10 Things I've Learned From 10 Years in Ministry - Part 5



A few weeks ago, I celebrated 10 years of student ministry at my current Church. Spending 10 years in one spot brings a certain perspective to life and ministry. Over the next few days, I want to share 10 lessons I've learned.

If I could go back to my younger self, 10 years ago, here are some of the things I would tell myself:

5. You can't do it alone 

 In ministry, we can be tempted to think that the world revolves around us. We begin to think that if we aren't physically present all the time, things will fall apart. This has a way of feeding our ego and making us feel "important" and "needed." We think we have to do everything. Our mantra becomes, "If you want it done right, you've got to do it yourself." I've been there before and it's a horrible place to be. The better way? Realize you need a team. The effort it takes to build a team is worth it in the long run. If you try and do everything yourself your impact will be limited. Training others to help you immediately increases your capacity to impact the people you minister to. I think you ought to work so hard building a good team that they can do most of the work without you. Work yourself out of a job - not because you're lazy - but because you're investing yourself in those around you. That's your job in the first place - To equip the saints for the work of the ministry. Your job is not to do the ministry all by yourself, but to create and invest in a team of people who can do the work of the ministry.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Treating Symptoms: The Gospel of Sin Management

Image
During my junior year of college, I started having chest pains. I didn't think much of it at first. I was 21 years old and healthy by all standards. The pain went on for several weeks until I decided to google my symptoms (something you should never do). Of course, this resulted in me being WebMD’d into a frenzy. I went to the emergency room and was immediately admitted because they thought I was having heart problems. I spent a day or so in the hospital and had every conceivable test run on me, only to be told there was nothing wrong with me. I was sent home. The problem went away for a while, but a couple of years later it returned. This time, instead of paying the insane amount of money the ER would ask for, I decided to find a doctor. I went to several doctors over the next few years. One thought it might be a heart condition, others believed I had ulcers, still, others thought it was something else. I received several different medications trying to relieve the symptoms...
Read more

We Did It To Ourselves - Individualism

Image
The American church is in a state of crisis. Many Churches are closing their doors and according to recent statistics, people are walking away from the church in large numbers. Everyone seems to have an opinion on the problem and the way to fix it.  I’m writing as a product of the church. Who I am was shaped by the (mostly) white, Pentecostal, American evangelicalism of the 80’s and 90’s. As I’ve grown older I have reflected back on my experience growing up in this subculture. It’s a subculture that left me many wonderful gifts. It led me to many experiences with God that shaped and formed the deepest parts of who I am. But it is also a subculture with many problems and issues. As I reflect on the current state of the American church, I can’t help but ask this question — how much did we contribute to our own demise?  Any movement that cannot self-reflect and ask this question is a movement that, in my opinion, is doomed. If we don’t see the problems, how can we f...
Read more