Abundant Life Leadership

I closed my last post with this sentence:

If you want to lead successfully, Jesus must first lead you!

To lead well and bear fruit, you must be connected to the Vine (John 15:5). Another way of illustrating  this is to imagine your life as a glass. As a spiritual leader, your main job is to be in a position where Jesus can pour into you to overflowing (see John 10:10; Ephesians 3:20; Psalm 23:5. The word for ""to the full" or "abundantly" means overflowing). As God pours His abundance into your life, you overflow into those He's put all around you. 

Your job as a small group leader is not to pour yourself out to others, but simply to allow God to fill and abundantly overflow your life into others with His love, mercy, and truth. 

So now I have a question, and I really need your response. How, specifically, is Jesus leading you? How are you opening yourself up to Him to fill and overflow your life into others? Please be specific, and share with other leaders so that we may grow together! 

Get the dialogue started below! 

Trophies, Cheerleading, Enoch, and Leading a Healthy Small Group

What do you want to be known for? What would you want people to say about you after you die?

At different stages of my life I would have responded to that question differently. As a kid growing up in Cincinnati, I wanted to be known as a great athlete, like Pete Rose or Oscar Robertson.

My athletic career was unspectacular. I accumulated a caseload of trophies, because I was on some good teams. I did get three individual awards, however. In basketball I got the award for Best Defense … which went to the kid who rarely scored a basket. In baseball one year, I got the Most Spirited Player trophy … which went to the kid who sat on the bench and cheered on the rest of the team.

My favorite award was the Most Improved Player … which went to the kid who didn’t stink quite as bad as the year before. The trophy had the initials “MIP” on the plaque. I overheard my mom telling all her friends I got the “Most Important Player” award. At least my mom appreciated my talent!

In college at the University of Cincinnati I would have said I wanted to be popular. Just for fun my freshmen year, I went out for the cheerleading squad. I figured at least I’d meet some pretty girls. On a fluke, I made the squad, three years straight. I was proud to be a “big man on campus.”

Today, in my better moments, I want to be like Enoch. You don’t hear too many people say that, do you? People say they want to have the faith of Abraham or the power of Moses or the wisdom of Solomon. But Enoch? I love what Genesis 5:22-24 says about him: “Enoch lived another 300 years in close fellowship with God …. He enjoyed a close relationship with God throughout his life. Then suddenly, he disappeared because God took him” (NLT).

No, I don’t want to live another 300 years! And it’s not at all necessary to just disappear without dying, unless it’s the rapture, of course. But I do want to simply live in close fellowship with God throughout what’s left of my life, and then for God to take me when he’s ready.

Enoch had a heart for God, and small group leadership starts with your heart. It starts with your relationship with God—seeking after him.

The previous paragraphs are adapted from my book, I'm a Leader ... Now What? I'm currently blogging about the Second Vital Sign of a Healthy Small Group: a healthy, growing small group leader. I believe in this foundational principle so much I write about it often! I've written about it in Leading from the Heart and briefly in The Pocket Guide of Burnout-Free Small Group Leadership. I'll continue to emphasize this until God takes me. 

If you want to lead successfully, Jesus must first lead you!

The Leader's Heart: 2nd Sign of a Healthy Group

The most vital mark of kingdom leadership is a leader's relationship with God. And that's the second sign of a healthy small group: a healthy growing leader.


The apostle Paul prayed for his Ephesian friends that "Christ will be more and more at home in your hearts as you trust in him. May your roots go down deep into the soil of God's marvelous love." (Ephesians 3:17, NLT). While I pray that prayer regularly for the Life Group leaders at Northeast Christian Church, I think it's OK to pray it for myself as well. So, Father, I pray ...

