Archive for 31 Day Countdown – Page 3

Transformational Worship in the Sunday School Experience

By Dwayne Lee · Comments (0)
Friday, August 21st, 2015

Worship ImageMany times when we use the word, “Worship” the thought of music comes to mind. I know I do, music is a part of who I am. I have been a musician/singer for years, matter of fact I was named after a rock-a-billy guitar player from the 1950’s and my first name means “singing”. So you would think it would be nature for me to think about music when we are talking about worship.

Yet when we look at the word worship from a biblical perspective it means so much more than just music. When you think about verses like John 4:24 that says, “God is spirit and those who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and truth.” Deuteronomy 11:13, “If you carefully obey my commands I am giving you today, to love the Lord you God and worship Him with all you heart and your soul…” you began to see this all inclusive attitude and activity of oneself in complete obedience to almighty God.

In the book Transformational Church one of the seven elements was Worship. In the book it describes this balance between community service and personal worship that comes together and explodes in corporate service. There is this firm understanding to have transformational worship in public there has to be personal devotion.

I like how Henry Blackaby put it, “Worship anticipates not only an encounter with God, but also a clear next word from God. Worship is totally God-centered! God-focused! Out of worship comes a clearer and more focused relationship of faith and obedience with God. Worship is God’s way of developing character and directing life into the center of His will.” From the book entitled, “Created to be God’s Friend”

That is where Sunday School can play a great part in bridging the gap of those that are missing out on those God-centered moments. In his book, High Expectations, Dr. Thom Rainer pointed out that after tracking people for five years, 84% of those who where in a Sunday School class were still active after 5 years as opposed to those who only attended a worship service…only 16% of those people were still active.

With our corporate worship services still playing the role of most of our churches entry points, assimilation is absolutely key for people getting connected  and understanding biblical worship. Sunday School classes and teachers need to create an atmosphere of worship. Stop dispensing biblical information only (that’s easy), but prayerfully create this element of reflection, biblical perspective, authentic community that culminates in worship. There are suggestions that could be made to help your class through the week as they create their own personal study time. Materials that could be offered or online study helps that would take them on their own walk with God.

So remember, worship is not just music but it is you as a follower of Jesus Christ surrendering yourself to Him in your daily walk, being emptied of self and filled with Him. Then as a teacher or a group leader of a class to create an atmosphere (or an opportunity) for God to show up and transform you group!

God is spirit and those that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth!

_______________

Dwayne Lee is the associate team leader of the Bible Teaching/Leadership Resource Group of the State Convention of Baptists in Ohio.

 

 

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Prayerful Dependence Changes Us

By Ken Kessler · Comments (0)
Thursday, August 20th, 2015

PrayerWorks

Sometimes prayer becomes something we do because we have always done it. Every week in our Sunday School class, we did the same thing – the “leader” of the class would get up and make the announcements, and then she would ask us what prayer concerns we had. And the list we would share sounded like the “wounded warriors of the faithful and family.” We really did care about people, and especially people that we knew well. Somehow the prayer support for these people just felt good! We would pray for them, and then the teacher would teach. Somehow, it just felt like the right thing to do.

Then one morning our Bible study lesson was on the Lord’s Model Prayer in Matthew 6 in the Sermon on the Mount. And we engaged in a discussion about what does it really mean to pray to our Father in heaven. We talked about the privilege we have to come to our Father and how we were taking it for granted each Sunday when we gathered. We looked at prayers of Bible characters and saw that when they prayed they really expected something to happen in their lives and other lives as well. God convicted us right then and there our lives were not being changed and our Bible study group was not been transformed because we were taking prayer so lightly.

So we changed our practice.

Here are some of the things we did:

  • We began our class with prayer, but with a prayer for enlightenment and conviction as we studied God’s Word. We asked God to open our eyes to His truth for us.
  • We enlisted a prayer leader from our class who was responsible for keeping prayer needs before us. In fact, the prayer leaders for our class were a couple. And they made prayer reminders for us each week of people and situations for which we needed to pray!
  • A prayer chart was begun which had two columns – one column was the prayer need and second column was the prayer answer. So each time God answered our prayer, we claimed the answer and gave Him glory and honor.
  • Every Sunday at the beginning of the class, a list was passed around by our prayer leader that asked us to place anything on that list we wanted to mention as a prayer request. Each Sunday, at the end of the class, we would get a copy of each those requests. Our prayer leader was very resourceful. She would make a copy in the church office and hand it to each of us. Then we would pray over that list and carry it home to use as for our personal prayer time.
  • We were challenged to have a personal prayer list with three columns – People in our Class, People in our Church Family, and People far from God.
  • Annually, we held a 3 hour prayer retreat at someone’s home just to listen to the heart of God. Many things came from those prayer times – the need and starting of a new group, the calling of a new outreach leader and care group leaders, a broken family brought back together, and the list goes on.
    Somehow we found that when we took prayer as our special communication with the Father, we changed. Bible study sessions became transformational. Our class grew. People came to know the Lord. People were called into service in other Bible study groups.

And just think – all that happened just because we decided to take prayer seriously! Prayer changes things, but more importantly, prayer changes us!

Prayer – Thank you, Lord, for the privilege of prayer. Help us to take communication with you seriously. Change our lives as we listen to Your voice and follow Your direction! Break our practices of familiarity and teach us to pray with an expectation that You will transform our lives and groups.

_______________

Ken Kessler is Team Leader for the Empowering Leaders Team of the Baptist General Association of Virginia!

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Sunday School And Vibrant Leadership

By Dwayne Lee · Comments (0)
Wednesday, August 19th, 2015

MirrorWhen you think about vibrant leadership what image comes to mind? A military figure, sports personality, Hollywood star, government official? How about a hero of the faith, lead pastor or worship leader? Here’s a question…What about you? Do you consider yourself a leader? A vibrant leader? Let’s be clear, I am not talking about charisma, but I am talking about someone who knows where they are going and has the ability to persuade others to come along.

As the book “Countdown” alludes to the seven elements of Transformational Church, Vibrant Leadership is one of those qualities that rose to the top of all the churches surveyed. Each leader saw themselves as someone who knew where they were going but had the capacity to lead from a servant hood perspective. These were leaders who loved sharing Jesus, equipping disciples, getting the church to model Christ and ministering to the community.

So, what does that look like for a Sunday School Leader? To be quite honest…it should look the same! You lead from a humble spirit and yet at the same time you are confident in what you are doing. The class you have been given stewardship over is your class, to lead, serve, care for, minister too, disciple, and send out.

The only way you are going to have an effective Sunday School is if you are an effective leader…a vibrant leader. Remember this, models and administrative structure may change but there are two key principles that should never change under your leadership:

  1. Open groups practice open enrollment.
  2. Open groups expect NEW people every week.

I can hear it now…you are saying to yourself, “We are an open group”. Here is a quick test. Ask yourself and your class, “When was the last time you invited someone to your class?” Remember, not to your church, but to your class. Then ask, “when was the last time we actually expected a guest?”

I cannot stress enough that the class will take on the personality of its leader! Remember you have heard it said, “everything rises and falls on leadership.” The same is true for your class, they are going to follow your lead.

A vibrant leader is not afraid to make mistakes.  They are not afraid to lead. Work hard at keeping your class an open group. Make it an exciting place for newcomers and regulars members. Be willing to share and send out members from your class to help in other areas. Find an apprentice to invest time and energy into.  Always keep this idea of starting new groups in front of your group, and let your class be the first to do it!

Be a vibrant leader!

 

Dwayne Lee is the associate team leadership to the Bible Teaching/Leadership Resource Group of the State Convention of Baptists in Ohio.

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Where Everyone Knows My Name…

By Ken Kessler · Comments (0)
Tuesday, August 18th, 2015

cutout-peopleTransformational Church process has reminded our churches about the importance of relational intentionality. Churches that practice this element follow through on a basic need of humanity – relationship.

God made us as relational beings. In fact, most of us believe being made in the “image of God” has a relational component. God made us to relate to Him and to relate to each other.

And look at the life of Jesus! He is constantly building relationships with people – his chosen disciples, his friends like Lazarus, Martha, and Mary, strangers like Zacchaeus and the Samaritan woman, and the list goes on.

Despite the reality of the Fall, our relational need remains. John Donne, the poet, even reminded us that no person is an island unto themselves. We need each other. We long for a place to belong.

The old television show, Cheers, theme song echoed the need for people to know us by name and know the importance of our personal journeys. If a bar in Boston can have that theme song, surely we in our Bible study groups can catch the significance of helping people belong also.

