(not necessarily in that order)

A couple weeks back, our Central Team met for our usual check-in and it was brought to our attention that we were $22K in the hole already (our FY starts in September). We've had times like this before, but it concerns us because of the timing. Fall is historically strong. 

We are consistently hearing stories of life-change, and that's encouraging, but there's a missing piece in the generosity department. We have A LOT of generous people, don't get me wrong, but there's something going on. I can't say we have a handle on it, but we have some hunches (economy, membership turnover, reaching a young demographic, etc.).

What we definitely knew is that we needed to create some margin in our budget so ministry could continue as planned. We didn't want to go further in the hole and/or start using our line of credit for day-to-day expenses. That's not an example we wanted to set. Here's what happened:

• Our Lead Pastor, Derek, told us that he had been talking to his wife, Kim, and they were prepared to take a 50% pay cut immediately through March.
• The rest of our team had a conversation and decided to go to our spouses (and before the Lord) as well. We all decided to take pay cuts immediately, as well.
• As a team, we decided that we wanted to bring the staff in on this and let them make the same decision we were making (as opposed to imposing a mandatory cut or lay-offs).
• We set up a meeting with our Elder team and paid staff for later in the week.
• At the Elder meeting, I was moved to tears as I talked about the conversation with my husband and how absolutely INCREDIBLE he was: so selfless, vision-minded, committed and energized. I watched in awe as one of them said, "The staff is not going to shoulder this alone. We need to lead. Let's all talk to our wives about increasing our giving during this time." 
• During our meeting with the staff, something awesome happened: it was an unspoken "hands in the middle" moment. When we were done, no one wanted to leave and break the feeling in the room. It was incredible. 
• Emails and stories started rolling in: elders committing to increase their tithe 50% and 100%, staff members taking 10%, 50% voluntary pay cuts from January-March, stories of incredible conversations with family and spouses, and talk of radical life change. The Book of Acts has come up quite a bit over the past few weeks. Our hope was 5% from each staff member; we ended at an average of 20%.

Here's why we handled it this way:

1. Leadership: I would much rather lead someone toward something than scold them into it. This decision by the leaders of Grace showed just how serious we are about the mission God has given us. 
2. Community: We are better as a staff because we turned to community first and tried to solve this problem together. I love these people deeply. I loved them before, but something is different now. 
3. Emmanuel: We have to embrace opportunities to sacrifice for the sake of the Gospel. This Christmas is shaping up to look different for a lot of our leaders, but it's something that they chose and are chasing down. Taking a pay cut/sacrificial giving quickly recalibrates your Christmas priorities. We're able to focus on God with us this season, for real.

My prayer will continue to be that the people of Grace will be stirred to radical generosity in the coming months and that a pattern of giving would be established in the hearts of our people.

I am extremely proud of Derek's leadership. When the rubber meets the road, we know he has our backs. But I have to say that I am completely blown away by our staff and elders. I am in awe of their hearts for Jesus, this church and each other. It's a blessing to do ministry with these people.

P.S. You can read Derek's blog and see the letter we sent out to our church here.

http://www.churchmarketingsucks.com/2011/10/in-the-trenches-switching-it-up/

WANT NEED:

I am so in love with this, it's not even funny. I would use these EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.

(via Papersource)

***UPDATE*** I totally bought some.

Before the teams of awesomeness™ arrived, Cleve gave notebooks to the leaders.

I used it in three ways:

1. NOTES: I took notes when Pastors were talking about their churches. I wanted to make sure to capture the words they were saying so that would inform our recommendations, work and final product(s).
2. DOODLES: When I'm doodling, I'm thinking. It's not an absent-minded habit - it has a purpose. I find that doodling actually keeps me MORE focused. I also sketched logo ideas, web layouts, brochure layouts, etc. In fact, I knew our team was the ultimate when I sketched a web layout while talking to the pastor, Brad looked at it, and was working on a Wordpress template the next time I turned around. #macgyver
3. LEARNINGS: I used the back of the notebook to write down the things I learned from each church we visited. It's definitely my favorite part of the notebook.

The Top Six Things I Learned/Rediscovered:

• Singing along with a CD in the dark can be an incredibly intimate time of worship. The things that larger churches decide are "necessities," aren't "necessities" at all. It's all relative. Harmony Fellowship showed me that resourcefulness is king. If they had waited to start their church until they had a worship leader, there would be a number of people who wouldn't know Jesus right now. They're playing to their strengths and waiting on God for the rest.
• As a church, we need to encourage each other and build each other up. Another thing Harmony taught me was the value of recognizing people. I know it will look different at Grace, but it needs to happen. Encouragement goes a long way.
• It is extremely important to continually remind people about the story of our church and the vision we're chasing. duh? Sometimes I err on the side of "people are bored with that." People will NEVER be bored by God's vision. 
• Relationships win.  Lighthouse Community taught me this by letting me watch them live. We need to leverage the power of relationship better. I don't know what that looks like, but we need to. 
• Keep the main thing, the main thing. Down with chaos! Down with clutter! The main message of our church needs to cut through enough without us clogging it up even more with unnecessary programs, red tape, obstacles and smoke-and-mirrors.
• Traditional can be engaging if it's done well. "Classic." What's the difference between a car in a junk yard and a perfectly restored '57 Chevy? That's the difference between traditional done lazy and traditional done well. It shouldn't be done for your own church members' comfort. It should be done because there are people outside the church walls who will respond to "classic."