• that Christ will be more and more at home in my heart ... so I am living the superabundant life he came to give me -- life that is naturally overflowing out of me to others;
• that I may stay connected to the Vine daily (John 15:5), abiding in him so that I can bear much fruit for you, fruit that will last,
• that, as Christ becomes more and more at home in my heart, others around me may follow my example ... but only as I follow the example of your son,
• that my roots keep growing, deeper and deeper into your awesome, abundant, undeserved, undeniable love,
• and, as a result (fruit), that Christ will also be more and more at home in the hearts of my family, my friends, my neighbors, and our small group members -- as they trust in you as I do.

Yes, the first sign of a healthy group is that it is Christ-centered, but that will only happen if he is first at the center of the leader's life--at home in his or her heart. ("The 'heart' in the Bible always refers to the center of a person's emotions and will."  —Life Application Bible Commentary)

May Jesus be at home in your heart, leader. This is more than a surface-level relationship. It is very intimate. This is more than just occasional. It's constant. It's why Paul encouraged us to pray "continuously."

Nothing is more important than this. If Jesus is at the center of the leader's heart and at the center of the group, the group you have been entrusted with will be on its way to health, strength, growth, and vitality.

So how's your heart? Or, better yet, who's at home there?

"For a Cause or for Christ?" (Repost of Heather Zempel Blog)

I've been talking about the first sign of a healthy small group. It must be Christ-centered. Heather Zempel (at right) put it so well in her blog November 23. Check it out:

"The disciples didn't lay their lives down for a cause but for a person."

That's how Dave Buehring kicked off his talk on the Ways of God at our Kaboom Retreat (formerly zone leader/team leader retreat) this weekend.

For some reason, that one statement is really challenging me personally and challenging the way I lead my team. I fear that I have spent too much time motivating people to a cause- make disciples, advance the Kingdom, create culture, change a generation, etc. That's all good stuff, but it's not the ultimate goal, is it? Maybe I should focus a bit more on simply elevating the person of Jesus Christ.

Causes are good. Causes build fans and create evangelists. Christ is better. He builds communities of faith and creates martyrs. Not that we all want to rush out to the Colosseum to volunteer ourselves for lion dinner. But laying down our lives is one of the ways we follow Jesus Christ.

The disciples didn't lay their lives down for some great cause that had captivated their emotions and imaginations. They laid their lives down for a person who had already laid his own life down for them.

Why am I more cause focused than person focused? Perhaps it is more comfortable and easy for me to acquaint myself with and attach myself to a cause than to enter a messy and flesh-killing relationship with Jesus Christ.

Read Heather's blog here.

Hungry Small Groups

For those of you outside of Northeast Christian, we are now on Day 2 of a food challenge, eating just a small amount of rice and beans for lunch and dinner (and maybe 1 tortilla) and oatmeal for breakfast. We're doing this as a church as an act of solidarity with those who live in the bottom economic half of the world. We want to understand what it might be like to be hungry, and grow our hunger to make a difference.

An interesting aspect of this for me is watching how our small groups respond. I've wondered if they would come together to encourage one another and spur one another on and bear with one another? I got my answer today when one of our group leaders, Stephanie Wilson posted a comment on our church blog:

So great to have a life group to encourage each other through the week. Last night the "I'm Hungry!!" email blasts to our group started around 5pm. It is fun to have a group to connect with and to hold each other accountable and to know that you have someone praying for you during this challenge.

Stephanie's words point to at least two of our signs of a healthy small group: Authentic Biblical Community and Mission-Minded. I'll write more about these in a future blog, but I thought this was a great opportunity -- a teachable moment, perhaps -- that I did not want to miss.

Groups that are moving both inward in community with one another and outward in mission are the most healthy, strong, life-changing groups. And the best part is how these two values are interdependent. They are symbiotic, or mutually beneficial to one another. It's what I posted in my first blog about being a part of a healthy ecosystem.

Is your small group hungering for more?

"Jesus declared, 'I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty'" (John 6:35).

Click the banner below to check out our "Hunger Blog"

I'm Not the Leader: 1st Sign of a Healthy Group - Part 2

I am not the leader of our small group.

