Four M's that will make you a better leader.

1. Mentor.

Paul said “Follow me as I follow Christ.” Every leader needs a mentor. Mentors don’t have to be people that you meet with one on one. Mentors can be people that you choose to learn from and then read everything they write, listen to everything they say, and watch everything they do, even from afar. If you want to become the leader God has desires you to be … you have to have a mentor.

2. Mind.

One of my favorite passages in the Bible says …”Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus.” To be a truly great leader you need to think like Jesus. The primary thing on Jesus mind was “how can I serve others”. Jesus was a servant. Because of this he was the greatest leader of all time. 

Leadership is really just finding a problem that needs to be solved …then giving your time and energy to build a team to solve the problem. If you want to be a great leader – stop thinking about yourself, start thinking about others … and you will be like Jesus … an incredible leader.

3. Mission.

Jesus once said – “The Son of Man came not but to seek and save the Lost.” Jesus was on mission. His mission drove him to talk, think, and act the way that he did. His mission was the catalyst behind every thing he did. What is your mission? Why are you here? What are you living for? Most people in life never find the answer to these three questions. If you can …If you can find your mission …you will not be like everyone else … you will be a leader.

4. Message.

In order to be a leader, you have to have people following you. In order for people to follow you, they have to know where they are going. As a leader it is up to you to not only know where you are going or what you are called to do… but you also have to be able to clearly state these things to the people around you. 

Take your mission and develop a 5 minute verbal presentation, a 15 minute presentation and a 45 minute presentation. As a leader you must be able to talk to one person, a small group of people or a large room of people about your mission in such a compelling way that it is hard for them to pass on joining your team.

Want to keep growing in leadership? Check out Youth Ministry University by clicking HERE

Your past belongs to yesterday. Your tomorrow belongs to you.

Your past belongs to yesterday, but tomorrow belongs to you.To maximize your tomorrow here are three things you need to do today.

1. Remember the past but don’t live in it.
 

Learn from your past but don’t live there. Stop wasting so much time thinking or talking about where you’ve been,what you’ve done or what’s been done to you.

2. Embrace the present.

You are where you are. You are what you are. You have what you have. Don’t lie to yourself about the truth. Be honest and embrace the situation you are in.

3. Change the future.

Where you are is not where you have to stay. What you are is not who you have to be. What you have does not have to define you. You control you … if something needs to change … then CHANGE. Learn what you need to learn. Do what you need to do and go where you need to go.

Your past belongs to yesterday but tomorrow belongs to you.

INNER CIRCLE Part Two: Four characteristics you desperately need in your inner circle.

I once heard the statement, "As a leader, you teach what you know but reproduce who you are". I think this is not only true for the leader, but for the organization that they lead.  Whatever is in the heart will flow throughout the entire body. Whatever qualities the leadership possesses will naturally flow out into every part of the ministry, church, or organization. 

Get the heart right, and everything else will follow! 

Here are four characteristics you desperately need in your inner circle. 

1. Honesty. 

Relationship is the strength of every organization and trust is the foundation of every relationship. Where there is honesty, there is trust. Where there is trust you can do almost anything! 

2. Humility.

The greatest leaders are those that have mastered the art of serving others. You want your inner circle leaders to walk into every room and every meeting thinking, "How can I help?". Surround yourself with humble people and your organization will quickly rise to the top! 

3. Hunger.

I love being around people that are content, but never satisfied. You need people leading alongside of you that always want to do better, go farther, and serve more faithfully. As humans if we don't stay hungry and keep eating we will eventually die. The same is true for any organization. We need to stay hungry. Keep eating. Keep growing. Keep moving forward, or we will join the piles of thousands of other organizations that became complacent, just before their demise. 

4. Hard Work. 

Dave Ramsey often says, "When you find "Good Luck" it will be wearing work clothes.

Nothing is ever done by thinking. At some point we have to stand up, role up our sleeves and get to work. I will take hard work over talent any day. Through the years I have seen that hard workers keep making a difference long after the talented people have already gone home. 

If your inner circle is full of honesty, humility, hunger, and hard workers ... buckle up because things are going to get really good! 

INNER CIRCLE Part One: Four types of people you can't have in your inner circle.

Every person is important. Every person has an eternal value given to them by God. Every person has a place, and needs to be treated with respect, love and dignity. However not everyone is someone that you should have in your inner circle. 

Your inner circle of friends and confidants are the people that will help shape who you are as a person, leader and organization. 

Here are four types of people to never have in your inner circle. 

1. People who have a personal agenda not a corporate vision. 

When someone has their own agenda, goal, or game plan they will never be completely on board with the vision of your church or organization. Rather than asking “What needs to be done?” and “What can I do to help us succeed?” They will constantly run things through the filter of “How does this help me?” or “Am I going to get to do, what I want to do?”.

This type of attitude causes split vision and split efforts. A house divided against itself will fall.

2. People who consistently tell you, “What other people are saying”. 

People are going to hear things from time to time and when they do, you want them to come and talk openly about what is going on. Open communication is a necessity and honesty is a non negotiable in a relationship.  However, when someone is consistently letting you know the negative things “other people” are saying about you or your organization, you have to begin to ask yourself, “Why are others so eager to talk negatively about us to them?” and “Why does this person always seem to listen to and be around the negative talk?”

People who consistently sit around the “gossip fires” that others have started, far too often are holding a match of their own. 

3. People who talk negative about past friends or leaders they've served. 

In 25 years of ministry, I have found that every person who consistently makes comments like, “My last church…” “My last pastor …” or “My last friend …” never stick around long. It is only a matter of time before the new church, the new pastor, and the new friend …become just like the last one. And the person moves on to yet another church, another pastor, and another friend that they will leave far too quickly. 

