or because I'm a carpenter I have a nicer house - and we know both those cenarios are rarely true.

I was going to hell, then I made a decision that changed that. It was God that saved me and my life is not mine. Easy to say, right? Then why does it always look like my life when I walk it out?

The bottom line is that we all have failures and struggles and no leader is above that. Publicizing them let's those you are raising up be on your team, and not under your thumb. Hiding weakness is pride and people can sense it eventually. They know it's fake.

Join a team and stop building your empire.

Here's one of mine - I'm scared to meet new people. I have a real issue with acceptance. I could tell you about my reasons, but it doesn't matter. I will make a fool out of myself to feel accepted. Usually this means profuse nervous joking in public. It also keeps me from going out of my church box to meet anyone else. I have 3 neighbors. Up until a month ago I only had met one of them. I've gone golfing with Travis, we have each other's cell #'s, etc. But God's really challenged me over the past few months that these are the easy relationships to be Christ to. Just live next to them. I met Carlos and Rachel about a month ago - he's a UPS driver and they just had their 2nd baby. This morning, After 2 Years, I met Ed. He's taken my garbage cans in for me numerous times. Today I helped him change his flat.

Let me just say this to finish - I wrestle with these things and I need you to get through them because on of the main reasons you are in my life is to help me because I need it.

I've been swamped this week getting ready for our 1st ever, never been done before, local summer retreat. I have a few more thoughts on rare leadership qualities, but I might not get to them til next week. Honestly, blogging is not my top priority.

Also next week (as long as I figure out the technology) will be episode 5 of The Little Big Church Podcast with an interview with Charles Hill, founder of The Sticks conference that will launch this fall. It's an awesome idea for the small town/small church that I won't be attending due to SOMEONE"S due date. Check it out here. See you next week.