You have heard us say that one of the benefits of the new church plant is that it will cause a leadership vacuum.  In other words there will be places of opportunity for some of you to take a step of faith and fill in areas that need leadership. That being said, all us want to lead well if given the opportunity.  But sometimes we forget that leading others begins by leading ourselves. And the way we lead ourselves can ignite the ministry flame in others, or douse it. Here are a few important lessons to help us consider what that might look like.

On Sunday, November 5, 2017, Dick Jaques and I announced on behalf of our entire Elder Team that New Hope Church is excited to plant a new church in MHK in 2018 under the leadership of myself and our Administrator, Dave Geldart! We’re excited to see what God might do through both this church plant AND New Hope in this next season. Let’s storm the gates of hell together! Here are some answers to questions we've been asked this last month. Hence a FAQ page (Frequently Asked Questions)!

“How’d you do with your WOTY 2017?” Or, perhaps a better way to phrase that question would be, “What’s God been up to in that area of your life you were wanting to grow in this year?” That rephrasing actually captures better the heart of “Word Of The Year” in that it puts the emphasis on what God is doing in our lives, rather than what we’re mustering up, how we’re going to do better, how we’re going to change ourselves.  To be sure, there is human agency involved.  We must choose to cooperate with God...

I don’t know about you, but the holiday season can often become stressful. I find my mind cluttered with lists upon lists, lots of family engagements, high expectations from myself and others, and did I mention STRESS?! With all of the distractions that come with this time of year, it can be difficult to intentionally help our families prepare their hearts for the celebration of Christ’s birth. I want to share a few Christ-centered activities our family has incorporated into our Advent season. Maybe pick one or two for your family to try!

“Teamwork makes the dream work.” This is a pretty well known quote by John Maxwell. But it’s not complete. The whole quote is, “Teamwork makes the dream work, but a vision becomes a nightmare when the leader has a big dream and a bad team.” I agree with this quote wholeheartedly. Within our Fusion Ministry, I have been placed as the Director. One of my biggest responsibilities in my role is to have in place an awesome Fusion Leadership Team, or a FuLe Team. This year I have been blessed with one of our biggest and most diverse FuLe Teams we’ve had in several years.

The vigorous, continual planting of new congregations is the single most crucial strategy for (1) the numerical growth of the body of Christ in a city and (2) the continual corporate renewal and revival of the existing churches in a city. Nothing else—not crusades, outreach programs, parachurch ministries, growing megachurches, congregational consulting, nor church renewal processes—will have the consistent impact of dynamic, extensive church planting. This is an eyebrow-raising statement, but to those who have done any study at all, it is not even controversial.