paul in albury

It occurred to me again today, talking with a friend from church, how unhelpful it is to speak of my “day off”. The obvious implication of that use of words is that I view my church family as work that I need a day off from. I’m uncomfortable with that. I’m uncomfortable with such a professional view of ministry. I’m uncomfortable with a view of church and ministry that forces me to figure out whether the people in my church family are my friends or my projects.

Its not the only alternative, but for me I tend to use the words “family day”.

To me the advantages is that its more positive. It speaks of what I am doing rather than what I’m not doing. I’m focusing on my family today.When someone asks if they can catch up on Monday, it seems more helpful to say, “Actually, Monday won’t work, cos that’s our family day” as opposed to “Actually, Monday won’t work, cos that’s my day off”.

Its not a big deal, and its certainly not right or wrong, but words matter.

And so does rest actually!

So whatever you choose to call it, make sure that you do it well to the glory of God!

Last week we had our first meeting of encouragement group overseers and our leadership team. After meeting together we are giving thanks to God for the way in which he is ministering to us through our encouragement groups.
The overwhelming consensus is that they are working and working well.

All the overseers spoke of their group members being diligent in preparing and enthusiastic in sharing. The small size of the groups is certainly bearing fruit. The flexibility of the groups (due to their small size) is also helping. Groups have changed meeting times more than once to accommodate members and some have even changed times to accommodate new members.

Just about all the groups have grown and new groups have already formed in the space of two months.

Of great encouragement to me was the enthusiasm of the overseers in the way that they are already grappling with how best to serve the people under their care.

They enjoy the open ended questions that leave a lot of room for discussion. They enjoy the freedom to not have to have every question answered. members of groups are already investigating interesting ideas that have arisen from the discussions and I have been invited to a group to delve further into particular topics that have arisen.

So far so good!

The challenge for me is to grow these overseers and to grow more overseers into equipped Bible teachers. That sounds exciting.

We don’t have enough growth group leaders!?!??

That was our dilemma heading into 2011. Our nightchurch congregation that I pastor is about 9 months old. We’ve grown quite a bit both numerically & spiritually. We have lots of people who want to meet during the week around the Bible but we’re not quite at the point of having enough trained growth group leaders.

Our interim solution is to try what we are calling encouragement groups.

What’s an encouragement group and how’s it going to work?
Groups of 3-4 people (single sex) meeting weekly for 60-90 mins to read & reflect upon a passage of Scripture, to pray together & to encourage each other in trust & obedience & evangelism. Every encouragement group across nightchurch will be synchronised ie. looking at the same passage in the same week with a shared set of questions.
Each encouragement group will have an “overseer” responsible for the group meeting together and for what happens in that meeting.
Overseers will be cared for by the leadership team. Each overseer will be contacted by a leadership team member every 2 weeks to help & encourage them.
Its hoped that encouragement groups through the year may expand and multiply into more groups with more overseers.

Not a growth group?
In 2010 nightchurch had one evening growth group that grew from about 12 to 30 people! Exciting but unsustainable. The essential difference between our encouragement groups and growth groups is that we are reducing the responsibility & expectation on a leader.  I admit the difference is small but it seems important to me.

What are the advantages of encouragement groups?
Because they are small they are flexible. They can meet anytime, any place and can change to suit the circumstances of the members. Because they are small we are hopeful of greater participation of members & accountability within each group. The oversight of the leadership team brings an immediate increase in pastoral responsibility across nightchurch. The encouragement groups give us time & opportunity & even a pathway to train up growth group leaders for 2012 and beyond.
The other thing that excites me about them is the organic chaotic nature of the groups which is dynamic and gives opportunity for gospel growth.

What’s a briefing night?
To help with the input & handling the Bible properly once every term all the encouragement groups will meet together in a big group on a Wednesday night for a time of teaching & prayer, celebration & supper. These times will act as a briefing time for the Bible book to be looked at in the following weeks. eg. Colossians will be our first Bible book to look at and so at our first briefing night I gave an overview of Colossians and together we tried to nut out why Paul wrote etc.

