No one else would stand by Paul's side, but God came near. God stood beside him. God carried him. God empowered him. And then the light of morning broke through.

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"Lean into the empowering presence of God and realize that you're not alone. Reach out to God, and he will reach out to you. He will restore your soul. He will encourage you and inspire you. He will heal you up and set your feet back on course. He will rally other leaders to your side who will pray for you and walk with you. He will remind you that nothing you do for Him is in vain. Nothing" 

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The kingdom advancement we're pursuing needs us all. 

"Why do i sign up for this"

"Who needs this"

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God is the one calling me to live this life and I want to be found faithful one day. 

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There isn't enough money in the world to motivate me to do what I do. But there is a kind of compensation that does fire me up. It's God's commendation to all his sons and daughters who serve faithfully: "Well Done". 

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1 Cor 15. 

When leaders have a quick and succinct way to check their motivations during times of trial in ministry, they stand a far better chance of enduring the long haul. 

God alone has my ultimate allegiance, he is the direct object of my highest affection and his promises are what I'm banking my entire ministry and eternity on. 

Jesus said to let your yes be yes and your no be no. (Matthew 5:37)

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Promptness is about character and leaders are not beyond the rules that govern things like courtesy and chracter. 

When a leader factors in traffic and detours and last min things and STILL manages to arrive early, team members feel affirmed. 

No excuses when you're late. Just apologise. Group members feelings are rank higher than my justification. 

I value their time, I really do view them as equals and I really do want my yes to be yes. 

The more varied the environments in which you exercised your leadership gift, the stronger that gift will become. 

Lead something besides your main thing. 

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It's a kind of cross training development. 

The complexity of the situation that stretch you will catalyze an intense period of research and reflection. 

What do I believe in, to the very core of my being? 

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What are the values or convictions that I feel to my toes? 

Maybe they were born of bible study, showed up on the heels of pain or the result of HS prompting. 

Let those issues arbitrate key decisions. 

Let them tell you where to throw your time and energy and passion and money. 

Wherever you see something going well - whenever light begins to chase back the darkness that threatens to engulf our world, look closely. There stands a leader who is holding that candle. 

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It boils down to diligent, God honoring leadership. Evil needs to be confronted and oppression needs to be resisted. Slavery needs to be abolished, churches rejuvenated and major social movements started. 

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Communicate the vision for change

Commit personally to pay the high price of leadership. 

Roll up your sleeves, release your best energies, pursue the vision with everything you have. 

At the end of all your efforts, a flicker of light would stand tall, light will push back darkness one mm more. 

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All progress hinges on diligent leaders, God's preferred method for transforming the  world. 

"This is the only time in history when I get to fight for God. This is the only part of my eternal story when I am actually in the battle. Once I die, I'll be in celebration mode in a glorified body in a while different set of circumstances. But this is my limited window of opportunity, and I'm going to fight the good fight for all I'm worth"

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If i'm waiting for some other life to be courageous, then I'm kidding myself. 

Leaders fight fear regularly. Don't play it safe, this is your one and only life. 

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Corporate leaders is just about betting money. Be it a few million dollars, at the end of the day it's just money.

Church work is more than currency. You're dealing with God's reputation and eternal souls. These are sky high stakes as well as steeper consequences. 

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Has God spoken clearly to me on this faith step? Has he spoken to the team members around me affirmatively? Then step up, what life are you waiting for? This is the only leadership life I get. 

What's this item about? What makes it interesting? Write a catchy description to grab your audience's attention...

If i communicate the right mission at the right time of the year and in the right way with the right motivation behind it, the sheep do not disappoint. 

When i take the pains to run down a list of appropriate questions on the front end, I set my sheep up for effective cooperation. 

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QUestions like

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Is this a good plan

Is it in step with the vision of our church

Have I warmed up this value recently with effective teaching from Scripture

Are my expectations of people resaonable

Have I chosen the right night of the week

Have I communicated effecively

Have I prayed fervently? 

Romans 8:6

life and peace - is a kind of vitality, energy and enthusiasm that you feel well up in your soul and bubble over in ways people outside can easily detect. Calmness and assurance and a sense of 'fit' characterize your entire aura. 

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In leadership terms, we carry a responsibility to lead in such a way that those we lead are as freed up as possible to do their jobs from a place of life and peace.

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"Are we still having fun?"

Not asking if things are easy or  if challenge spikes ever occur.

But asking if there's still something fundamentally life giving about the role they're playing and the job they're doing. 

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People are perpetual works in progress, there is no end to the amount of work we could do to serve them better. There are always more appointments that could be taken, more prayers to be prayed, more encouragement that could be offered. 

