The Christians cannot be distinguished from the rest of the human race by country or language or customs. They do not live in cities of their own; they do not use a peculiar form of speech; they do not follow an eccentric manner of life…. Yet, although they live in Greek and barbarian cities alike…. and follow the customs of the country in clothing and food and other matters of daily living, at the same time they give proof of the remarkable and admittedly extraordinary constitution of their own commonwealth.

They live in their own countries, but only as aliens. They have a share in everything as citizens, and endure everything as foreigners. Every foreign land is their fatherland, and yet for them every fatherland is a foreign land. They marry, like every one else, and they beget children, but they do not cast out their own offspring. They share their board with each other, but not their marriage bed.

They busy themselves on earth, but their citizenship is in heaven. They obey the established laws, but in their own lives they go far beyond what the laws require. They love all men, and by all men are persecuted….. They are poor, and yet they make many rich; they are completely destitute, and yet they enjoy complete abundance.

To put it simply: What the soul is in the body, that Christians are in the world.”

From Gabe Lyon’s book The Next Christians, page 185, 186, quoting Cyril Richardson’s book Early Christian Fathers, pg. 175. Note: From the primary document “The So-Called Letter to Diognetus: The Mystery of the New People

So…is this how most people perceive Christians today?
Why or why not?

I’ll share more thoughts next week that have been rattling around my dome this week about alternative ways of doing church and being the church.
Interesting to see the nature of this particular church in the story and the commentators perspectives on church.
But for now, what thinks you?

Day 2 of speakers at Catalyst started with a guy named Tim Sanders.  He’s the author of a book called Saving The World At Work.  He had some great thoughts about making a difference every day, being incarnational wherever we are at.  Here are a few quotes from him.

• You create abundance by giving, not by consuming.
• Good is the new great. (Which made me question if I should really try to be great like Jim Collins suggested.  Very confusing.  Just kidding by the way.)
• Tell your people to take their values to work.
• What you learn on Sunday makes you a rock star on Monday.
• If not you, who?  If not now, when?

Dave Ramsey

Man, this dude is fiery.  For some reason I was expecting some chill quiet guy, but I think Anne Jackson’s twitter said it best when she said he sounded like an angry Dr. Phil.  It was actually pretty awesome.  Rachel and I started reading his book Total Money Makeover right after we got married.  When I saw him on the list I assumed he’d be talking about money, but this year he shared some leadership principles from his organization.  Specifically the five enemies to unity.  Those being:

• Poor communication
• Gossip
  • Gossip is complaining to anyone about anything they can’t change.
  • Some of the biggest gossips I’ve ever met do it in the name of a prayer request.
• Unresolved disagreements
  • Happen when a leader doesn’t know they exist or avoids confrontation.
  • An indecisive leader is by definition, not a leader.
  • Nobody ever killed anything by saying, “Ready, aim, aim, aim, aim…”
• Lack of shared purpose
  • Caused when a leader doesn’t restate the goal, the vision and mission early and often.
  • Start by having a shared purpose in your family.
• Sanctioned incompetence
  • Team members eventually become demotivated when someone else on the team can’t or won’t do their job and a leader will not take action.

Of course after his talk on leadership there was a quick interview regarding the current economic situation.  Some great insights there as well of course.

• There is a spirit of fear being cast by media and politicians that is resulting in bad decisions, including the most recent legislation that was passed.
• The world should be able to look at us for hope and security but we’re just as scared.
• If you had been handling your money by God’s principles as we talked about last year, you wouldn’t have anything to worry about.
• Don’t buy gold!!!  The last time a fallen economy turned to the gold system after collapse was the Roman Empire.
• Keep putting money in your 401K.  If you take it out now, you will feel pretty stupid in a few years.

Great stuff from both these guys.  Notes from the last 3 speakers coming soon so we can move on with blog life.

I’ve followed his blog for quite a while now.  The dude shares some amazing leadership insights there regularly and it has been fun to see their churches journey from a distance.  Oddly enough though, I didn’t have super high expectations for this one.  But I was dead wrong!  Furtick blew the place up and ended with a standing ovation.