Will it work?
So far so good. We have over 80% of our church family signed up. There’s a great excitement about the possibilities. Our overseers are all ready stepping up to the mark. We had our first briefing night this week and lots of people came & it was a blast.
I’ve written the questions for the first 6 weeks of studies through Colossians 1-2.
Next week we start meeting to encourage each other!

Stay tuned!

Continuing to reflect on our first year here in Albury….

After establishing the mission statement of “growing followers of Jesus”, the next significant task was for the elders to come up with a set of agreed values. Before coming to Albury I hadn’t really bought much into values & vision etc. I didn’t really appreciate the distinctions between mission & vision & values. Hearing Peter Moore run a seminar on those things at METRO conference 2010 started my thinking. Of even more value, I sat in the seminar with Dave Powell, the other pastor here, and so we were both thinking.

To put it simply… in my understanding of it…
mission statement = what we are doing
values statement = what we are believing
vision statement = what we are becoming.

Pete was very insistent that most churches have a version of a mission statement & a vision statement but have never taken the time to develop a statement of shared values. This will often lead to conflict down the track because the leaders have not talked through the things that matter to them most.

That was a great opportunity for us here in Albury with lots of new ideas floating around. it was also important because my sense was that the elders were doing lots of work in the church, but not much work on the church. Taking the time to think through values together would provide us with a great opportunity. It did take a lot of time. But it was a terrific investment!

We invited Pete down to share a day with the elders in Albury. It was a pretty intense day working through exercises helping us to begin to formulate the things that mattered to us. It was a beginning of a process that lasted many months.

We came away from the day with a whole lot of ideas… a mess of ideas really… with me & Dave tasked to try & pull some of them together.

It was a great exercise for us to grow our friendship & partnership. Trying to take all the ideas from the elders, and do justice to them.. and yet make them manageable & memorable so that we could share them with our people.

Lots of discussion & disagreement & prayer ensued. Some of it was frustrating but all of it vital because the more time we spent talking about things the more we were understanding each other better.

One giant step forward for us was to realise that we didn’t have to cover every doctrine. We weren’t re-writing a doctrinal statement of faith. We were simply coming up with what mattered most to us within APC.

Another moment of excitement was when Dave came up with the idea of each value being one word ending in “-ing”. It gave them all a very dynamic feel and meshed in really well with our mission statement of “growing followers of Jesus”.

In the end we came up with a set of values that we then presented to our people on what we called our Core Values morning. What a great morning!

100 people came, the elders shared our value statements one by one, reading from the scriptures & praying together.

People afterwards used words like inspiring & exciting & wonderful to describe the experience. With their feedback we massaged the values a little bit more and they were published the following week.

It was a long process which required a large investment of energy & time. But it was well worth it. In many ways, the process was far more important than the result.

Our people own the values in a very real way. The elders stepped up as godly leaders thinking big.

And of course, having laid the foundation of our values we’re now in a good situation to start thinking about where we want to be in 5 years time.

I’ll keep you posted…

(our values can be downloaded from:- http://intechrity.net.au/apc/crosschurch/APC_Core_Values.pdf )

2010 has been big year for me & my family. And heading into November I’ve begun reflecting on some of the things have taken place ministry wise since ariving here in Albury at the end of January. My hope is to blog some of these over the coming weeks.

The last 10 months have seen some pretty big and exciting changes here within Albury PC.

An important part of those changes has been our adoption of the mission statement:- “Growing followers of Jesus”.

Like all good ideas we borrowed it (thank you Phil C) but its been a great help.
We launched it on a vision night early in the year as a good expression of the great commission. It then began appearing on our signs & banners and letterheads. But more importantly & more excitingly its now popping up all the time in our conversations. Its been absorbed into the culture of our people. That’s exciting because its a good reminder of who we are & what we are wanting to do under God’s kindness & for his glory.
I especially like that is dynamic. It implies growth & change. Its also personal.

