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It’s Orange Week again. It’s a time when I, along with a number of other people who serve in churches in family ministry, blog about past Orange Conference experiences and Orange strategy in general as we gear up for this year’s Orange Conference. In my posts this week I’m going to focus on the 5 Orange Essentials; what we’ve learned about them and how we’ve tried to implement them.

Essential Four – Elevate Community

Orange defines this essential as - Connect everyone to a caring leader and a consistent group of peers

Studies have been done that show the importance of having multiple adult influences in a child’s life. Even apart from faith, studies have shown that teenagers who have more adults in their life do better in every area of life including school, friendships, and avoiding pitfalls. In our churches it is easy to have adult volunteers serving with kids and students and think we are practicing this essential. Here are some questions we wrestled with to see how we were doing:

• Do we have groups or classrooms?
• Are children and students seeing the same leader every week?
• Do our leaders know the parents of our kids and students (and vice-versa)?
• Do our children and students miss their leader when they are not there?

We could not have said yes to many of those questions years ago. The reality is, switching to a model that elevates community and connects kids and students with specific leaders consistently is difficult. It requires more administrative work, more commitment from volunteers and more alignment throughout the church. However, in our experience, it’s all worth it. Everything you hear from Orange and at the Orange Conference about the benefits of elevating community is true.

Practically speaking, how have you elevated community? What barriers did you overcome?

It’s Orange Week again. It’s a time when I, along with a number of other people who serve in churches in family ministry, blog about past Orange Conference experiences and Orange strategy in general as we gear up for this year’s Orange Conference. In my posts this week I’m going to focus on the 5 Orange Essentials; what we’ve learned about them and how we’ve tried to implement them.

Essential Three – Reactivate the Family

Orange defines this essential as – Enlist parents to act as partners in the spiritual formation of their own children

This may be the most difficult essential to succeed at as a church. In some ways it is like trying to change an entire culture and mindset that has been place for a long time. Many parents in our churches agree with this and live it out. However, many of them do not live it out whether they agree with it or not. It is a challenge as a parent to be intentional about leading their own kids spiritually and therefore it is a challenge as a church to help them thrive in that role.

Family experiences like KidStuf are a great way to have a platform with parents and regularly talk to them about how they can participate in the spiritual formation of their own children. Our church has done KidStuf for 5 years and has also been exploring and will continue to explore other ways to partner with parents with the same goal in mind. We did a Parent & Small Group Leader Lunch event to help parents connect with their child’s small group leader. That was a huge success and we’ll do it regularly. We’re also planning some other events for families where we hope to have fun and equip parents at the same time.

Carey Nieuwhof said it well at the Orange Conference last year when he said “The script isn’t written yet” in regards to the best ways to partner with parents. He said we’re writing it. He’s right. That’s one of my favorite things about the Orange Conference, hearing about how other churches are writing the script.

How are you partnering with parents? What’s working? What isn’t?

It’s Orange Week again. It’s a time when I, along with a number of other people who serve in churches in family ministry, blog about past Orange Conference experiences and Orange strategy in general as we gear up for this year’s Orange Conference. In my posts this week I’m going to focus on the 5 Orange Essentials; what we’ve learned about them and how we’ve tried to implement them.

Essential Two – Refine the Message

Orange defines this essential as - Craft core truths into engaging, relevant and memorable experiences

At the core of this essential is the idea that we don’t have time to teach kids and students the entire Bible and the entire Bible is not equally relevant to their stage of life anyway. In addition, repeating content in fresh ways helps it stick. At our church we have partnered with Orange for our children’s curriculum from day one because they do a great job of creating content and supporting elements that are engaging, relevant and memorable. Our student ministry uses XP3 as well and supplements it with their own content to create different series.

One thing I have learned from practicing this essential is how true it is. We have seen the power of refining the message as children really do learn the basic truths and virtues we teach. One basic truth is “I need to make the wise choice”. We’ve seen time and time again how kids are actually thinking about that outside of church.

Something I’d like to try related to this essential is to have an extended series (maybe summer) devoted to helping kids engage with the Bible. The purpose would be to help them see the broad story of the Bible, learn how to read and interact with it, and understand some of the nuances that many adults could benefit from knowing. I think we assume the Bible is easier to understand than it really is, particularly when we truly value context when reading it.

How have you refined the message? Have you had any success with a Bible-type series with kids or students?

It’s Orange Week again. It’s a time when I, along with a number of other people who serve in churches in family ministry, blog about past Orange Conference experiences and Orange strategy in general as we gear up for this year’s Orange Conference. In my posts this week I’m going to focus on the 5 Orange Essentials; what we’ve learned about them and how we’ve tried to implement them.

