Building a 3-D website for your church

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Friend, I’ve been to your church’s website, and the news is not good.

The four most common problems I’ve noticed, and in this order, are:

1) It’s outdated. You’re still pushing last year’s Christmas program.

2) It’s neglected.  You’ve got a big weekend coming up (I know, because I’m the speaker!) and there’s not one word on there about it.

3) It’s dull.  Who wrote this, I wonder.

4) It’s too hard to find stuff that ought to be easy.  On one I looked at this weekend, wanting to read up on their staff, I had to check out all kinds of categories to find where they had buried the photos and identities of staffers. Finally found it under “new to our church?”

Half the pastors of churches where I have spoken recently or am scheduled to speak will read this and “just know” I’m talking about their website and be offended. Was I talking about your website, pastor buddy?

Probably.

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What to say to a church bully

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(This is the type of article some church people will find objectionable.  I’m fully aware of that and am willing to run the risk of the flak from writing it.  If it results in one congregation standing up to a member who has held the church in a stranglehold and run off preacher after preacher, if it puts just one bully out of business, it’ll be worth the flak. This is a far bigger problem than most people realize.)

No church bully thinks he’s one.  He’s just (ahem) looking out for the interests of the church since a) no one else seems to be willing to do it and b) even though it’s a difficult task, he has the courage to step up and do the job.

Cooper Manning, oldest son of Archie and Olivia Manning, and thus older brother of football champions Peyton and Eli, admits that he gave his little brothers a hard time when they were children.  “I never thought of it as bullying,” he says.

They never do.

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A hundred things I tell young pastors (the final 20).

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81. Just as no one knows you better than your spouse, your co-workers on the church staff see you as no one else does. Make sure they respect you as a person of integrity and compassion who keeps his word, has a sincere heart for God, and treasures each of them.  Defend them before critics.  If you lose their respect, the fabric of your leadership begins to fray.

82. Watch for certain scriptures–a verse here, a verse there–to begin to impress themselves upon you in a special way. This is a work of the Holy  Spirit. When this happens, He is inviting you to study this area more, to seek His insights and receive His teaching.

83. Humility. Do not fear apologizing to your people. If you made a mistake and everyone knows it, to stonewall and refuse to admit it is to enrage a few and disappoint the others. By humbling yourself and admitting your error, then asking for their forgiveness, you endear yourself to everyone who matters.  (I’ve known of pastors who gained so much love and acceptance by publicly apologizing for a mistake, they jokingly say they are now looking for some other dumb mistake to make just so they can apologize.)

84. When you need the approval of a committee, say the finance or personnel, for some project or expenditure, if the chairperson says, “Oh, go ahead and do that, pastor,” you should respond, “Thank you, my friend. But I’d really like the entire committee’s input on this.” Insist on meeting with the entire panel, and never allow the chair to act as if he/she is the committee. (Church bosses are created just so subtly as this.)

85. Always err on the side of conservativism in finances and on the side of grace in relationships.

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A hundred things I tell young pastors (61-80)

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61. Resiliency. There is no shame in being fired by a church or run off by a group within the church. The shame comes when you let that discourage you from future ministry.  Read Second Corinthians 4:8-10 again and again until you “own” it. Then get up and get back in the game. Your team needs you.

62. If you are terminated–or “encouraged to leave” a church in a way that leaves you angry and bitter–read Luke 6:27-35 repeatedly until you make it your own. Then, to rid yourself of the anger and bear a faithful witness to your detractors, do the actions the Lord commands here: do good, bless, pray, and give to them.

63. Encourage pastors who have been terminated. (A pastor recently ousted from his church asked me, “Why don’t other pastors want to help me?” I said, “Tom, when you were pastoring, how many unemployed preachers did you help?” He said, “I didn’t know it was the problem it is.” I said, “They don’t either.”)

64. Problems. Teach your lay leadership (preferably in small group settings) how to deal with problems that arise in church, how to confront a troublemaking member, and what to do about a pastor who has gone rogue. (When nothing of that sort is happening in your church is the perfect time to teach this.)

65. Make yours an encouraging church.  Train your people to write notes of congratulations and appreciation to people in the news who do good things.

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A hundred things I tell young pastors (41-60)

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41. Preparation. Remember that preaching is not a written art, but an oral thing. So, once you have finished your plan for the message, go for a walk and preach it aloud.  This will alert you to detours to avoid, rabbit trails to shun, potholes to steer around, and will make you aware of areas where you need to do more work..

42. Never deliver a sermon you have not preached to yourself at least three times. Likewise, when you plan to read a Scripture in the worship service, prepare by reading it aloud numerous times to prepare your tongue for forming these particular sounds, to find phrases you need to emphasize, and so you can do the reading justice.

