Change Strategy II
How do I change others or how do I initiate change in
an organization?
We are called to “Go and make disciples.”
That call includes change. I need to help people change.
We are not God. We are not the Savior. We cannot be substitutes for Christ.
However We do need to be the salt and the light. We are called to display the Love of God to all mankind.
So as a leader of change we must know that:
- People don’t like to change. They hate it. If you hate it, they hate it even more.
- People are afraid of change.
- If you try to change them they will rebel.
- You can put lipstick on a pig and try to teach it to sing however it will just frustrate you and make the pig angry.
- Change has no value if we are not going somewhere.
- We need purpose
- We need a plan
- We need to have a destiny.
- A leader of Change has to tie people
into purpose, plan and destiny.
- Accordingly,
only God knows those things. We must push people to Jesus.
A person of change
will affect the not only their own life but the lives of anyone in their
presence.
1. Change leadership
is trying to effect change in an organization
Acts 2 The presence draws by lack of admin disapoints
Traditional Dead
Highly administered
(30,000 members)
Country Club
- We negotiate every day in all that we do
- Negotiate with children so they do chores
- Negotiate with wife to get $20.00
- Administrative Leaders Have the money so they have the power
- Money is power
- Whoever controls the money has the power to push an organization
i. YMCA no longer lifts up Jesus
ii. Organizations push toward Jesus or away based upon the leader
To work on: be wise as serpents and gentle as doves. i.e. How do you change influence others that do not want to be changed.
Tragedy of life and ministry is that admin buys admin (better computers, programs ) and presence buys presence (bring in more prophets).
People always focus on that which we like and do well at instead of our weaker side. We need to increase the weaker side of our lives and churches.
THE PRACTICAL
How To:
Disciple every segment of the church population. Many pastors and leaders are very good at a particular segment of the church population and they focus their attention on that area. For example, a youth pastor will focus on children between the ages of 13 and 18. A person who visits nursing homes regularly will have to be comfortable with an over 65 age group and will have the ability to speak their language. Each generation, each segment has their own language, their own culture and at times their own theology. Theology means “the study of God”. Each generation will have their own understanding of God. Theology changes. It is not static but dynamic. It has the ability to move and change depending upon the people or culture.
Dynamic or Static.
Static theology is a theology that has been placed in a box. Static theology will make statements like, “We don’t worship like that here!” “We don’t lift our hands in worship.” “Speaking in tongues is of the devil.” Static does not have room for change or variance. Static does not allow God or his people the ability to be creative and express freedom in their relationship with a BIG God. While we should all know that there are certain aspects of theology that indeed no have room for change. After all God Himself is the same yesterday today and forever. For example, we can never try to dismiss that fact that Jesus died for our sins. Jesus rose from the grave. Jesus is seated at the right hand of the father. These are orthodox doctrines that can never be altered or changed. But I want to be clear with the difference between doctrine and theology. Doctrine has been established in the Christian church over the past 2000 years. The Chrisitian church has fought and wrestled and prayed to establish a set of orthodox doctrines that have NO room for change or varience. When we begin to change doctrine we become like the Mormon church that says God gave us another book called that book of mormon and we add to God’s pure word. However, in stating that orthodox doctrine cannot change, the practices of our theology will change. The way we understand God will change. The way we see God will change.
Abraham kept taking steps of faith and God kept revealing
more of himself as time went on. God revealed himself to Abraham as his Shield
and his Fee. Later in life God revealed himself as Jehovah Jireh,
his provider. Many of us get saved and think of God as our Salvation but never
begin to walk this journey of faith. We stop trying to discover other aspects of
God, other aspects of His character. There is a Hindi story that tells of three
blind men being led to an elephant and are asked to explain what an elephant
is. The first grabs the trunk and says that the an elephant is like a snake.
The second grabs the leg and says an elephant is like a tree. The third man
grabs the ear and thinks and elephant is like a cloth. The point of the story
for our example is that many of us only can see one part of God’s character and
we boldly proclaim that “God is like….” The Baptist church will state “God is
like….” The Methodist church will state “God is like…” The
The need to combine the different aspects of God’s character
into a collective theology is greater today than ever. I am NO way speaking of
a universal church or a world theology that accepts homosexuality or perversion
of any kind. I am however speaking of the reality that God is bigger that we
allow him to be. God will move in Africa very differently that the way he moves
in
Dynamic Theology
A dynamic theology will allow for variance in practice.
