Several years ago, I moved into the role of lead pastor when we planted 7 City Church near downtown Fort Worth. I had served as an executive pastor, associate pastor, youth pastor, and non-profit leader prior to assuming this new opportunity, and with this transition...
In my last article, I talked about three ways to lead faithful team members. From the Parable of the Talents, we discovered how the master led faithful leaders by commending them, entrusting them with more responsibility, and rewarding them. So, how do you deal with...
Leadership comes with a host of challenges, uphill struggles, and negative voices that tell us why we can’t do what we want to do. But, despite the circumstances, leaders lead. They don’t let the struggles they face, the disaapointments they encounter, or the...
Over my last several posts we’ve taken a journey through what it means to lead through prayer, using the Lord’s Prayer to guide us. From Jesus’ words we’ve discovered how not to pray, how prayer is relational rather than transactional, what it means to pray the...
Leadership is painful. Difficult decisions can produce hurt feelings, and those hurt feelings can turn into ruthless accusations, agendas, and assaults on the leader in charge. The pain can be so great that leaders are tempted to back down from the vision God has...
Somebody who knew how to pray more than anybody I knew was my Grandmother. My grandmother lived to be 92 years old in a small village in England. She wasn’t popular, or famous, or rich. You won’t find her name in the history books of earth. She didn’t have a lot of...
When most of us think about prayer, we think of all the things we need to pray about. Family, friends, troubles, personal needs, leadership challenges, hiring decisions…the list is endless. Without even realizing it, our prayers begin and end with a focus on us, and...
If you could ask Jesus any question, what would you ask him? What’s it like in heaven? Why haven’t you healed my friend? When are you going to give me a new job? Why is there so much suffering in the world? In the Gospel of Matthew, a member of Jesus’ team posed a...
Leaders are proactive by nature, and our get-it-done nature has a way of bulldozing our way into the future. The problem we risk encountering is that our relentless, fast-paced, get-it-done-at-any-cost mindset can push us ahead of God, or out of step with Him. That’s...