With the idea of growth has come the colour green.
Its a bit of a joke among our elders but we’ve tried to incorporate the colour green in lots of things but especially our sign at the front of the building.

Our building is on a main road in Albury but its largely obscured because it sits behind a motel. All you can really see from the road is the entrance o the driveway.
To counter that a big arrow shaped sign sits at the entrance.

It was previously white with lots of information on it in blue writing.

Its now bright green as you can see in the photo. “Look for the big green arrow” has become a catch cry! Its bright, fun, contemporary, fresh & eye catching.
Its a small part part of our strategy to try & grow followers of Jesus here.

Okay… dumb title for this entry…. but surely one of the best one hit wonders of all time????

We had our first weekend away as a church family last weekend. The nightchurch family is only 6 months old and I had high hopes for the time away together. The Lord exceeded my hopes! Anyway I thought I might make some jottings about church weekends away.

They are incredibly valuable!  I believe that in my previous church our weekends away together over some 10 years did more than most things in shaping our culture for good. Our sense of being a family really grew out of time together away.

I love NOT getting in a guest speaker for our weekends but rather look after the teaching myself but not in the traditional way. I think that for lots of churches, their weekends away consist of 4 or so teaching times each of which resemble church… a bit of singing, a Bible talk, praying… and maybe some small group work. Instead of that approach I prefer one that is a bit more messy but a lot more fun & interesting.

I choose a topic. eg. last weekend the topic was encouragement. The vast bulk of my preaching is expositional so I think a weekend away is a good opportunity to branch out from that.

In each teaching time most of the time is spent in small groups reading lots of Bible and simply chewing it over together. eg. our first teaching time on encouragement consisted of each group working through 18 short Bible passages (1-4 verses) to try & get a grip on what God means by encouragement. In terms of questions we simply had to create a mind map about encouragement. Its slightly chaotic and lots of threads are left hanging loosely but its fun and I think people grow in confidence in simply reading the Bible together. (Study Bible notes are banned!)  I also reckon that if God’s people are gathered around God’s word good things are going to happen. Usually I get everyone back together at the end to try & pull some of the treads together but not too many. We’ve got the whole weekend to keep chatting it through. I also think its fun to have the groups report back to the big group on things that they’ve discovered. One of our teaching times consisted of reading lots of proverbs concerning the tongue & words and then each group came back & shared something that they had learned. Some had a song, a drama, a poem… it was hilarious & helpful!

We had lazy fun time in the afternoon & evening.
We had a Q&A time before dinner of Saturday.

At nightchurch on Sunday night we were tired but buzzing.

Time will tell how much we’ve kept in step with the Spirit’s teaching…
but for now at least there are many of us very committed to being like Barnabas…. the Son of encouragement…. encouraging one another to remain true to the Lord with all our hearts.

The following conversation took place in our family Bible reading time this morning after reading Ezra 3:-

Daughter: Dad, if this stuff happened near the end of the Old Testament why is it in the middle?

Dad: Good question! In the Bible, all the narratives are kept together.

Daughter: But I thought they were true?

Dad: They are!

Daughter: Well they’re not narratives. Narratives aren’t true.

Dad: These are. They really happened.

Son: Well they’re a recount not a narrative. Recounts are true , narratives aren’t.

Dad: But these are historical narratives.

Other son: That just means they’re made up stories in the past. That’s the way the words are used at school.

Dad: You mean, every time I say narrative to someone who’s been to school while you guys have been going to school… they hear me talking about a story that’s not true?

Sons, daughters (and maybe the hermit crabs): Yes!

Dad: How long have you been learning to us the words like that?

Everyone: Since kindergarten.

Dad: So I need to describe Ezra as a recount to point out that its true?

Everyone: Yes!

Scripture teachers, youth leaders, preachers beware the “n” word!

For a few years now I’ve been sending out weekly emails to my church family and I think its a very effective ministry tool.