4. People who no longer want to grow. 

People stop growing for a lot of reasons. However, inner circle friends and teammates need to be reading, studying, improving and growing everyday. Wherever the leader goes the team, ministry, or organization will follow. If someone is stagnant and not moving forward spiritually, relationally, or educationally, neither will anything they lead.  

Again, I want to emphasize that, every person is important. Every person has value. Every person has a place, and should be treated with dignity, love and respect. However, when you are looking for friends and building your team to help shape and direct who you are as a person, leader or organization, you need to have the right people around you. 

You will never get the right results, if you surround yourself with the wrong types of people. However, you will consistently get good results when you have the right people by your side.

In my next blog I will be talking about "Four types of people you have to have in your Inner Circle". 

Do BIG Events really work? Tips for reaching teenagers and making disciples.

Around the youth ministry landscape there is some debate on if “Big Events” really work?  In conversations with youth pastors from around the country, the most common reason I’ve heard to why student ministries have decided to stop doing big events is, ”We worked real hard, spent a lot of money, our numbers went up for one week, then within three weeks we were right back to were we were before. So I stopped doing them.”

The truth of the matter is, if you don’t do outreach events properly, you can spend a boatload of money and not see any real momentum or growth in your ministry. However, if done properly, I have found that “the big event” can be a catalyst for true, life change in the lives of both the believing and non-believing teenager.

We once did an event “The Biggies”.  At this event we had over 1500 students in attendance. We had 200 first time visitors and 28 teenagers accepted Christ as their personal Savior. In the six weeks that followed the event, we averaged over1300 teenagers per week in attendance, had over 400 first time visitors, and 85 teenagers became Christians. We also graduated 75 young people from our Student Ministries Discipleship Program. Looking back, this “Biggies Event” catapulted us into experiencing what God had for our ministry.

Thru the years we have seen that, yes, big events do work.  

Over the next few paragraphs, I’m going to dive into the nuances of the big event, in hopes that you and your student ministry will join me in using this incredible tool to grow the Kingdom of God in your area.

Five reasons you need to do a Big Event. 

1) It gives students that have never been to your student ministry a reason to show up.

Unsaved teenagers don’t wake in the morning and think “Boy, I’d like to go to church tonight, have some guy I don’t know preach to me, and then give my life to Jesus.” Teenagers that don’t know Christ will never think about going to church, unless you give them a reason to think about it. That is what the big event does best. It puts “church” into the mind of someone that typically never thinks about it.

2) It gives students that have not attended your service in a while, a reason to come back.

Why have some of your teenagers stopped coming to your youth service? Maybe they’ve forgotten about it, maybe they’ve been busy, or maybe they haven’t had a real good reason to come back in a while. Doing a big event, gives unplugged teenagers a reason to get off the couch and plug back into your student ministry.

3) It gives your hard-core Christian students a reason to bring a friend with them to church.

Lets face it. It is extremely tough to get Christian teenagers to bring unsaved friends with them to church. Maybe its because they don’t have that many unsaved friends. It could be, they know they should invite someone, but just can’t seem to get up enough courage to ask them, or maybe they’ve never actually thought about it. Hosting a big event in your student ministry, will give your Christian teenager a reason to find someone that doesn’t know Jesus, break thru their fear, and actually bring them to church.  

4) It gives your volunteers something to rally around, pray for and be excited about.

People want to make a difference and they want to be a part of something that is bigger than themselves, that is why your volunteers are giving you their time and energy each week.  Allow them to make a difference. Show them God is up to something big in your community and host a big event that impacts tons of teenagers.

How to use big events to build big momentum. 

1 - Put the BIG event at the end of a teaching series.

2 - Take three weeks to preach on reaching out to the lost before the event.

3 - Use the BIG event as the first service in your new “hot topic” teaching series.

4 - Follow up effectively with your first time visitors.

5 - Get your first time salvation students plugged into a discipleship program right after the event.

Six questions to ask yourself before doing your event.

1 - Why are you doing the event?

2 - What is the event?

3 - What is your goal?

4 - What is your follow up plan?

5 - What is coming up after the event, that will keep students coming back?

6 - Is what we're doing really a BIG event or just a special service?

Three Steps in Creating a Big Event that Works.

Plan the Event. 

What is the service going to be? Who is going to speak? What is the music going to be like? Are you going to have special give-a-ways? What is your budget? What is your goal?  (Having a goal is important because, if you aim for nothing you'll hit it every time.)

Build Anticipation. 

Take 3 to 6 weeks to advertise and get people excited about what is coming up. Start off slow. Then as the days and weeks go by build more and more into your advertising campaign. Do flyers, T-shirts, Videos, Drama's, etc to build anticipation toward the day of the event. None of these things have to be expensive. Get your students involved making t-shirts, artwork and flyers. They would love to be a part and they don’t cost much money!

Equip your people.

The best advertisement is your students getting out there and spreading the word. Give them flyers, ask them to canvas the areas they live in, wear T-shirts on certain days of the week to school, and have them do some Social Media pushes for you.

About two weeks before you outreach event, have your students fill out cards with the list of friends they are going to bring to the event, then you as a staff take copies of those cards and pray over those names every single day, until the event arrives.

However you do it, equip your people to bring in the lost for your outreach event.

If done right hosting a big outreach event can work! If you would like more help on reaching teenagers and making disciples, check out the RESOURCE page and YOUTH MINISTRY UNIVERSITY.