He had originally planned to speak out of 1 Samuel as printed in the materials, but changed his mind and spoke from 1 Kings 18…kinda.  To be honest, I don’t remember a whole lot from the scripture, but the sharing of his own story and his encouragement to all of us there was pretty awesome.  His point, as I mentioned a few posts ago, was talking about moving from the promise to the payoff.  Often when there is a promise from God, there is a part that is often not talked about at conferences like these and that is the long, often painful road of the process to get there.

Overall, I pretty much didn’t write down any notes from Steven’s talk, but just sat back and was encouraged and challenged.  Furtick reminded us that 2 years ago he was in “the nosebleed section up there at Catalyst” himself.  He encouraged the youth pastor struggling with 5 kids and the worship pastor who has to do the hymns he doesn’t even like and the pastor pulling teeth to lead his congregation to keep on trucking and to get up and preach like it was the last time ever and to lead to worship like you’ve never led before.  Thanks for the reminders Steven.

Seth Godin

Many of you may know of Seth Godin as a marketing genius and business blogger extraordinaire who wrote some great books, including Purple Cow.  Well at Catalyst Conference he spoke on the concept of Tribes, and then gave everyone there a copy of his new book, Tribes.  It was such an intriguing talk and the book such an easy read, that I’ve already read it.  (I also ended up with an extra, so who knows, there just may be a giveaway here before the week is over if anyone’s interested.)  Some notes.

• 
  Tribes matter…more than word of mouth.
• Interupting people is broken.  Proseletyzing is broken.  Now it is all about tribes.
• A crowd is not a tribe.
• Check out tribes.com.
• Positive deviants – find someone who naturally leads, who is challenging the status quo, and give them a platform to lead more.
• You have to do something people will criticize.
• If you’re concerned about being safe, you’ve already failed. No one wants to follow a safe leader.
• Tribes:
  • find people that are alone.
  • find people who always knew there were people out there like them.
  • put together people who would never otherwise be together.
• Be a heretic!
• Heretics don’t let the rules and religion stand in the way of their faith.
• 4v2 – Are you doing something for the tribe or to the tribe?
• Be inspiring!

Craig Groeschel

Hands down, the highlight of the conference.  I pretty much shared the impact of this with you here.  I’ll start by saying, I already had high expectations.  Graig is pretty much my favorite pastor out there right now.  He is the one whose podcasted messages I watch regularly.  There was a “sit together” section of preferred seating right in front of the stage for different groups of people each session.  I was sitting in the front row.  I’m not into the whole celebrity pastor thing, but let’s just say I found myself thinking several times, “No way!  Craig Groeschel is like 20 feet away from me tight now!”  Lame.  I know.  However, I must say it was impacting to be that close and experience the passion this guy was putting out up close.

The title of Craigs talk was, “Finding It When You’ve Lost It.”  It was based on his new book, IT.  The concept: they have campuses that all things considered are on level ground.  Same type of venue.  Same technology.  Same video messages.  Similar worship styles.  However they would visit one and come away saying, “They have it,” and from another saying, “They’re missing it.”  So what is it?  Buy the book.

He spoke out of Joel 2:12-17.  Here’s the notes from his talk:

• Saying “it” is the Holy Spir-it doesn’t work.  That’s insulting saying that the Holy Spirit is in one place and not the other when we know that it is in both places.
• The reality is there is a different manifestation of the Spirit dependent upon the work of God’s people in a given place.
• The most important ingredient to your church having it is that you have it.
• If you have lost it, you must do somethin drastic to get it back.  Cause if it were a small tweak, you would have done it already.
• Some of you have eaten your last meal for a while and you need to walk out of here and fast and pray and mourn until God shows up in a powerful way!!
• You need to ask God to stretch you.
• But before He can stretch you, He has to heal you.
• But before He can heal you, He has to ruin you.
• Who/what will stretch you?  Who/what will bring about healing in your life?  Now go and get yourself around that person.