Generally I send out an email with a summary of the news from the last Sunday’s bulletin, a short summary of the talk & maybe a prayer point or 2. At one level its pretty administrative but at a deeper level it provides me with an opportunity to guide my people in their thinking and choosing & prioritising.

I try to make the emails personal & I share my convictions about things.
eg. Rather than simply a reminder that our rosters need filling out I take the opportunity to briefly point out why rosters are a good thing because we are a church family and its right that we serve one another.
Rather than a reminder to sign up for the weekend away I take the opportunity to point out the positives of the camp etc.

The way we communicate & advertise things matters. (This is the same reason that I have always prepared our bulletins.) Its a great opportunity to be training our people.

Inevitably, most weeks I send more than one email and there are always jokes about my emails filling up people’s in boxes. But at the same time I believe its been a helpful way of letting people in on my thinking and vision… my hopes for the church family…. my personal struggles… prayer needs of our family… etc.

It doesn’t replace the need for in the flesh face to face relating but I do believe that it enhances it. And to be able to connect with everyone at the same time with the same message is a great way to enhance unity of purpose & mind.

What to do when the church is going backwards financially….

That’s the issue we’ve been wrestling with a bit over the last 6 months here. Our giving never reaching budget… our projected deficit growing & growing… what’s the best course forward?

Here are some random assorted thoughts based on previous & current experience:-

• A diminishing bank account and a budget deficit that looks a lot like your stipend is a great incentive to pray. Maybe spiritually healthy humble pastors are always in churches struggling financially.

• Humble communication is VITAL. Pointing out the elephant in the room is very important and should be done quickly & clearly.

• Giving is a gospel issue and should be treated not as a distracting nuisance but an important issue of discipling.

• Like all gospel issues, dealing with it will inevitably bring opposition and patient endurance is required.

• People seem to be hard to convince that there is a problem. (Or perhaps I am too easily convinced.)

• People seem quick to defend the level of giving across the church even when its palpably poor.  When the issue is raised people are very sensitive about making people feel guilty.

• Language matters. I think we should be encouraging our people to “invest in gospel growth” as opposed to just “giving to the church”.

• Vision & strategy should come first. Its much easier to encourage investment if there is something worthwhile & exciting to invest in.

• The Session & the Committee of management need to own the problem with you so that its not just the pastor whinging.

• Personal testimony is very powerful. In the wake of our Session & committee identifying that we had a crisis that urgently needed addressing, one of our committee members testified:-

Firstly, I’ve felt convicted once more to rethink my current giving level. Secondly, for our churches it is a time of great need. By great need I’m not so concerned about not meeting budget but more about the great ministry of our churches, both now and into the future and what can be possible with the right funding. It’s more rewarding to support the ministry of growing followers of Jesus than to help balance our books. So from last week I increased my own giving and it was an easy decision that felt right.

I shared this testimony anonymously with our people to great effect I believe.

• We’ve committed to monthly updates from our Committee of management that keep us informed about the financial situation but also about the projects the committee is working on etc as part of our mission to grow followers of Jesus.

• A balance is needed between never talking about money and talking too much.

Our situation has turned slightly around since the beginning of the year. We continue to pray & encourage & teach.  I begin a 4 week teaching series on Money next Sunday.  We continue to wait upon the Lord.

I know that I’m late to the party but… I really love reading & using the ESV study Bible.

I’ve not been part of the push for the ESV… still use the NIV in church & Bible study groups & youth group etc.
But I bought an ESV study Bible when I saw it on special in the local Christian book shop and its been terrific.
On holidays for 3 weeks I’ve been reading through Chronicles ( I love reading the Bible on holidays with no pressure to prepare anything). I just thoroughly enjoyed the maps & the notes & the introduction in the study Bible. Couple that with the cool on-line version and its a GREAT resource. It’ll be complete when the ESV app on my ipod is able to synch with my ESV online account which I gather that they are working on now.

The huge number of articles are great too… I occasionally flicked through some of them & will go back for more….

So I know I’m probably a bit behind the times….
but I feel like its enlivened my Bible reading!