• Our hope-filled future is bound up in sharing the story of Jesus, in discipling others, in bringing those disciples together into communities of believers, and in developing and releasing those believers to create other communities... till Jesus the King comes again!

Gateway or bottleneck

Posted on May 17, 2013 by wtdavid

I was recently reading through a number of articles that I had placed in a file when I ran across this quote in one of those articles:

“Young leaders want and need a place at the table. I know of one church where the leader (who is himself in his thirties) meets weekly with the church’s key emerging leaders. They read books on church leadership to discuss, they engage in spiritual and theological reflection. But they don’t stop there. He regularly offers them opportunities and assignments to do critical ministry projects and innovations. In some cases these have led to whole new ministry organizations being started, with young leaders at the helm. It happened because his leadership became a gateway and not a bottleneck.”Bottleneck

Several things struck me.  First, this leader had a “developmental mindset”. In other words, when new workers came into his ministry, he viewed them from the perspective of how they could be developed and trained to grow in ministry.  He saw their need for ongoing learning and training from the day they walked in the door (see my post from 13.05.2013).  Next, he gave away or delegated ministry opportunity.  He gave people a chance to test out their gifts and abilities in a context where he could give feedback and counsel.  He did not micromanage what they did.  He followed what they did: praying, giving feedback and cheering them on.  Finally, this leader was a young guy (in his thirties) who was building and releasing a growing number of workers and leaders.

World Team workers have an average of eighteen years of experience in cross cultural ministry.  We have an “experience capital” that is significant.

Imagine what could happen, by God’s grace, if that “experience capital” were used to create “gateways” for younger workers and leaders.

Filed under: Challenge, Delegation, Development | Leave a comment »

Mentoring 101

Posted on February 21, 2013 by wtdavid

mentoring5Mentoring is “the process where a person with a serving, giving, encouraging attitude, the mentor, sees potential in a still-to-be developed person, the mentoree, and is able to promote or otherwise significantly influence the mentoree along in the realization of potential.” In other words, mentoring is about helping or facilitating another in their lifelong development in character and competency.

However, mentoring another doesn’t just happen because we think the idea is “cool”. Getting involved in mentoring relationships begins with three critical steps.

The first critical step is to pray for and learn how to have “developmental eyes”. When a new worker joins our ministry team, how do we “see” them? Do we see them just as additional labor and hands for the work? Or do we see someone with potential to grow in certain areas, to potentially move into certain roles of responsibility? Do we assess the person as to what they can’t do or what they have the potential to do? There are vast differences in the ways we “see” people.

The second critical step is to develop your ability to mentor by asking more questions than you answer. This may be something that requires some new skill training as most of us are trained to answer questions more than we are to ask them. The aim in mentoring is to develop the other. Most often that occurs through their discovering truth and its application.

The final critical step is making known that you are available and willing to mentor others. I’m not talking about “tooting your horn”. I believe that workers truly do want to be mentored, but they often assume others don’t want to mentor them or don’t have the time to mentor. Making known your willingness to mentor offers the invitation to other workers to seek you out.

If one of our core values is training and developing leaders, I believe this means we should be characterized as a community that mentors others well.

Filed under: Development, Lifelong learning, Mentoring | 2 Comments »

Learning from the ‘old’ guys

Posted on August 30, 2012 by wtdavid

J.I. Packer, in his book, A Quest for Godliness, quotes a well known Puritan writer (17th century): “And he that doth not feed on and thrive in the digestion of the food which he  provides for others will scarce make it savoury unto them; yea, he know not but that the food he hath provided may be poison, unless he have really tasted of it himself. If the word do not dwell with power in us, it will not pass with power from us.”  A fitting word for us today.

The hardest part of any day is setting aside time to dig into the Word of God for ourselves, to mine its truths and to dialogue with God about what we are learning and how it all applies to us.  The excuses are multiple: I just don’t have time; or doesn’t Bible study preparation count; or there’s no ‘system’ that seems to work for me.

Two small steps might be a beginning towards getting us back into ‘savouring’ the truths of the Word. First, ask someone to pray over the coming week(s) for you to have a desire to be with the Father.  Second, start sharing what you are learning with others, not in a teaching sense, but just sharing how something from the Bible is impacting you and how you desire to work it into your heart.  It sounds so straightforward, but the act of sharing or giving to others in this way creates a thirst for more, more time in His Word.

This is exactly what we want to see in our disciples as well, isn’t it?  To have a thirst and hunger for God’s Word and share it with others?

 

Filed under: Development, Lifelong learning, Prayer, Priorities | Leave a comment »

Why I Could Use An Intern (II)

Posted on July 6, 2012 by wtdavid

One solid reason why I could use an intern is that there is more work than I can accomplish, and delegating tasks can serve as a reminder of my daily need for God.

Another reason would be to ready (read: train) the next generation of workers and leaders.  Hands on experience with real time assessment and feedback are a gift that we can give to many as they journey towards God’s mission for their lives.  Many of us are where we are in ministry because of the opportunity that a mature worker or leader gave to us to try our hands at ministry through a variety of tasks, even those that seemed mundane.

Here again, two obstacles loom in front of us.  First, we simply assume that we do not have the time to give to such an effort.  Basically, it would take us longer to carry our every day work.  Real time assessment assumes time and depth of relationship.  Second, there is often no short term return on the investment made in the life of an intern.  Most interns do not walk in the door able to do all that we need done.  There are some strong gifts that they bring and can put into practice, but they are unfamiliar with how to fully work out these gifts in the contexts where we live and work.

That’s why I need an intern.  Working with an intern reminds me that life and ministry is a journey, and that just as others were patient and willing to work with me, so I must do the same for others.  And as those interns grow and develop, ultimately I will need to give way and allow them to begin to exercise more and more influence, and begin the same process (multiplication) with interns that come their way.

I may have shared this story before, but it is worth repeating.  One of my friends here in France shared about one of the leaders in his church that had a plumbing business.  This plumber was complaining about the fact that there was no one on the horizon to take over his business once he retired.  When asked the reason for this scarcity, the plumber replied that it all stemmed from a decision a number of years ago when he decided not to take on any interns.  “Too much work,” he said, “and everything would have taken much longer to finish.  It was just easier for me to do it myself.”  The obstacles of time and a lack of short term investment had led him to “get his work done,” but now there was no one to continue or further the work.

Let us have a developmental mindset that allows us to work with and hand over ministry to others who will further and multiply (again) the ministry.

Filed under: Delegation, Development, Mentoring | Leave a comment »

Raising our level of competence

Posted on April 12, 2012 by wtdavid

Many of us simply do not know how to respond to workers who do not have the necessary knowledge, skills and abilities to do their ministry. When this kind of situation is allowed to go on, the agency suffers and often responds by working around the inadequately trained worker, the worker who lacks the needed competencies.

This is what is called the “frustration approach”.  We become annoyed with the inability of the worker to do their ministry, and choose not to address their developmental needs.  We work around them by carrying out their work or having others carry out their work.

There is another approach though.  We could call it the “redemptive approach”.  Our ministry focus becomes the development of the worker needing competency training.  In this approach, we come alongside the worker and choose to honestly address their competency needs and bring the resources to them which would raise their level of competency.  Rather than working around them, we work with them.  If the worker does not demonstrate the skills needed to carry out the ministry task after this training, then we need to look at other ministry options which might be better suited for their current gifts and skills.

Raising our level of competency means allowing the community to honestly assess our knowledge, skills and abilities and bring training to us that will cause us to grow in our ability to more fruitfully carry out our task.

Next post: Core skills and LL3.

Filed under: Community, Core competencies, Development | Leave a comment »

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