12 May A Pastor “Gets” Healthy Ministry Resources
Scott Hardaway, pastor of Pathway Community Church (Jackson, Mich.), used his blog to explain Healthy Ministry Resources to his people. Did a fine job, too.
12 May LEAD Teams: an Insider’s View
The most effective way to start a church is for churches to cooperate in starting new churches. Banner Church (Byron Center, Mich.) has been part of a LEAD team, the first one in Michigan. The other members are Howard Matthews (HomeFront UB, Grandville), Scott Hergert (First UB, Lansing), Thurm Payton (Lighthouse UB, Williamston), and Darrel Bosworth (Kilpatrick UB, Woodland).
Our LEAD team gathers every 6-8 weeks to support the work of Gordon Kettel, who is planting a church in Grand Ledge, Mich. Tom Blaylock, the director of Church Multiplication, also meets with us. Our experience has been good. Gordon is so fun and entertaining; we have a great time together.
The initials stand for learn, encourage, achieve, dream. It’s a group of pastors getting together for the specific purpose of thinking and praying together about the most strategic places God might have us plant a new church.
The commitment of that team and church, by the pastor participating, is:
- Identify a potential church planter.
- Pool resources.
- Set goals for how often to start a new church.
- Do everything possible to support and encourage the planter.
We commit for a period of 2-3 years to start a church and see it through. We’re a committed group of guys who serve as a sounding board for Gordon. He shares struggles and asks questions, and we agree to always laugh at his jokes.
In the 1980s, I became a church planter. I felt entirely alone, even though I received a regular paycheck from the conference treasurer and was told the conference backed us. God used that experience to teach us, as a family, some amazing things, and we learned how to share Christ without any real support. But the LEAD team concept excites me, because I feel it’ll lead to some real success stories.
08 May Thoughts on Being Bishop
At the Michigan “Hang with the Bishop” meeting, someone asked, “How are you doing in this new position?”
Being bishop has been an eye-opening experience. The amount of conflict a bishop must referee is more than I expected. Some situations have been tense. It’s probably a good thing that I’m big.
But it’s an honor to be elected by your peers. I sometimes struggle with wearing the title “bishop,” but I’m okay with it.
Someone asked me if I enjoy the job. I don’t think this is something you enjoy, but I appreciate the opportunity to serve. I just believe in the sovereignty of God. He put me here, and he knows what he’s doing.
06 May “Hang with the Bishop” Meetings
During April, Pat Jones and I held “Hang with the Bishop” meetings in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Michigan. These were agenda-less meetings.
People showed up, we asked them what they wanted to talk about, and that was our agenda. About 70 people came for the last meeting, held at the East Washington UB church in Ashley, Michigan. We plan to hold a couple more, and will let you know when and where.
One question people wanted to know at each place was, “How are we doing as a denomination?”
It depends on who you talk to and on what day. We’re making progress slowly. We have churches that haven’t reported any conversions for a long time. There are barren altars and barren hearts, and yet the people are satisfied. We have so many places where people are being disobedient to the Great Commission. In some places, the Great Commission is not even on their radar.
But in other places, exciting things are happening. There are people in churches catching the vision. That’s exciting to me. We’re seeing some good fruit coming from the consultations we have held, and you’ll be hearing much more about those. So I’m optimistic about what God wants to do.
02 May LET’S TALK: About Denominations
Denominations take a lot of flack, and it’s not necessarily undeserved. The pro-denomination and anti-denomination sides have their fan clubs. What do you think?
- Is being part of a denomination a useful thing?
- Does a denomination help, hinder, or otherwise affect what happens in a local church?
- If you’re a pastor, what’s your perspective about being part of a denomination? Would life be better for you in a non-denom church?
- Does the average person in the pew give a hoot about denominations?
- What’s the proper role of a denomination?
- Are denominations dinosaurs that should just go away?
Please use the Comment feature to give your views. We have an authentication process (spam makes it necessary), but when you get authenticated once, it’ll be easy to leave comments in the future.
29 Apr Emphasizing What Jesus Created
It’s all about the local church. It’s not about the denominational headquarters.
I work out of the national office in Huntington, along with ten other people. Our only reason to exist is to support our churches as they carry out the Great Commission.
Healthy Ministry Resources is the new name of the United Brethren national office. That’s how we will answer the phone when you call. That’s what this website is about. The name reflects our focus on serving and resourcing our churches.
The church is the only institution established by Jesus. That’s the sharp end of the spear, the place where ministry occurs. The place where we continue carrying out the mission of Jesus.