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Research shows that if you work more than 10 hours a day, your effectiveness go down. 

Assign a ritual to celebrate a day of real hard work. 

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Having a daily finish line means work stays at work.

When i go into nonleader mode, the people around me dont have to vie for time with my ministry care and concerns. 

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Daily finish line

so that ministry doesn't become non stop and resentment dont set in. Have a weekly finish line for sabbath.

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Monthly finish line

get alone with God and relish a little solitude. Do intensive reading, intentional reflection and a bit of personal evaluation. 

Get around people who build into me and challenge me to lead at higher levels. 

Finish lines allow us those moments of emotional completion. They help us hear God say "Enough is enough"

Remind us that we are more than leadership machines. 

When an initiative fails, there are lots of options: self flagellation, berating others, blaming external factors etc.

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Ask this question instead: Did we do any learning? 

Thats the best response to failure. 

When leaders lead effectively, they tend to generate an increasing amount of velocity in their own lives and in the organizations they serve.

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There's more to leadership effectiveness than speed. Because in direct proportion to organizational growth, "good" pastors are also expected to grow their souls (our rs with God and with those closest to us) 

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Adjust my velocity or i will spend the most impact rich years of my life going fast but feeling empty on the inside. 

Self reflect: In the various areas of my life, am i "gaining soul" or losing it? 

Do i feel more aware of God's presence, more confident of his work in and through my life, more inclined to exhibit the fruit of the Spirit, and more determined to help grow His kingdom? 

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If your soul line is suffering, maybe it's time to humble yourself and slow your pace. Don't gain the whole world and lose your soul. 

The leader must be in the center of the action

The leader must feel the pressure first, hear the sounds first, smell the smells first and sense the momentum of the way things are going long before anyone else. 

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A leader has to make sure that everyone in the organization is being supervised by someone who is visible, present and courageous - someone who is unmistakably in the fight. 

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Leaders in the local church get crystal clear on the intensity of the battle we're in and what it will take to win. We are engaged in a wild spiritual battle for the hearts and minds and souls of human beings. As tragic as it is to see soldiers dead bodies being stuffed into black bags, the stakes of our battle are infinitely higher. Our effectiveness, or lack thereof, seals men's and women's eternities; for us, it's not just a life and death deal. The stakes are eternal life and death. 

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God is the giver of the leadership gift, and the fully expects us to keep heading straight into the fight until such a time he changes our orders or take us home. THose we lead derserves our most competent and confident effort. 

Even if the 'facts' revealed that I am part of the problem, i should take responsibility for fixing what is broken.

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When you have clear, objectified data, you can plan better, make better decsions and chart a surer course for your church. 

They had my full commitment to sending a reply to every SOS i received withint 24hours of its arrival. I will act on it myself, commision an emissary or tell you that while i appreciate your concern, the issue is not serious enough in my judgement for me to act on it immediately. 

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Dont want to launch something unless I have a strong sense that we can build it, resource it and sustain it over the long haul. Good leaders call out high commitments from people. At some point we have to ask ourselves how many hills can we realistically ask their congregations to climb in a given time frame. 

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Ephe 6

Ministry is hard. But Jesus said my yoke is easy and my burden is light

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Doable Hard

Breathes life into you 

Raises your spirit kind of work

Keep ministry life sane

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Destructive Hard

damage soulrs, marraiges and our ability to minister effectively 

the way we do God's work destroy God's work in us. 

constantly dreading your days, feel overwhelmed and dreaming of getting away

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Agree to constantly function in the "Doable Hard" 

When high capacity people work in close proximity to each other, there will be friction. What matters is what you do immediately after the friction occurs. 

One way is to let time heal the wound, don't pay too much attention and let the anger subsite. Eventually all will be water under the bridge. (stew so long that you begin to think of the other person differently.)

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Or the Bible's approach.

Ephesians 4:26 and Matthew 5. 

Whenever an infraction occurs, let's commit to addressing it and resolving it as soon as possible. Deal?

"Alot was said during the meeting, are we okay?" 

"I'm feeling a little troubled about the last comment I made to you in the meeting. It landed a little more personally than I intended it to. I want to keep short accounts with you. Are we okay?" 

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Avoid slipping into an accusatory role or polarizing the conversation before I fully understand what actually transpired. 

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Certain things don't make sense to me and seem terribly unwise on the surface, but if the other person is given freedom to help me understand the situation, maybe I can see the situation from another angle. 

75% of the time I still wind up pursuing the same course of action in response to the information I learn. 

Creative meetings are often dangerous places. 

