One of the first, simplest, and best tools for time-management is to distinguish the urgent from the important. But I discovered this week that it has hidden, secret powers. You know how it goes of course: the threat is that the urgent drowns out the important. And so every time management system I’ve seen has
Thom Rainer has been conducting some surveys (here) about how long pastors spend preparing sermons in an average week. They’ve covered a few famous preachers (Piper, Dever, Driscoll, MacArthur etc), and quite a swathe of the rest of us. The findings are fascinating. The big headline is that most of us (70%) spend about 10-12
I was taught at seminary that my role was to do myself out of a job. The great temptation of the pastor is to hoard ministry, and so I must delegate, clear out the desk, equip the rest of the church for ministry, and then my job is done. Move on. There are at least
It was one of the foundational insights of the Reformers – the priesthood of all believers. No more priestly caste, because we confess our sins to “The Reverend One-Another” They even did away with the very word. ‘Presbyter’, or ‘elder’ was preferred, and the anchor point of their work was teaching. But because we are
It’s one of the big theories about the Web. Chris Anderson first outlined it in his book, ‘The Long Tail’, and the marketing guru Seth Godin riffs on it endlessly. And it’s so nearly right it’s important to see that it’s completely wrong. It goes like this: at one time the only way to
You can now order ‘The Message of the Church‘ at 20% discount from IVP-US (the British IVP edition has reached #1 BestSeller on Amazon.co.uk). Just click on the link here. You can order the UK edition from IVP here at a 28% discount. And it becomes even cheaper if you buy several copies to read in your small group
A highly gifted man I know has just moved to pastor a new church. He’s a good preacher, down to earth, warm and greatly loved – and in the decade he’d been at the previous church it had more than doubled. He’s left multiple services, a packed church, a growing staff team and a building
It’s quite the thing these days for churches to have pithy descriptions of their values. A list of them, usually around five in number, starting with the same letter, appears on a large number of church websites. I think this is a great idea. It clarifies and prioritises. But I think sometimes we fool ourselves
Because, as someone said today, it’s like doing open-heart surgery, on yourself, without an anaesthetic, in public. Or at least it should be. Think it through: What’s the opposite of each part of that description? How does this Sunday’s sermon shape up? H/t. Trevor Johnston, from the mission society, Crosslinks.
There’s a little flurry of atheist ‘churches’ at the moment. Meetings of like-minded secularists who listen to some music, hear a talk, reaffirm their views, have a collection, and then afterwards have a cup of coffee and some home-made cake. It’s very earnest (and therefore very funny), but they are deliberately trying to put into
I’ve been running off-and-on since I was at uni, but my latest ‘off’ has been my longest, around 18 months because of an ankle injury. But I’ve been easing myself back in, and this morning I did my first timed, distance run. What helped me was a series of podcasts which I downloaded for nothing.
Why do we put off making the hard decision? Often we are looking for answers in two areas to line up. But in reality they may never do so, and our desire to wait for them is what holds us back. Clarity This is the search for precision over what we should do. What would
I recently had lunch with an old friend who is also the pastor of a large (in UK terms) church – 600 members, grown pretty much from scratch. I was hungry for my Thai curry, but hungrier to learn. As we mulled over various things, he sketched out some of the basic maps he uses
Top of my list of warning signs for those of us in ministry, is that it’s fatally easy for Christian leaders to read the Bible – but to become so preoccupied with the opportunities of ministry that we only read it for others’ benefit, and never just for ourselves. Now, I know that’s a false
I met a local minister in a car park the other day, and he was already looking flustered. The summer is over, the term card hasn’t been sorted, and September’s here, which means one blink and we’ll be singing ‘Hark the Herald.’ Deep breath, don’t panic. Make a cup of coffee and grab a pen
At the back of our church was a small, rather drab, bookcase. It was used to store songbooks, and Bibles. But we had bought a larger new one, and we were going to redecorate, so we wondered about chucking it out. The brakes went on. Because fixed to the top of the bookcase was a
I’ve just come back from holiday and read a ton of books – a good slab of them on a Kindle. If you’ve got one, or run a version on some other device, you’ll know how convenient it can be. And you’ve probably discovered how easy it is to highlight and take a note. One
Now we’re getting back into the swing of things after the break, I thought it would be good to welcome new readers (and welcome back old ones). I began this blog in August 2012, and since then a lot of people have stopped by, so I thought I’d get straight what we’re here for. For
So you come to the end of your evangelistic course, and you make it clear that there’s a decision to be make. Yes or no, life or death, Christ or an idol. It’s a clear choice. To the people who want to decide for Christ you have a warm welcome, some books to recommend, maybe
School terms are over, the summer hols are here, and it’s time to close down the children’s groups for a few weeks and have a series of all age services. So – why do we do that? I understand why the leaders make need a break, and it’s harder to get a rota together when