That honestly doesn’t even begin to unpack all that was in Craig’s message.  But at least it gives you a glimpse into where it went.

More from day 2 tomorrow…

Andy Stanley

Andy started off the conference by speaking on moral authority out of Nehemiah 5:6-18.  Nehemiah was able to lead the way he did not because of his position, but his influence.  He had moral authority.  He had proved himself to the people over 12 years.  Here are some notes on what he said:

• Moral authority – alignment between your creed and your deed.
• As church leaders we MUST have moral authority in 3 primary areas of our lives:
  • Forgiveness
  • Family
  • Finances
• As leaders, we can’t carry into the future the junk of the past.
• If forgiveness is at the epicenter of our faith, we have to lead the way in forgiving, no matter how we have been hurt in the past.  And if you are a leader, you have been hurt and/or betrayed.
• Someday there will be another pastor at North Point Community Church, but my kids will never have another dad.
• For some of you, the boldest leadership decision you could make this week is to walk out of here right after this session and go home to spend time with a family that hasn’t seen you in weeks.
• Nehemiah spent 12 years not taking what was financially “owed” him, which gave him great moral authority when the time came.

Very challenging stuff to start out.  I know that my biggest struggle that I need to lay down is the forgiveness factor.  How about you?

William Paul Young

This was just a casual interview with the author of The Shack.  The most impressive part to me was his passion and authenticity.  His emotion as he talked about the people in our culture that are asking why God is putting them through things as he spoke passionately on the verge of tears made me want to tear up myself.  There was only one quote I wrote down from this one, but worth sharing.

• We have a group of young people coming up today and they have the best crap detectors I’ve ever seen.

Jim Collins

Collins is the author of Good to Great.  A book I have on my shelf that I’ve been wanting to read one day.  He spoke about several principles from his book.  His talk was simply a gold mine of leadership principles.  Which means I took lots of notes.  Good stuff!

• 
  The most important thing in your organization is a culture of discipline.
• Principle of the flywheel – it NEVER happens in one fowl swoop.
  • If you get too far, too fast…BEWARE!
  • Undisciplined pursuit of more is how the great fall.
• First ask who, then what.  Make sure you have the right people in your organization, then grow.
• The ultimate preparation for what you cannot predict is who you have on the bus.
• Signature characteristic of leaders of great organizations vs good organizations – humility.
• If it is about you, you will not build something great.
• A big difference between “level 5″ leaders and “level 4″ leaders is a willingness to make painful, difficult decisions.
• The true report card of a leader comes in after they are done.
• The presence of a To Do list without an equally robust Stop Doing list is a lack of good discipline.
• Do not spend 5 years getting 2 years experience.  You can decide who you work for.  Choose wisely.

He finished with a list of things to do in your organization this week.  Not sure I got them all, (I think there was supposed to be 10) but here’s what I did get:

• Go use the free diagnostic tool at jimcollins.com.
• Self assess – how are we doing at these things.
• How many seats are on the bus?  How many are filled?  What is the plan to get to 100%?
• Get young people in your face!
• Create a personal board of directors.
• In your church, build a counsel.
• Turn off electronics for a day.
• Ask yourself, “How do I commit myself to where I’m passionate enough to endure the pain of level 5 leadership vs. level 4 leadership?”

Lots to digest from his talk.  I think I’ll need to pick up that book soon.

I’ll let you chew on those three for a bit, with the final 3 from that day coming in a little bit.  Trying to keep these posts somewhat manageable on the reading level.

Any thoughts?

So I’ll make this short.  Looking forward to lots of great speakers, but right now I’m most looking forward to hearing from Jonathon Tyson again in the labs after being inspired by him at the greatest unconference in the church universe.

Also looking forward to meeting and/or connecting with good friends and blogger friends alike.  If you’re gonna be there, lemme know, and let’s connect!  And you can be sure to catch some live blogging over here during the week.  See ya!

It’s time now to give it another go.

