So What's So Bad About the Prosperity Gospel?

Turn on your television and on some channel somewhere you'll find a nicely dressed preacher telling people that God's will for them is that they would prosper. It sounds good, especially when they back it up with strategically selected verses of scripture. But is this really God's will? What if I'm not rich? Does that mean I've sinned?

In this ten-minute video John Piper unpacks the dangers behind the Prosperity Gospel. If you are receiving this post via email, click on the title to view the video.

Free Audio Book: Desiring God

For those of you who spend a lot of time in the car, here's a link to a free audio download of John Piper's book Desiring God. Don't we just love free stuff? Oh yeah!

5 Warning Signs of a Sinking Church

As leaders we are always seeking to lead our churches to be healthy and vibrant, fully engaged in the mission of Jesus. While it is not always easy to evaluate the health of your own church Thom Ranier provides some warning signs of a church that is in a state of decline. We do well to recognize these signs before they arrive.

1. The church has few outwardly focused ministries. Most of the budget dollars in the church are spent on the desires and comforts of church members. The ministry staff spends most of its time taking care of members, with little time to reach out and minister to the community the church is supposed to serve.
2. The dropout rate is increasing. Members are leaving for other churches in the community, or they are leaving the local church completely. A common exit interview theme we heard was a lack of deep biblical teaching and preaching in the church.
3. The church is experiencing conflict over issues of budgets and building. When the focus of church members becomes how the facilities and money can meet their preferences, church health is clearly on the wane.
4. Corporate prayer is minimized. If the church makes prayer a low priority, it makes God a low priority.
5. The pastor has become a chaplain. The church members view the pastor as their personal chaplain, expecting him to be on call for their needs and preferences. When he doesn’t make a visit at the expected time, or when he doesn’t show up for the Bible class fellowship, he receives criticism. In not a few cases, the pastor has lost his job at that church because he was not omnipresent for the church members.

There's Something to be Said for Perseverance

When it comes down to it, church planting, like much of leadership is just plain hard work. While there are those occasional mountaintop experiences, most of the time they are few and far between. Often times one of the most helpful things a leader can do is not give up. Though there is not a lot of fanfare associated with perseverance, nothing can quite take its place.

The Resurgence website recently posted on this helpful topic. Here's the link.

3 Things Youth Workers Need to be Good At

How much training have you given to your youth leaders? Do your youth volunteers lead "youth meetings" or do they lead people? Here are three simple things that can help them be more effective as youth leaders.

Followup
Who needs a call back this week? What email has been sitting in the bottom of your inbox that needs a reply? What made it on your task list, but sits there with persistence week after week? Who did you promise something to, but haven’t delivered on? Follow-up is a scare commodity in our fast-paced, disorganized world.

Thank yous
Who needs a note from you this week? Can you crank out a couple emails that would mean the world to people who receive them? Who did something for you that needs to be appreciated? Build this into your routine of the week, or chances are you’re unintentionally burning bridges behind you if you say nothing after the ask.

Affirmation
To me this is different than thank yous – thank yous are for people who have given you something and need to be appreciated for something they did. Affirmation is for who someone is. It is an appreciation of their legacy and character that is making an impact. Affirmation is also ultra powerful way to build up someone’s self-esteem.

Take a second and create a short list of people who need one of these actions this week.

Grandparenting: Ready or Not Here We Come

I think I can honestly say that I've never been completely prepared for any phase of life I've been through. Whether it's been marriage, being a parent, raising teens, kids leaving home, kids getting married, or whatever, each has come with a clear sense of "What's in store for us now?" Don't look now, but I'm at that place again.

On Tuesday, September 1 our son Seth and daughter-in-law Shannon, welcomed into the world their first child, Adara Lynn Hein. She is absolutely gorgeous, as you can see for yourself. With this beautiful girl comes the next phase of life, grandparent-hood.

Over the years I have heard strange rumors of perfectly normal adults going through some kind of wild metamorphosis as they pass through the tunnel of becoming a grandparent. Fiscally responsible people all of a sudden throw out the budget in light of a new bundle of joy. Health-conscious do-gooders travel down grocery store aisles filling their shopping cart with items they previously cursed for years, all because of a little voice that says, "Can I have that grandma?" People who haven't been to a garage sale in years are all of a sudden scanning the Thursday edition of the local newspaper in hopes of finding a garage sale add that contains the magic words, "Baby clothes".

It's yet to be determined whether Gayle or I will succumb to such wild transformation. However, one thing we are certain of at this point of life and and that is that God is good. We are humbled and at times perplexed by His everlasting love and grace. That God would send His Son, Jesus to die in our place on the cross, for our sin has always been a mystery to us. We are fully convinced that there was nothing within us that merited such action. But for this life-changing grace we are eternally grateful. And it is in His grace that we continue to trust. Therefore, we can say with all confidence, "Grandparenting Here We Come!"

Getting the Most Out of Twitter

Okay all you Twitter Heads, here's some very helpful information from Michael Hyatt (one of my favorite bloggers btw) on how to get the most out of your Twitter account.

1. Why Do You Twitter?

Two reasons: First, I am very interested in leadership. Leadership is influence. Twitter allows me to use my influence to effect thousands of people. Second, I am interested in building my personal brand, so that I can leverage that on behalf of my company. As I build my brand, I build trust. When people trust you, you have more influence. It all works together.

2. What Do You Think has Contributed to Your Growth Success?

I think by adding value to people’s lives.

I try to point people to articles and posts that I believe will enrich their lives in some way. The more generous you are with Twitter, the more followers you will attract. It’s like making a deposit in their bank account.

Conversely, “using” your followers to pimp your own products or services is like a withdrawal. You can do it, but you must be very careful that your deposits exceed your withdrawals.

3. What Strategies Would You Give for a Twitter User Who’s Not “New” But Who’s Been Around and is Looking to Take It to the “Next Level”?

1. Make sure that you are tweeting great content. Again, be generous. Give more than you ask.
2. Re-tweet great content from others. This builds equity with the people you are re-tweeting, so they are more likely to re-tweeting you.
3. Twitter frequently, but not too frequently. I think 8-12 tweets a day is about right. More than that will wear people out.
4. Don’t reply publicly to private questions. This is what direct messages are for. If potential followers can’t follow your conversations, they won’t follow you-or worse, they may unfollow you. Only post public tweets that are relevant to ALL (or at least most) of your followers.
5. Create a custom landing page. When people consider following you, the first thing they do is click on your Web link on your Twitter profile page. That should go to a special landing page on your blog or Web site.
6. Blog about Twitter. I wrote “The Beginner’s Guide to Twitter” and it is the most popular page on my blog. I have also written several other posts about Twitter. They get lots of traffic.
7. Auto-follow everyone who follows you. I use TweetLater.com to do this. I’m not sure I can explain why this works but it does. When I started doing this, my follower growth sky-rocketed. I use TweetDeck to manage such a large number of followers by segmenting followers into groups.