Should we use real wine or grape juice in Eucharist? Should we baptize children
or only adults? Whether you like it or not the world we live in and the God we
serve is dynamic. While our personal theology may be static, the world’s
theology of God is not. There was a period in the 1800’s in
God and theology are not the same thing. Let me repeat that, God and theology are not the same thing. God is God and He is bigger than anything we can ever imagine. Theology is our understanding of God. Our understanding of God must change as we grow in relationship with Him.
The Christian church during the middle ages took a stand for
war and battle. They went to
Practical Theology
The foundation has to be set for us to understand that people’s personal and practical theology will change and be different as they come into a greater understanding of God. Each person has to find God for themselves. And accordingly, each generation has to find God for themselves. God has many children but He has no grandchildren.
“To those who accept Him, he gives the right or ability to become children” John 1:12?
Just because we believe in Him does not make us His children. But it does give us the right to take possession of our identity. Abraham Obeyed God and it was accounted unto him for righteousness. Jacob wrestled with God and demanded a blessing. Our belief in Jesus does not mean that we are his children.
For even the devil believes in Jesus, and trembles.
See the parable of the 10 virgins in Matthew 25. Some virgins were ready for the bridegroom and some were not. It states in verse 12 “But he answered and said. “Assuredly, I say to you, I do not know you.”
In Luke 13 we hear Jesus utter these words:
Strive to enter
through the narrow gate, for many, I say to you, will seek to enter and will
not be able. When once the master of the house has risen up and shut the door,
and you begin to stand outside and knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open
for us and He will answer and say to you I do not know you, where you are from,
then you will begin to say, We ate and drank in Your presence, and You taught
in our streets. But He will say, I tell you I do not know you, where you are
from. Depart from Me, all you workers of iniquity.
What does this mean? It means that even some of the Christians reading this book may not be His children! It means that just because our parents were His children we may not necessarily be. Each generation must meet God himself. God is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God met each of these men individually. He repeated the promise of their father to them and renewed the covenant with each of them individually
In Genesis 26:3 God spoke to Abraham’s son Isaac and stated. “Dwell in this land, and I will be with you and bless you; for you and your descendants I give all these lands, and I will perform the oath which I sword to Abraham your father.”
In Genesis 28:13 God spoke to Isaac’s son Jacob. “Behold, the LORD stood above it and said: “I am the LORD God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and your descendants.”
Just because we call ourselves Christians doesn’t mean that we have met God. It doesn’t mean that we have made a decision to become His child. It doesn’t mean that God has visited us or has given us a promise. Each person must seek God for themselves and wrestle with their own theology just as Jacob did.
Genesis 32:24 Then Jacob was left alone; and a Man wrestled with him until the breaking of day. ……. And He said, “Let Me go, for the day breaks.” But Jacob said, “I will not let You go unless You bless me!”
Practical
Each generation, each segment of the church population is wrestling with the temptations and difficulties of their day. If my grandparents knew the issues that I had to deal with they would role over in their grave. Drugs was not even an issue until the 60’s. Teen sex and teen immorality was never as big as an issue as it is today. Mtv forever changed the way young people live and think. A show that is produced on Mtv called the “real world” puts 8-10 young people together in a hotel and video tapes all of their discussions on life, sex, relationships and more. For any Christian over 65 the conversations would be disgusting and unbelievable. However this is what our children are begin fed today.
We need to understand as we make disciples we must approach
each generation in the appropriate way. In the same we must approach each
culture in an the appropriate way. There is much talk in missionology
circles about culture and cultural identification. Paul said, “when I am with
Jews I am a jew, and when I am with gentiles, I am a
gentile” Missions teaches the same. When I am in
In
They
knew the purposes of God in their generation. david
They knew the times in which they lived
The following is a short list of different segments within Jubilee
infants
Children
Youth
Teens
Singles
Single parents
Divorced
Sexually abused
Ex-addicts and alcholics
Young Married Couples
Older married Couples
Pastors
Leaders
Business men
Retired people
Blue collar
White Collar
Professional, doctor and lawyer
Introverted
Extroverted
Poor
Rich
Peers discipleship relationship with friends. Praying for them encouraging them. E-mailing them. Always thinking of the best for them. Looking out for them. Eating with them. Spending time with them.
Add to the above list the fact that we have some Brazilians, some Mexicans and many other cultures represented.
The call to “Go and make disciples” is all encompassing. God
gave us a complete word that must look at all segments of the population and
evoke them to change. Does this not seem a bit overwhelming? I have seen in
The Christian church must be multi-generational. We must be able to understand and meet the needs of each generation and segment with our church.
