Visionary Leadership


This from Don Wilson of Christ’s Church of the Valley

“The problem with facilities is convincing people that they are the church on Monday through Saturday and not just on Sunday. IOW, ministry can and must happen anywhere, not just on church property.

Most new churches build their building too soon and too small.

Two essentials: “critical mass” and “momentum.” Lead by example.

Big vision attracts people with big vision.

Every time we go through building programs, we suffer big Satanic attacks. Don’t plan too far out. No 5-year (or longer) plans. Need to work on core values. Difference between successful churches and successful corporations — successful churches tend to be personality driven and successful corporations tends to be core values driven. We need to determine our core values! Do more with less. CCV plans to cut out 1/3 of their ministries in the next year! You are your greatest leadership challenge. Your leadership style has to change at every level. Old Proverb: “An army of sheep led by a lion will always defeat an army of lions led by a sheep.” That’s a great statement about the importance of good leadership! Sacrifice was a real focus today, and Don Wilson asked, how do you get people who don’t tithe to understand the concept of sacrifice? 90% of the things we pray about in our churches are things that Jesus never prayed about. Jesus prayed about kingdom issues. CCV’s vision is to WIN, TRAIN, and SEND, and their priority is on the winning part. Instead of the old “here’s the church, here’s the steeple, open the doors and here are the people,” it should be “here’s the church, here’s the steeple, open the doors and release all the people.”

4 thoughts on “Visionary Leadership”

  1. I posted this on your ‘what’s wrong with this picture’ thread, but there was no reply.

    “Mr. Edwards.

    I am gay, and live in Perth not far from Bedford.

    What is Bedford Baptist church’s position on gay people attending the church?

    Should gay people like myself be warned against attending your church?

    Also do you have any people in your church who practise sin?”

    I was wondering what your visionary leadership was in this area?

  2. I dont wont to get in debate with you Lance in this public forum.

    However I will state what I stated in the other thread in reply to Nilmot.

    I believe practicing homosexuality is a sin. I think Nilmot and I agreed to disagree with each other about that. And it appeared to be a cordial disagreement.
    There are lots of sins people in church commit, in answer to your second last question. But I dont think you were asking a question so much as making a statement.

    However if someone is proudly displaying their sinful lifestyle as a practice, and promoting it, I and BBC would take issue with that.

    In regard to your last question, our church’s focus is on young families. We recognise we are not a large church, and so therefore we focus what we are good at.

    I do believe that people need counselling on a whole raft of lifestyle choices, but in our church we have decided to focus on family issues.

  3. So I guess Mark you are saying that gay people are welcome in your church, as long as they are not in a relationship. I guess the odd slip-up would be tolerable? as long as they weren’t proud of it, or open about it. No different to say a single straight person who views internet porn from time to time?

    Mark you say that your church likes to focus on ‘young families issues’ Are you implying that homosexuality is not a young families issue. If we think that gay people are not growing up in our young evangelical families then we are seriously deluded.

  4. What I said was that our church would have an issue with it, I didn’t say they wouldn’t be welcome.
    Church should be for sick people, whether they are addicted to porn, or struggling with their sexual orientation. And this would include confronting sin, and helping people to deal with it.

    Your question about visionary leadership seemed to be relating to people like yourself, who are presumably adults. (?)
    Our focus is not on adults struggling with homosexuality. This does not mean we would not try our best to help, but it is not part of our strategic vision.

    Young people struggling with their sexuality certainly is.

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