43. When you are invited to guest preach in other churches, do not reinvent the wheel. This is no time to hammer out a new sermon, but an opportunity to use something you have previously preached. This allows you to improve on it. In time, this may become a favorite sermon you preach in many places.

44. While your sermon-machine is always on (and you will always have a notepad nearby when reading anything), make it a point to read Scripture devotionally–asking the Father to feed your soul–every day.  Read for no other purpose than to listen to God.

45. Stewardship.  Tithe your income and more through your church.

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A hundred things I tell young pastors (21-40)

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21. Off days.  Early on, establish with your spouse at least one full day (including evening) each week for yourselves.  Have an understanding about this when talking with search committees. Protect it. (Then, help your wife to know that a) you will work hard to protect this day, but b) there will inevitably be exceptions once in a while.)

22. Search Committees. When dealing with search committees, do not become so eager to go to that church that you fail to do your homework (such as looking carefully at the church’s history, its relationships with previous pastors, what income/benefits they offer, the details about the living arrangements, etc.).

23. Mentors. Find one or two older ministers as your mentors. Call them occasionally to tell what’s going on and seek their counsel. Pray for their ministry.

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A hundred things I tell young pastors (1-20)

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(The first twenty, given in order only as they occur to me.)

1) In all the world there are only three Christians who love change; none of them are in your church.

2) When you speak before an unfamiliar group, be careful what you say because you never know who is listening to you. You’ll start to tell a story about some guy in your former church and his mama is sitting right in front of you.

3) There will never be a time in your life when you know all the Bible and have your questions all answered; if you cannot serve Him with some gaps in your knowledge and preach without knowing everything, you’re going to have a hard time.

4) Your church members should submit to your leadership, but you’re not the one to tell them that.

5) The best way to get people to submit to your leadership is for you to humble yourself and serve them the way the Lord did the disciples (John 13); they will trust someone who loves them that much.

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The brave and courageous leader of the Lord’s church

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“Be strong and courageous” (Joshua 1:6,7,9,18).

The pastor of a church with which I’m familiar is something of a bully, according to some members I know. So, the other day, seeing him talking rudely to two women and watching them leaving in tears, a deacon in that church did a brave thing.

He went to see the pastor.

After hearing out the preacher on what had occurred, this courageous clayman told the pastor he was in the wrong, that he had been out of line, and asked him to apologize to the women.

The last I heard, the pastor has not apologized. From what I gather, no one expects that he will.  He built a reputation as one who will get his way above all, and to back down to anyone is not in his nature.

Such a bully has no business in the ministry.

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How God’s children can have a nice quarrel

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“The Lord’s bond-servant must not be quarrelsome but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition….” (Second Timothy 2:24ff.)

Just because we are not to be quarrelsome doesn’t mean we can’t have a good old-fashioned argument.

We just can’t have a “good old-fashioned knock-down fight.”

No one must be hurt in the process.

We can have differences of opinions, and conflicts of convictions. Since the church is composed of partially developed, not-yet-finished specimens of God’s grace–people like you and me–we’re going to have differences. That is a given, a fact of life.

If my wife and I, we who love each other most of the time and have lived together as husband and wife for going-on 52 years, if we have differences of opinions and occasionally outright arguments, it figures that rank strangers would.

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The Kingdom of God is a party.

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“And Jesus answered and spoke to them again in parables, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king, who gave a wedding feast for his son….'” (Matthew 22:1-2).

Tony Campolo told a story–then developed it into a book–that has lodged itself in my brain and will not let me alone.

I’d like to do all I can to plant it in yours too.

Oddly enough, at the beginning of the book, Tony says he took an author’s license to shape the story just a tad. “It did not happen in just the way I am going to tell it to you.”  I found that interesting.  (Think I’ve met my soulmate! lol)

He says, “The names and the setting are made up and dialogue is a bit contrived, but the story is essentially what happened to me about four years ago.”

For reasons I cannot quite put my finger on, before recording the story here, I thought pastors would find his admission/confession interesting.  Can I be forgiven for thinking most of us would have tweaked that story, then sent it on its way without ever telling anyone it did not happen exactly as we told it, but that we had prettied it up?

Tony Campolo–surely you know this man! If not, google him. He’s so worth knowing!–was speaking in Hawaii, and for a resident of the Philadelphia area as he is, that means he wakes up at 3 am ready for breakfast.  So, he was out in Honolulu looking for a diner where he could get some bacon and eggs. (Note: I once bought him just such a breakfast in a diner in Black Mountain, NC, and we swapped stories for two hours. A delightful memory.)

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