There's a TON more, but I'm still wading through it all. These are the ones that rose to the top. I love my little notebook. It's a keeper.

Last week, I had a Mary Kay consult (For those of you who know me, I know you're laughing. Stop.) with Jess DeJesus. Believe-it-or-not, the experience taught me something about church communications (I might have a problem). As Jess told me a bit about the company, I really resonated with their values:

1. Go-Give™ Spirit: lend a helping hand to others, both at home/work and around the world.
2. The Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
3. Make Me Feel Important: Pretend that every single person you meet has a sign around his or her neck that says, "Make me feel important."
4. Balanced Priorities: God first, family second and career third.

The values gave me a different way to think about my job and calling, especially "Make me feel important." From their site:

Mary Kay Ash once said, “It’s so simple, yet makes such a difference. Pretend that every single person you meet has a sign around his or her neck that says, ‘Make me feel important.’” At Mary Kay, this is a reality — from being recognized for a job well done to people taking an interest in your life.

Much of our job as Communications Directors is about relational intelligence and serving people. In fact, I'd argue that those two things are more important than any other aspect of our job. You can have the sickest standards manual on the planet and the best, most cohesive and approachable language in your print materials, but if your coworkers and congregants think you're a jerk your ministry will eventually crumble under the weight of your own awesomeness.

Unfortunately, because I'm introverted, the energy I have to put into relating to people and their needs completely drains me. It's the first thing to go when I'm stressed. It does not come naturally to me: it's difficult. The second thing to go when I'm stressed is my attitude of serving. When I feel like I'm drowning, the last thing I feel capable of is helping another person! Part of the problem, too, is that I overcomplicate it. I don't need to worry about all the ins and outs of relating to people and serving, I just need to imagine that sign around each person's neck and then make it happen.

I'm a visual person, so mental pictures tend to stick with me. As soon as Jess told me about the "make me feel important" value, I was hooked. I had images of people I know running through my head with signs around their necks. I can already tell that this mental picture is making a difference. When someone comes running into my office with an emergency, there's the sign. When I get asked the same question for the one hundredth time, there's another sign. When someone is angry about how I handled an event or an announcement, they have a sign, too. 

It's definitely a journey, but it's one of the most important ones a Communications Director can take. I promise you that a focus on relationship and serving will change your ministry. March is the month of making people feel important. Wanna join me?

I am really excited to be leading a team for Creative Missions! If you haven't heard about it you can get the full scoop here. There are three main reasons I'm doing this:

1. I feel strongly that God is calling me to it.
2. My gifts align with the goal.
3. I love when churches work together.

I've participated in traditional mission trips and I always leave feeling like I didn't make a dent. I suppose that's part of the short-term missions experience on some level, but I think my feeling was deeper than that. "Did I use my gifts?" Don't mistake what I'm saying: I am not above cleaning, throwing a hammer and singing with kids in a neighborhood. I did all of those things and more because I was there to serve. But something was definitely missing, and I think it had to do with my particular giftings. Creative Missions is going to give me a chance to use the gifts God has given me to help a church reach a region for Jesus. I will be able to roll up my sleeves and do what I do best: be creative. It makes me tear up just thinking about it.

Churches are wildly different from each other, but we all (hopefully) have one thing in common:

"...Jesus came to [the disciples] and said, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Matthew 28:18-20

Creative Missions is an incredible example of how the body of Christ can work together for this common mission, and how unity makes us stronger. The churches we're planning to serve will benefit, sure, but I'd be willing to bet we might learn a thing or two as well. Sometimes, the best innovation happens when you're out of your element. It's going to be interesting to see what God does in me and the life of my church as a result of what I learn from these churches.

To say that I'm looking forward to May 22 would be a huge understatement. I absolutely cannot wait! God is up to something incredible, and it's an honor to be a part of it.

Also, I have to give it up to Cleve. He is leading this effort and is chasing after his vision, and it's inspiring. Go, Cleve, go!

I just need to open the hood for a minute or two and share what’s happening around here.

Our team has been thinking through what it looks like for a church of 1000+ to live out this verse:

“When you come together, each of you has a hymn, or a word of instruction, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation. Everything must be done so that the church may be built up.
-1 Corinthians 14:26

We don’t meet in homes (well, except for small groups), so how do we facilitate something like that verse in our worship services? I don’t think we’re totally sure yet, but we’re starting with an experiment. For one special day, we’re asking people to:

• submit ideas for an offering moment
• share their life stories
• respond to Derek’s sermon questions
• choose from a list of songs that fit our theme for the day

We’re also going to seek out a specific individual to video tape a call to worship to show at the beginning of the service. That’s gonna rock.

It’s a baby step, but I’m excited. We’re hoping to have a mechanism for ongoing submissions of ideas/stories in the future so that we can build a library to choose from. We’re thinking of even letting people sign out flips to film their own stories.

Right now, we’re using Facebook, our site and the weekly bulletin to gather ideas and communicate the change. 

Exciting…game changing…crazy…

This is going to create chaos…good chaos. But that doesn’t mean it has to get insane. We can still communicate and worship in an orderly, God-honoring way. That’s my filter through this whole thing: “increased chaos does not have to mean increased clutter” (sentiment courtesy of Kem Meyer).

Our goal isn’t to create consumers (picking favorite songs, etc.), our goal is to enrich our worship experience through different perspectives and genuine community. 

I’m hoping to post a video of the result back here when all is said and done. I can’t wait to see what God has in store for this.