I'm not trying to get out of anything. I'm not passing the buck. It's just that a group can only have one real leader, and I'm not it.

In my last blog, I wrote about the importance of a small group being "Christ-centered." What's even more important is that the leadership of my group must be Christ-centered. I've combined these as two separate but related aspects of the first sign of a healthy small group.

I am the "second-chair" leader of the group. The Best Small Group Leader Ever is a perfect model. Jesus only did and spoke what the Father gave him to do and say (see John 5:19; 8:28; 12:49 and other passages). Jesus recognized the Father as the real leader.

I try to look at our small group as a matter of stewardship. God owns the group, but he has entrusted the people to me. They were his in the first pace. Then he gave them to me to care for, encourage, spur on.... Jesus modeled this perfectly too. See John 17:6-12. I believe I'll one day be held accountable for what I did with those he has put under my care ... some day, when the "Chief Shepherd" appears (see 1 Peter 5:2-4).

I've been learning that my main job as the second-chair leader is to stay close to Jesus. My leadership actually has little to do with me, my ideas, my abilities, even my gifts. No, it starts with what God is graciously pouring into me and then simply--but powerfully--overflows from my life into others near me.

This is one of my favorite subjects to write about. I've discussed it in Leading from the Heart and I'm a Leader ... Now What? and it's a vital element in The Pocket Guide to Burnout-Free Small Group Leadership. So you'd think I'd have this down by now. Wish I did. But I always seem to take back control, forget to rely on God, try to depend on my own minimal strengths rather than God's unlimited power. So the "how" does not come as easy as the "what" and "why." I know it starts with my time spent with him. I do well there. But it's more than that. It's truly letting Jesus lead the group through me.

I (or someone else in the group) begin every meeting in worshipful prayer, recognizing Christ's presence with us and that he is our real leader. I ask him to show his power as he leads us. Then I watch for what Jesus does in and through me as I lead from the second chair. This is a good start, but I want to continue getting much better at this. I'm guessing I'm not alone.

Tootsie Pop Small Groups: 1st Sign of a Healthy Group

Healthy small groups are like Tootsie Pops. The most important part is what's at it's center. I was thinking about this analogy and the tract that contrasts two ways of living life, represented by two circles: the self-directed and Christ-centered life. Here's the illustration from the Campus Crusade web site:


What's at the center of these circles determines the kind of life you have. What if these circles represented your small group? Who's on the throne there?

Is your group ...

• leader-centered?
  
• content-centered (focused on curriculum or a certain study or author)?
  
• challenge-centered (focused on a group member's or the group's issues)?
  
• cause-centered?

There's nothing wrong with any of these, of course, but a healthy group is focused on Christ and his presence, power, purposes, and plans.

In his blog on Organic Group Formation, my good friend Randall Neighbour provides some great diagrams contrasting unhealthy and healthy group formation. Check these out and, if you want to read more, see Randall's post:





These show how a group should form, and in my new book, The Pocket Guide to Burnout-Free Small Group Leadership, I discuss in much more depth how a group can form or re-form around Christ. This is, I believe, "central" to a healthy, strong, growing small group.

Why do so many small groups fail to bear much fruit? Because we've been focusing on a lot of other things rather than Christ. Jesus promised that whenever we gather together in his name, or for his purposes, he will be there among us (Matthew 18:20). And if he is among us, he will bring transformation. And if his purposes truly are our purposes, we will be making, baptizing, and teaching disciples. And if he is present, his power will be at work in unexpected ways; he'll do more than we can ask or imagine in and through our groups!

I've seen many small groups take a lot of licks trying to do group life centered on things other than Christ. So, here's the question:

"How many licks will it take to get to the Christ-directed center of your small group?"

How are you doing at making Christ's presence real in your group(s)? How are you keeping him at the center? How are you staying focused on him and his purposes for you?

I'll write more on this first sign of a healthy group in my next blog ...