Tag «Lead»

How to Evaluate Your Church’s Discipleship Program

*This article is an excerpt from Disciple: How to Create a Community That Develops Passionate and Healthy Followers of Jesus. Some months ago, I published the book Disciple: How to Create a Community that Develops Passionate and Healthy Followers of Jesus. In that book, I point out that many churches that think they’re disciplemaking churches…

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20 of the Most Difficult Things Pastors Have Done in Ministry

The question was straightforward: What are some of the most difficult things you have done in ministry? I asked this question on some of my social media channels, so it was an informal survey. The responses were high, over 600 in the first eight hours. While the quantity of the responses was indicative of the…

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How To Avoid These Costly Financial Mistakes Your Church Could Be Making

At BELAY, we’ve been helping busy leaders for over a decade, and we’ve learned, no matter what organization you lead, finances are paramount to your success – and church finances aren’t any different. Poorly managed church finances can hurt a pastor’s ability to lead church members and reach the local community. After all, very little…

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Leading a Church When the Wrong People Hold Power

Can you lead a church without proper authority? Yes, but it is more challenging and complex. I’m assuming most church leaders would rather not step into a situation where they have the responsibility to shepherd without the corresponding authority. But there are churches with misaligned power structures in desperate need of good pastors. What if…

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Seven Things We Didn’t See Coming in Churches at This Point after the Pandemic

Admittedly, it’s a tricky thing to find a precise beginning and ending point to a pandemic. We could accept the declaration from the World Health Organization that COVID-19 began on March 11, 2020. But the virus was rapidly spreading around the world prior to that date. The ending date is even more of a challenge…

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Seven Things You Can Do to Become a Better Leader

If it hasn’t happened already, it won’t be long before a new generation of leaders are being tapped on the shoulder to step into service in their church or organization. In November 2022, the Federal Reserve shared an article titled “The Great Retirement Boom,” which details the rise in retirement during the era of the…

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Churches Are Getting Less of Total Charitable Giving—Here’s Why (And What You Can Do About It)

For decades, the church has lost ground with overall charitable giving. Charitable giving is up—a near record of $485 billion in 2021, despite surging inflation. Giving to churches has dropped even though giving to non-profits is up by 4%. In the early 1980s, churches received over half of all charitable giving. Today, churches receive less…

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My Greatest Surprise about Churches Seeking Consultations

I’ve done church consulting for decades now. Over the years, I’ve worked with churches of various sizes, multiple denominations, differing polities, and diverse locations. I’ve learned a lot over the years. Some patterns are generally the same among these churches, which doesn’t surprise me. Some examples are that most churches are not doing evangelism well,…

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Five Reasons Why the Disappearance of the Offering Plate Is So Significant for Churches

My childhood memories are vague. Still, I do recall with some surprising detail the passing of the offering plates in my first church. I never questioned its validity or efficacy. It was just something churches did. Most churches used an offering plate or its equivalent prior to the pandemic. Now, most churches do not. It…

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What Is Our Story?

How can Americans, and American Christians in particular, work toward a more comprehensive and equitable national narrative for all? The exclusivist aspects of the core narratives that have defined the United States make clear that we need a new narrative. We need a general consensus of values and a feeling that we’re part of the…

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