Here’s how important Vacation Bible School is: Plus, almost everyone who’s ever lived near a church building knows: this is THE thing churches do in the summer for kids. Which means, if you’ve been around the church world long enough, you’ve probably heard some good, Christian people actually complain about how “that family” always finds…
Content vs. Systems Meet Anxious Amy. She loves, loves, loves Jesus, and she loves kids. She has been leading a large children’s ministry at her own church for over 7 years. And Amy has been running at full speed, ever since she can remember. Her motto is, “If you want something done right, you have…
Here’s your permission to quit! You can stop the unsustainable pace and saying yes to time-filling tasks, and take your life back!
Picture this: Your church has decided to hire a new staff member. Since this is a big decision, it’s probably best made with the input of a group of people who have insight into what the ministry, and the church, needs. This group of people, the search team, often has the same goal: to find…
I spoke to a group of high school students in the spring of 2023 and asked them how their teachers were addressing AI tools like ChatGPT. To my surprise, they had never heard of ChatGPT. In response, I just looked at their Student Pastor and said, “Sorry, man!” Jump forward a couple months, and the…
It’s Friday, and it happened again. You’re sitting in front of your laptop trying to come up with something to preach on Sunday. Your mind is blank. Your soul is dry. You’re frustrated and angry for getting to this point again. You were so excited earlier in the week about what you wanted to share. Now, you don’t want to be here, stuck doing sermon prep. It’s the weekend and there are other things you’d rather be doing. All the while your cursor is blinking, “You’ve got nothing. You’ve got nothing.”
Let’s get to the point by naming the problem: Many church committee meetings don’t need to take place. Often, we leave a meeting, see a bumper sticker in front of us and think, “Yep, I’d rather be fishing, too.” I don’t even like fishing, but that would be better than some of these meetings. People…
Balcony time is an intentional, weekly practice of spending time working on your ministry rather than just in your ministry. Often, doing church ministry and other non-profit work can feel like putting out one fire after another and prioritizing what feels urgent over what feels important. Balcony time helps alleviate those issues by increasing the…