People are afraid of spelling their thoughts out so that they won't get criticised. 

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During future brainstorming sessions try to

- placed cupped hands over top of head and said 'give me a little mercy here, okay?'

- No matter how wacky or impractical the idea seemed, people can confidently move through the period of emotional risk they step into. 

Vociferously disagree but refuse to destroy each other in the process. 

We have deep feelings about many kingdom issues and passion beget passion.

Effective leaders do not fear passion, they welcome it.

But from time to time passionate discussions digress into personal attacks and real people get really hurt. Your team must know that as the leader, you will never sit idly and allow a meeting to turn into an alley fight. 

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Ephesiasn 4 'truth in love' passage starts off with Paul telling Christ followers to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. A leader must insist on leading in a manner that contributes to unity, even in the heat of disagreement. 

There's a difference between a genuine community and a 'pseudo community'

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It's a great temptation for small grps to slide into a state where they're not quite telling each other the truth, not quite celebrating each other. Instead, they tolerate each other, accommodate each other and they settle for sitting on the unspoken matters that separate them. 

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You have to endure a little chaos to break free from falsehood.

"As far as I can tell, we're not experiencing real community here. We're not where I want for us to be, Frankly, I'm holding back. I'm not giving you the final 2 percent of what I'm thinking. And I'm not really hearing what you have to say either" 

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- Draw a flip-chart with "Pseudo Community" and "True Community"

- Think of the 3 most important rs in their lives. How many know that you're settling for a pseudo community with at least one of these three?

-  Go through that messy tunnel to resolve all these issues that are hindering.

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As a leader, you must constantly ask direct questions "Are we okay? How can we clean up the messes we've made along the way?"

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Stay prayed up, rested up and committed to entering the tunnel of chaos whenever the Spirit prompts. It's one of the truest tests of character and love. 

Set the tone for how they feel about the future of the organization or endeavor. 

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Once the bad news is out, I am freed up to shift to an upbeat posture. Before dismissing everyone, summarize what we've covered in a positive way

"To recap, there are some things we can't rejoice about just yet. But we are still moving into the future in full trust mode with God, believing that..."

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As the leader, try to deliver the bad news first. Get it over with and then get on with something that will leave your people in a much better place. 

I dont want ministry to become so professional and efficient that relationship and community gets squeezed right out. 

Galatians 6:2, we fulfill the law of Christ when we agree to carry each other's burdens. The people you lead have to know they're part of a burden carrying team. 

Simply put, your followers need to know that it's legal to admit that while they may be sitting across the conference room table wearing a smile and a trendy outfit, nothing is fine or fitting quite right on the inside. 

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As you work to create an atmosphere of genuine community, you'll keep your hearts tender toward each other, collective prayers more focused and keep the 'church' in church work. 

Leadership is supposed to be a forward looking process. 

Leaders like to know about problems while they're still small so that those issues don't grow into big, organization-imperiling monsters that can kill momentum and threaten mission achievement.

Leaders like to be prepared. They like to have contigency plans to avoid pitfalls. This is what leaders were made by God to do.

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Last min grenades ask a proactive person to become reactive. A well paced problem solver to become a firefighter and a long term planner to focus all energies on the next 24hrs. 

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The 'no 11th hour surprises' value is something the point leader has to instill consistently in all followers so that it becomes a cultural norm. 

"I want to keep blood pressure stable, nuttiness quotient low and fire drills and soap operas to a minimum"

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Character

maximum energy, maximum effort. 

Good character is tough to discern in a 15mins interview. Do your due diligence to be sure that the person coming on board has a proven track record of being a truth teller, covenant keeper, seeks to be conformed to the image of Christ, manage relationships well and credits the efforts of others when a victory is won. 

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Competenece

Persistence is often key here. If someone tells me no, I can't let that deter me. Keep the convo alive by seeking to understand the other person's perceived obstacles and then depending on how badly i need them on board, do everything in my power to help overcome them. 

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Never apologize for looking for maximum competence in your new teammates, gifts and talents and capabilities that will take your ministry to the next level of effectiveness. 

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Chemistry

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The whole reason we show up for these meetings, the whole reason we do anything around here, is to create an environment where people who are elbowing or wrestling or weeping their way through seasons of disappointment can receive ministry. 

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Christ said he was going to build 'his church' a community of real people with real, beating hearts that would be attentive to each other and responsible to each other and quick to extend mercy and grace and love. 

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It's not some amorphous or corporate feeling organization that I'm spending hours trying to fix or advance. It's a living, breathing, pulsating organism that is evolving real time based on the thousand ways we choose to care for each other, listen to each other, hold each other up when the rug has just been yanked out from beneath our feet. 