Introducing the new CLC blog home.
At least temporarily.
Let me know what you think.
We have about a week let to test it out and Typepad and decide if it’s
a good use of finances to spend a couple bucks on it.  I personally am
just a huge fan of the ease of Typepad.  Even though it frustrates me
at times, I still find it the easiest platform to really make a site look good.
Even if we stick with Typepad, the plan is to map it to it’s own domain soon.

In addition, we’re experimenting a little with our own social networking site at Ning.
So all you CLCers, roll on over and join our network!
We’ll keep working on it to see how we can use it effectively as a connections tool.

Basically I’ve really been bouncing this around in my dome for a while.
Everything on the web is really moving in the direction of social interaction.  Basically, web 2.0.
In reality we are way behind the curve as the Church.
Most of our church websites are simply nice brochures on the web.
So what can we do to move our website more toward interaction with others?
Hopefully this is a step in the right directions.

So 2 questions for y’all:

• Any thoughts on the blog or Ning sites?
• What other ways can we as a church, or is your church, creatively using the web to reach or interact with people?

Please, do share.

Part way through, Dan and I thought it would be worth broadcasting on Mogulus.
If you weren’t able to catch it live, there is about an hour of it up looping at my Mogulus page.
Sound gets a little messy part way through for some reason.  Sorry.
This should give you an idea what the forums are like and give you some great things to think about.

This was forum number four. If there’s one coming within driving distance of you, go check it out.

Numbers in attendance at Sunday
gatherings has long been a measure of success for us in churches, and,
truth be told, a validation of our worth as pastors quite often.  Not
healthy, I know…nut true.  But as I start to name many of the people
I don’t see, I also realize a large number of them are very involved in
the actual life of the church.  They are people who are doing ministry
outside our church regularly.  They are people who are active in taking
Jesus to the people that surround them everyday.

For a long time
I’ve felt that I’d rather see a church that is alive and active
throughout the week, and that is more important than showing up on
Sunday.  But it’s a lot harder to actually consider the real life
implications of this.  And believe me, we have a long way to go in both
areas in our faith community, but it’s just really had my dome spinning.

Last week I found this post via Monday Morning Insight. 
In a class with Len Sweet they talked about measures of success within
your church.  Measures outside of numbers of butts in seats or amount
of money given.   Here are a couple of my favorites:

• The number of adoptions people in the church have made from local foster care.
• The number of pictures on the church wall of unwed mothers holding their newborn babies in their arms for the first time.
• The number of phone calls from community leaders asking the church’s advice.
• The number of emergency finance meetings that take place to reroute money to community ministry.
• The number of people serving in the community during the church’s normal worship hours.
• The number of churches your church planted in a 10 mile radius of your own church.

Please, go here and read the other 13 he shares.

A
lot of these things are a much better depiction of the heart of Jesus
than showing up for an hour and a half on Sunday morning.  Don’t get me
wrong.  That is important also, but I’d rather see ministry happening
throughout the week.  So why don’t we look at these things as much?  I
think because they are harder to measure.  And they don’t stroke our
own ego’s nearly as much as filling the sanctuary on Sunday morning.

So, how about you?

How would/should/do you measure the success of your/our/a church?

VS   

I read a great article this morning over at MMI about the things the church could learn from a staff field trip to Starbucks.  Check it out over here and then come back over.  It’s well worth reading.

Now every so often I think we need to be careful about these things.  It is possible to go overboard worrying about these sorts of issues, but unfortunately, that’s NOT the problem at most churches. 

My favorite part is the reference to Starbucks goal, which I’ve heard before, of being the "third place" for people to be, right behind home and work.  I would love to see this be more of a goal in every one of our churches.  (Quick reminder – the church is not a building, it is a community.)  If we really want to be a community of believers doing life together and making an impact in our community, shouldn’t we be together a whole lot more than just Sunday and life group?  And shouldn’t all of these gatherings be a place where "outsiders" should feel comfortable to be with us and see Christ in us as well?

Just a few thoughts that got me going this morning.  What do you think?