Denominations are organized hierarchically, with the man-made part at the top and the Jesus-made part–the local church–at the bottom. We are switching that around, focusing everything we do on the Jesus-made part.
We can’t avoid all of the ecclesiastical functions of the national office or the role of the bishop. As a group of churches, we’ve agreed to submit to accountability and various standards, and to give the bishop authority.
But mostly, Healthy Ministry Resources is here for this mission: “To effectively resource pastors and congregations of the US National Conference to fulfill the Great Commission.”
10 Mar In the Army of the Lord
I’m just finishing the book Band of Brothers, by Stephen Ambrose, which Pat Jones told me about. It is about a group of soldiers in World War 2 who were led by Dick Winters, who was a tremendous leader. They were sent to the front lines, the first to go in, and they lost people. But they had a mission. They were a “band of brothers” because they had this mission. They weren’t a family–families don’t necessarily have a mission. But these were soldiers with a mission–to take an objective and win the war. I find that fascinating.
Isn’t that exactly what the Lord told us to do? We talk about being the family of God and get all gushy about it. But we are the army of the Lord. William Booth knew that; it’s why he called his organization the Salvation Army. If we had the same kind of desire to accomplish at all costs the mission that our leader has given us, I think our churches would look different. I would look different.
20 Feb Gary Dilley: Well Done!
Here in the national office, we’re excited about the upcoming arrival of Jeff Bleijerveld as the new Director of Global Ministries. He’s a quality guy who will fit right in. I’ll enjoy watching him take our missions program to the next level…whatever that is. Jeff starts on March 3.
Tomorrow, the office staff will hold a farewell luncheon for Gary Dilley, who served as Global Ministries director from August 2001 until January of this year. Because of a prior commitment, I’ll miss that luncheon. Pat Jones has offered to eat my pizza for me, and he’s welcome to it. But since I’ll be gone, I thought I’d use this space to say some words about Gary, who has been a beloved friend, in addition to a coworker.
The 1990s were a time of unprecedented expansion in our worldwide ministry. In 1993, Ray Seilhamer was elected bishop and Kyle McQuillen was elected as Director of Missions, and they both served until 2001. At that time, we had churches in eight countries, and had opened only one new field per decade–Nicaragua in the 1960s, India in the 1970s, and Macau in 1987.
But from 1993-2001, the number of fields nearly doubled:
- 1993: Thailand
- 1995: Costa Rica
- 1997: Mexico
- 1998: Myanmar
- 1999: El Salvador
- 2000: Haiti
- 2000: Guatemala
In addition, the church planting work in India grew by leaps and bounds, and a number of Hispanic churches in the United States arose through the work of Denis Casco. Disclaimer: we in North America can’t take credit for this expansion. Much of it came from the initiative of our churches in Hong Kong and Central America. But in each case, we were involved, often heavily involved. So a great deal of new territory needed to be assimilated into worldwide United Brethrenism, and numerous new demands were placed on Global Ministries funds.
(more…)
23 Jan Books I Recommend
For a long time I have tried to read a lot of good books. It must have been from my years in book publishing. Anyway, 2007 was no exception for me. Here are several book I read in 2007, and which I recommend. The links take you to the Amazon store entry for that book. However, you can order any of these from the UB bookstore by calling 888.622.3019 and asking for Marilyn.
George W. Bullard, Jr., Pursuing the Full Kingdom Potential of Your Congregation (Chalice Press, 2006; 226 pages). For congregations who thrive in the midst of great challenge; Vision Plus Intentionality.
Jim Collins, Good To Great and the Social Sectors: Why business Thinking Is Not The Answer (HarperCollins, 2005; 42 pages). A small booklet that describes how the principles of Good To Great can apply to organizations that are not profit-making businesses.
Thom S. Rainer & Eric Geiger, Simple Church: Returning to God’s Process for Making Disciples (B &H Publishing Group, 2006; 272 page). Describes how a church must organize to have effective spiritual transformation of its people.
(more…)
11 Jan Reflecting on the Last Two Years (Part 2)
A couple days ago, in Part 1, I discussed my dismay over the many churches that are disobedient to the Great Commission. Now I’d like to tackle a second issue that has concerned me as I interact with our churches.
2. The amount of conflict that exists in so many of our churches.
There are people in conflict with the pastor, pastors in conflict with the people, and people in conflict with other people in the church. Dealing with conflict in churches is without a doubt the most tiring part of this job. I’ve come to the conclusion that these two issues are related. Let me put it this way: if you aren’t going to fish, you will probably fight and may ultimately flee.
(more…)