Relational intentionality reminds us that a sense of belonging does not just happen. Our Bible study groups must be intentional in connecting to people in our regular routines and in out of the way places just like Jesus. Relationships don’t just happen; they take work!

So as we think about our Bible study groups, here is an acrostic to help us think about our intentional plans to help people belong to our groups:

  • Bonding with someone creates a gateway into positive relationships. Take the time to find out what are the interests, hobbies, strengths, work settings, hometown, family setting, and other personal things to create a bond with them. Connect them to people who have similar backgrounds. Don’t take for granted that people know each other.
  • Elevate the importance of care groups in your Bible study group in order to show that you care about a person whether they are a guest or a regular member! Make sure everyone is assigned to someone for follow-up contact.
  • Learn the language of social media. While social media will not take the place of face to face encounters, it does give us an opportunity to make immediate contacts and be relational.
  • Open chair principle from Lyman Coleman is a great one to practice. Have an open chair you pray for each week and think about with whom you can build a relationship and bring to your Bible study group.
  • Name tags make a difference. Help guests know everyone in the group. Regulars may know everyone by name, but think how challenging it is for a guest.
  • Guest language is more appealing than visitor language. We treat guests with much greater value than an unexpected visitor. Treat all people as guests rather than visitors and watch the difference!

Relationships make a difference in introducing someone to Jesus. Be intentional and watch the difference it makes!

Prayer – Lord, open our eyes to people as you see them. Help us to treat them with the love and respect that they deserve. Make our Bible Study group a place to belong and where people come to know you in new and fresh ways. Amen!

 

Ken Kessler is the Team Leader for the Empowering Leaders Team of the Baptist General Association of Virginia.

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Do You Have a Group of Students or Missionaries

By Mark Miller · Comments (0)
Monday, August 17th, 2015

missionary

10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1: Launch!  Without a successful launch the rest of the mission is irrelevant. But there is more to a successful mission than just the launch.  In Countdown, David Francis and Rick Howerton present 10 mission critical decisions that every groups must address. In the next several blogs, the writers will be highlighting seven key elements that were first discovered in Lifeway’s research and published in the book Transformational Church.  These seven elements [Missionary Mentality, Relational Intentionality, Vibrant Leadership, Prayerful Dependence, Worship, Community, and Mission] were found in every church that had both a successful launch and a successful mission of impacting their community.

“Missionary Mentality was and is the key distinction of a Transformation Church,” wrote David Francis.  Don’t confuse having a “Missionary Mentality” with the element identified as “Mission”.  The mission often explodes and becomes ineffective because we failed to think like a missionary before, during, and after a successful launch.

Getting a group or class to think like a missionary can be difficult.  Mainly because of how leaders and teachers and members see their Sunday School Class. Most just see their Sunday School class as a place to teach the Bible and they see the members of their class as students.  A teacher doesn’t need a Missionary Mentality to teach the Bible to those who show up. Let me remind you that Sunday School was never intended to be a ministry to those who showed up.

We live on mission field today and we need group leaders and Sunday School teachers to once again see the members of their groups as missionaries not just students. My favorite definition of a Sunday School class, is that a Sunday School class is a team of people on mission for God.  With a Missionary Mentality, you will lead your class to be on mission to a world that is lost and to equip your members to serve in this mission field.

One of the first things missionaries do when they get to a new field of ministry is spend time learning the culture and the people.  If we are going to reach people through Sunday School classes and groups, we must start by learning about the people who live in our communities.  Sadly, our culture is now filled with secular adults who know very little about Christ and His church.

In the fourth chapter of Mark, Jesus tells the parable of the sower or soils.  A missionary recognizes the types of soil in his field of ministry and develops a game plan to begin to see fruit in his labor.  The work is not easy, but what good would it do for the missionary to just sow seed without preparing the soil?  When a teacher begin to think like a missionary, the class will begin to identify and discover the people who live in their community. The group members will begin to understand what type of soils they are plowing and sowing.  When classes and groups have a missionary mentality, prospects are discovered, needs are identified, and a vision is birthed.  And they may even begin to use nametags.

Missionaries recognize that they live on a mission field, do you?

________________________

Mark Miller is the Sunday School Specialist and Harvest Field Team Leader for the Tennessee Baptist Convention

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