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Interdependence, vulnerability, listening, giving of ourselves. Can you hear the Spirit whisper to you now? 

This is church. 

Leaders traffic in idea creation. Be ferociously disciplined about seeking them out and incredibly committed to stewarding them well. 

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In order to land one good idea - one breakthrough idea that will kick your organization activity into high gear - you have to allow for hundreds or even thousands of mediocre ideas. 

A five can never attract, motivate or retain people who are higher on the effectiveness scale than they are. Five can recruit and mobilize and retain 4-1s but they can never lead 6-10s. 

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It's my responsibility to increase my own level of effectiveness but to also surround myself with people who were as close to my level as possible. Because collectively, we will be able to attract people who are equal to or lower than our leadership effectiveness scale. 

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Embolden your team to find the brightest, most accomplished and most effective leaders. 

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Some pastors poke fun at the disciples Jesus chose. As if the Messiah shot low and went after misfits. True, he didnt necessarily surround himself with aristocrats. But a careful profile analysis reveals that guys like James, Peter and Paul - a monster leader whom Jesus made a special appearance on the Damascus Road - had quite high leadership capabilities. 

And when his action - oriented, high capacity direct reports were thrown the kingdom ball, they scored in a way that would count for all of history. 

Use this to describe courageous, high risk plans that God just might use in a major way. 

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Once you label something in a culture, you give it an identity. You legitimize it and in doing so, increase the likelihood that you'll see that behavior on an ever increasing basis. Because people become organizational heroes when they exhibit it. 

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You will never take big hills without making bold moves. 

Anytime you see God-honouring values being lived out genuinely and consistently, a leader has taught about that value. Whatever the value, if it's alive and well in a local church it's not be accident. 

It's only here because of intentional, committed, dedicated effort. 

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Leaders must figure out what values they believe should be manifested in their organizations. And then put them over the flame of a Bunsen burner by teaching on those values, underscoring them with Scripture, enforcing them, and making heroes out of the people who are living them out. Over time, sufficiently hot values will utterly define your culture. 

Acts 20 - 21. Paul knew the dangers awaiting him if he went on this missionary trip. 

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Leaders have to contend with this idea of how seriously we will pursue our God-given visions. 

The single greatest determinant of whether followers will ever own a vision deeply is the extent to which those followers believe the leader will own it. 

They will only take a bullet for the cause if they believe down to their tows that you would do the same. 

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People can tell if you own the vision or you're just a hired hand. 

The compromised leader might well continue to lead, but eventually everyone figures out that God will never fully bless the efforts of this hireling. 

Leaders rise & fall by the language they use. Sometimes whole visions live or die on the basis of the words the leader chooses for articulating that vision. 

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When you put the right words, it becomes memorable and powerful. It becomes weight bearing. It's like the 'insider language' that deepens community and creates clarity. 

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Wrestle with words until you can communicate big ideas in a way that captures the imagination, catalyze action and lift spirits. 

The other person is probably going to remember only a few sentences from our conversation, so I want to work hard to select accurate phrases of note. 

"Asking" is a significant part of leading. 

Ask people to devote their best to God, to consider Christ. 

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When handled properly, people are actually quite flattered to be asked to do significant things for God. They might not always say yes - they can't always say yes - but they are almost always honoured by a wise and well - timed ask. 

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People will think that they are kingdom oriented, responsible enough to be asked, to be entrusted responsibilities. 

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1) Set the context.

My goal here is to be obedient to God's prompting, not to force you to sometihng. It won't affect our friendship or my respect for you. 

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2) Ask clearly and succinctly

I'm going to ask you to consider... but before I do that I will give you 4 reasons why.... I really want you to pray about it and consider coming on board. 

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The nature of human beings is that we tend not to drift into better behaviors. We usually have to be asked by someone to consider taking it up a level. 

"Maybe I really can take it up a notch. I'd just never thought much about it until now"

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If you're chasing a bold vision, one of the greatest gifts you can give the people around you is to get in front of them, eyeball to eyeball and ask them to step up and do something great for God. 

At the core of leadership sits the power of vision. 

There are as many life-giving, visionary pictures of the future as there are leaders among us. And when God finally brings clarity and certainty of a vision in a leader's life, everything changes for the better. 

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Don't apologize for the strength of feeling you have for the vision that God has put into your life. Don't hide your feelings about it. God meant for you to feel deeply about his vision for you as you do about anything. 

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Just get it painted so that people's hearts are stirred enough to shout, "Count me in!"