The word that must be revealed at this point is call integrity. Integrity comes from the root integer. An integer is a whole number. It is not one and one-half. That would not be a whole number. Integrity means wholeness, completeness. We must have integrity within the church body. There must be wholeness in our discipling process. We cannot just look at the children or just look at the adults. That is not balanced. Every member of the church body must be important and discipled. James said it as such:
“for if there should come into your assembly a man with gold rings, in fine apparel, and there should also come in a poor man in filthy clothes, and you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and say to him, “You sit here in a good place,” and say to the poor man, “You stand there,” or, “Sit here at my footstool,” have you not shown partiality among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts?[1]
He said do not look just at the rich but also look at the poor. They need to be treated equally and fairly. One of the first battles within the New Testament church happened because of favoritism within the church.
Now in those days,
when the number of the disciples was multiplying, there arose a complaint
against the Hebrews by the Hellenists, because their widows were neglected in
the daily distribution.[2]
The Hebrews were being favored in the daily distribution of food for the widows. Whether we realize it or not we bring an agenda to the church. Sometimes our agenda is not necessarily contrary to God’s purposes. But sometimes it is. Joshua was confronted with a similar issue during a battle for the Promised Land.
And it came to pass,
when Joshua was by
In other words, are you for my agenda or the agenda of those other people? When our agenda matches the Lord’s agenda we get excited and think that somehow we moved the hand of God. The truth is God’s agenda will march forward. We can move forward with it or we can fight against it. So I repeat that we need to have integrity in the church discipleship program. We must align ourselves with His agenda because:
God is not a respecter
of persons.[4]
He loves all equally.
The issue remains with our agenda. Ephesians points out that he gave the church Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and Teachers.[5] Usually the leader’s gift attracts certain types of disciples, and rightly so. A prophet will attract other young prophets. An evangelist will attract other evangelists. The only problem with this is that a church can quickly get out of a balance. A church filled with evangelists will get many people saved but they will soon leave the church confused and hurt if there are no leaders with pastoral abilities to shepard this new flock.
Birds of a feather flock together. This is why my local church has had so many administrative issues over the years. We are very gifted in the arena of the prophetic. Our pastor has a gift to raise up other prophets. Some of his spiritual sons and daughters currently travel around the country preaching and ministering in churches as prophets. This is the gifting of our house. However we are very poor in the area of administration. No matter how hard we try to build an administratively tight staff we seem to fail. But according to John Maxwell, strength spends more money on that strength. [6] We pour energy and time on building prophets because it is exciting. It is our gifting and we understand it.
I return to God’s agenda. He wants an integral[7] body, a body that looks at every person as a potential leader in the church. Can we disciple six-year olds with the same passion and success as young single men? Can I disciple young married couples with the same wisdom as the youth? I tell you that God is extremely concerned about His family as we are concerned about ours. I want my wife, my children, my parents and even my in-laws to be growing spiritually. Is it really worth ministering in God’s house at the expense of our own family? Disenfranchised pastor’s kids are sometimes the worst kids on the block. Pastors’ wives in many denominations are told not to get too close to the women in the body and are therefore lonely and depressed.[8] God wants every member of his body to have the same opportunity to be whole.
The difficulty is in getting God’s wisdom for his WHOLE church. The beauty is that God is more concerned about His church than we are and desires to create a balanced body. All we need to do, as leaders, is follow His agenda. Each of us must seek His agenda for our own church and our own family. I cannot on these pages give you all the answers. God is wise and is wisdom is deep. However I can offer a few tips in a few different areas.
Children.
Children cannot concentrate very long on one subject. They like action and they have energy. The first attribute of God revealed in the bible is the attribute called creator.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. [9]
Children are starting the beginning of their life and I love to talk with them about the first of God’s eternal attributes. Children see creation. They can touch animals, trees, plants, water and sand. The ability to feel God’s creation and be taught about it is a powerful tool for forming their minds about God.
Children also love stories. We teach them all the famous bible stories in Sunday school and they remember them. They love to hear about Daniel in the lions den. They love to hear about Moses and Pharaoh. The reason they can comprehend stories is because God designed them to do just that. He put into them an innate desire to be curious.
At this point put the scriptures that tell us that when our children ask us… we should tell them the stories. i.e. the stones on the other side of crossing the Jordon.
Young married couples
The first year of marriage is usually the most difficult for any couple. It is the year when most of the fights happen. The first year will either make or break a couple. I would say that the seeds of most divorces are planted the first year of a marriage. Unless they are uprooted they will grow large and choke the flowers of the marriage. Discipling young married couples is very important for any church. A