This is an astonishing, mighty, humbling and devastating passage of the Bible. As I have been preparing I have been struggling and wrestling partly because I feel I cannot do it justice in a single sermon, or even five. But mainly because I don’t think I can do it justice at all, so astounding and profound are the truths that Jesus teaches here.
Read moreHow to Evade Capture; Col 2:8-17
LIVE
IN
CHRIST!
That's the prime exhortation from Colossians 2. He is amazing, the treasure and wisdom of God.
But make no mistake, there are plenty of forces out there that will try to stop us.
How to Live in Christ; Col. 2
Do you want to be encouraged in heart? Get to know Christ. United in love? Christ. Do want treasures of wisdom and knowledge? You only get them from Christ. Its not just that he imparts them, he is them.
Read moreLeadership Lessons: Struggling to Develop a Team Mentality 2
The second in a series of four short lists on why a church may struggle to develop a team mentality.
2. Organisational Reasons
Relational poverty – no sense of fellowship or really knowing each other
All effort put into running high quality main meetings rather than into discipleship or team building
Structures (or theology) are set up to give most responsibility to few people, encouraging passive receivers
Leaders or congregation not able to cope with participative or consultative leadership, hence no invitation to others to take initiative
Lack of capitalisation of team. Unwillingness to take resources from other places to make team work
Organisational structure set up to disenfranchise the majority
View that the leader retains a degree of detachment from the community as the elite, trained professional
Leadership Lessons: Struggling to Develop a Team Mentality 1
In this post and the following three are 4 sets of reasons a church may struggle to develop a team mentality. There are probably plenty more.
1. People holding wrong assumptions about what the church is:
- Church is meeting to attend rather than common life together
- Lack of understanding about every member ministry
- Unbiblical view of fellowship = activity or nice time together
- Unbiblical view of leaders = activity coordinators
- Unbiblical view of congregation = consumers or pupils
- Historical assumptions about relationship between clergy and laity
- Denominational assumptions or practices that turn leaders into a priesthood