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You May Need Some Loyal Mavericks! If you’re of a certain age, the movie Office Space was a painfully awkward story of a mind-numbing, inspiration-sucking, cubicle-landscaped work environment. While it was over-the-top, it does reflect a problem we often find in church leadership structures: a critical “dream-deficiency.” I get it: ministry can feel overwhelming and draining. Been there, done it, sold the t-shirt on eBay. But doesn’t it seem sad that we serve a wildly creativ

How About a New Way to Measure Healthy Effectiveness? All healthy churches are characterized by four key traits: Integrity, Passion, Servanthood, and Imagination. While different churches will be stronger in some of these than others, all must be present and effectively balanced. Integrity means that systems and processes all function to achieve the church’s goals. A church with integrity has a clear sense of purpose and maintains systems that leverage resources toward fulfil

Are You Assessing the Status Quo of Your Church or Organization? In the book Elemental Leaders, I identify four critical traits every healthy and effective church must have: Integrity, Passion, Servanthood, and Imagination. In the section on Passion, I offer 6 “firestarters” for re-igniting passion in a church. In this post, I want to single one of them out as the first step in creating movement in a church…or any organization, for that matter. It is: For corporate passion to

Yeah, I know that’s a wide open question, but the New Testament says a lot about production. Of course, in their agrarian culture they used the word fruitfulness. And often. In our performance-oriented, comparison-driven culture, this can be dangerous; it can creep into our understanding of grace and how relationship with Jesus is initiated and maintained. But the Creator Father in whose image we’re made, loves output that glorifies beauty, love, truth, and transformation. Li