Compassion By Design

I have been living life with a great deal of stress lately– a couple of weeks ago my new iMac started acting up. I did the usual things including opening the manual (for the first time) and calling Apple support. I am really dependant upon my computer and of course none of the usual approaches fixed my problem. After toiling for several hours I heard those fate filled words, “this computer is going to need repair.” I think I already knew that, as I gazed at colored screens that were not part of my regular set up and had crashes every couple of minutes—these words came as a shock none the less. I dutifully took my iMac into the repair facility with hopes that I wouldn’t be in the stone age too long—and as I expected they said it would take about a week.

Have you ever tried to survive without your Mac? Better yet, what do you do when some crucial member of your church plant team gets transferred, has marital issues, has to change jobs, or is in some way is taken out of service for a season. It could even be as hard losing your iMac. I’ve learned some lessons from this experience, and they are lessons that we might want to apply to our church planting efforts.

1. Always have a back up plan. Whether it is a transportation or sound equipment or worship leading, have a #2 waiting in the wings. Often new leader’s get stretched sooner than anyone thinks, and that is not a bad thing.

2. It will take longer than you expect. Its great when things go fast and big, but they don’t always grow that way. Its easy for us to believe that the universe actually revolves around our Entourage Calendar (outlook for your PC’ers), when in fact there are a whole other set of principles at work and at war. We need to be in this work for the long-haul, and shouldn’t start without that attitude.

3. Flexibility produces growth. Its is good to stretch, and usually the best stretching has some pain attached. We should work to keep our hearts soft and flexible, and trust in our Maker when we or our plans get stretched all out of shape. If we want flexible leaders, we need to model this for them, and we will most definitely get the chance. In my case, it really is possible to work from your laptop!

4. God can raise the dead and can even rescue an iMac from a repair shop called Mac Heaven (yes, that’s the real name). When the shop called, after 2 weeks☹, I told him that I thought my computer had died and gone to Mac heaven—but now I could rejoice because it was alive! When you are in the middle of a repair job, and your plan is not working out as you thought—remember that there is really a bigger plan at work. The limitations that are seemingly imposed by circumstances are not anything more than a chance to grow our reliance and faith.

5. Whatever happens, you can write about it later. All of these stresses become a valuable story later, they become the things that allow us to have greater value in the lives of those we serve. As a real testimony to this fact, I am writing this blog on my newly restored iMac—see it really does work! Our lives really are a story that is being crafted together by a master poet. And we can’t imagine how well it will read—real poetry when it is done. I know that the crazy places that my ministry has taken me (imagine Washington DC!) may look like a crooked path, but the design is just way above my pay grade. I am getting a little better at looking back and realizing that today is just another important chapter.

My latest workbook is now available with the title “reFocus”. The current “Understanding Community Needs Kit” is focused on new churches, and we have had lots of requests from pastors who are in existing churches, so we revised the kit to fit the needs and challenges of churches that are seeking to become more missional. From the back of the book:

Engaging the community is not an option for churches of our era—healthy churches must find new ways to outreach and provide community service if they want to reach this culture. ReFocus is the first step for churches that want to turn the corner to “missional” with intentional and focused community service. The community needs assessment process, carefully redesigned in this workbook for use by volunteer teams, helps the local church to effectively “listen” to the community, as it builds hundreds of new relationships and a ministry focus. The workbook provides a complete process beginning with leadership orientation, proceeding through effective surveys and interviews resulting in a “strategic match” that aligns the resources and calling of the local church with the critical needs in the community. If you are pastoring a church that is moving toward missional, revitalizing a church or simply working to build greater community engagement, this book will help you build new relationships, grow leaders and focus your community efforts in a powerful way. Order by following this link.

For church planters, the horse we intend to ride is a well planned church planting effort complete with a healthy team, budgets, role descriptions, work-plan management (see converge), supporters and church style. So much rides (pardon the pun) on our effective thinking and preparation. We know that this is a faith adventure that we are undertaking, and we know there will be some rough spots, that is why we plan ahead. Proverbs 21:31 tell us that our “horse is made ready for battle, but victory rests with the LORD.”

For some a different proverb should be written, “our horse is malnourished and unshod, and we ride forward like Don Quixote to tilt at windmills” (Mills translation). In other words our preparation is really an important key to our success. Another Proverb (21:5), confirms this reality, “The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty.” I think the support offered by converge related to work planning and the coaching that goes with it is a worthwhile way to help new churches stay on track. Also, needs assessment is an initial planning tool that also helps us to find and focus on people that we can serve and reach.

No matter the supports we include, the challenge is always taking the time to plan, and requiring focus along the way. This challenge to plan well and adjust while we trust in the Lord is even more critical when we add missional community service as a part of our new church.

Effective community service is not offered or sustained through unplanned or hasty efforts. Things that we get away with in ministry space (that’s a sad commentary), won’t stand the light of public scrutiny in a broader community space. We can’t move forward without essential charitable documents, budgets, defined roles and careful thinking that lines up our gifts and talents with community needs. If we ever want to move past experimental, occasional outreach to long term missional service, we have to get serious about effective preparation and planning. So, how is your horse? Have you tuned up your plan lately, or are you running a hasty race that will require lots of repair work later? Are you laying a foundation of focus and discipline? Are you doing the essential planning, communication and documenting that lead to later success? Those things are hard for us all, but we know that our trust in the Lord’s grace isn’t permission for sloppy Agape, or loose horseshoes.

According to the research completed by Ed Stetzer about what makes church plants most sustainable, new churches that include outreaches like block parties fare better than those that use door to door evangelism strategies. These outreaches serve several important purposes: 1) they help build team cohesion; 2) they stretch team members outside their comfort zone; 3) they provide another marketing opportunity; and 3) may help us connect with potential visitors to our launch.

Many of our outreaches however, are more marketing than missional. Being missional has to do with organizing our church life AND the personal discipleship of our team around relational connections with people. Being in the community is an important step toward growing a real missional DNA, but the postman is in the community too, and he/she is not necessarily missional. Being “sent” means not only “showing up” in the community, but actually connecting with people in a caring way. Missional DNA shows up as our people become more committed and comfortable in reaching out to new people on their turf.

The number of people in your team that actually make a personal connection with someone new during the outreach is often very limited. Our people get busy during these outreaches, but they don’t always talk to anyone. Could we use our planned outreaches to build a greater relational and incarnational DNA in our plant team? We know that the more that the entire team becomes connectors, the healthier and larger the church launch.

Here are some suggestions about making our outreaches missional growth opportunities.

Structure outreaches relationally. Don’t do ring and run outreach. Plan the outreach to require some kind of conversation—make it comfortable and non-invasive, but conversational. This is the difference between just washing windows for free, or taking a brief survey while you wash windows. Surveys, like those in a needs assessment help those who are not highly skilled talkers to learn to start conversations.

Model relationship building. Talk about this in advance and tell success stories when you are done that amplify the importance and ease of talking with people. Share skills in conversation starting. Don’t only tell the most exciting stories, tell the simple ones where a quiet team member had a positive conversation.

Pair people to stretch their networking skills. Place those who are not easy talkers, with those who make this look easy. Teach the strong relational leaders, to take turns talking with others and to encourage those who are being stretched.

Do Needs Assessment survey work during the outreach, so that lots of conversations are started. By simply adding needs assessment to your existing outreach calendar, you ensure that in every contact a conversation is started. To learn more about needs assessment, join a free conference call, or attend the February 5,6 Needs Assessment Training in the national capital area of Virginia.