Essential One – Integrate Strategy

Orange defines this essential as – Align church leaders and parents to lead with the same end in mind

Aligning parents and the church starts with having church leadership that is aligned. Our church recently took another step in this direction when we re-aligned our staff this past year. Our family ministry team meets weekly now and we use that time to share stories, look at the calendar, communicate, and learn together. I remember years ago hearing Reggie Joiner talk about the importance of meetings in integrating strategy. I’m weird because I typically love meetings, but most people don’t. Regardless, we have found it to be true that a regular team meeting is necessary in order to truly be aligned.

The Orange Leaders Handbook and Think Orange books (my links) remind us that it is easy to create this team. Somebody has to lead it, but that person does not have to be in a specific “Family Minister” or similar position. It does not have to be all staff either (ours isn’t). I would recommend meeting at least once a month as a team.

What is your family ministry team like? Do you need to create one?

The great team behind givingrocket.com, and soon-to-launch preachingrocket.com is putting on a free 3 hour training event for preachers, teachers and communicators on March 15 from 1-4PM EST. It’s an online event with some of the most influential preachers and communicators in the Church today. Get more information and sign up at PreachBetterSermons.com.

Don’t assume you have to be a preacher to benefit from this! If you communicate in any way, to any age group, this will be helpful. Like many of you who read this blog I spend the bulk of my time communicating to kids, students or volunteers and this free event will help us in those arenas as well.

Here’s who will be sharing:

• Andy Stanley
• Perry Noble
• Dr. Charles Stanley
• Louie Giglio
• Jeff Foxworthy
• Jud Wilhite
• Vanable Moody
• Jeff Henderson

I love that Jeff Foxworthy will be part of it. Comedians, more than most communicators, really have to captivate an audience and usually in a short amount of time.

Leadership development is critical to the growth of any organization, especially the church. In the church where volunteers make up the vast majority of “who gets it done” it is even more important, though often times neglected. As our church, children’s ministry and student ministry have grown the specific group of leaders I have sought to develop has changed but I’ve tried to remain intentional about investing in them. Below is a list of things I have done over the years with the various teams I have led to help them grow as servants, ministers and leaders. I hope some of these will be helpful to you and your team.

(Hint: Make sure you’re meeting regularly with a team of leaders and potential leaders)

• Have everyone on the team take a personality profile and go over the strengths/weaknesses of each profile and discuss as a group how knowing that can help you work better as a team.
• Have everyone complete a spiritual gifts inventory and discuss how every one’s gifts are being used or not, and what shifts need to happen to maximize strengths and delegate weaknesses.
• Listen to 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership Podcasts and discuss - itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-21-irrefutable-laws-leadership/id264791387
• Delegation
  • Make list of tasks you are responsible for.
  • Divide the list up between things only you can do, things others could do, and things you should stop doing.
  • Highlight tasks you love and tasks you hate to do.
  • Work on delegating things others could do and stopping things you don’t need to do.
  • Revisit the list in 3 months to see what everyone has delegated.
• What would be your one sentence job description? Discuss.
• Clarify the win for each environment and role within the environment.
• Discuss What Every Volunteer Needs resource from Willow Creek - www.willowcreek.com/wca_prod.asp?invtid=PR32892
• Read 5 Dysfunctions of a Team. Use the assessment to evaluate your team and employ the ideas from the end of the book (Overcoming each dysfunction) to work on them: www.tablegroup.com/dysfunctions/
• Read Death by Meeting and restructure your meetings to be more effective.
• Read Making Vision Stick, create a simple vision statement that is clear and compelling and create a system to help you cast it, repeat it, celebrate it and embrace it.
• Play Patrick Lencioni’s interview on the Catalyst Podcast about volunteers and discuss the relevance to your team.
• Draw up the organizational chart for every team and ministry you lead
  • Make note of the empty slots/roles that need to be filled.
  • Draw up what the organizational chart would need to look like if you doubled in size.
  • Use the future chart as a guide to know what you’re working toward.
• Listen to the Harvard Business Review Ideacast 8 – Leading Through Conflict. Is there conflict in your organization? How should you address it?
• Watch Systems: Liberating Your Organization as a team and discuss systems in your organization.
  • What behaviors/actions in your organization do you want to go away?
  • What behaviors/actions in your organization do you want to see more of?
  • Systems create behaviors – discuss the systems behind each of them and figure out how to celebrate them or change them.
• Read Tony Morgan’s post about Empowerment vs Delegation – how can you empower people on your team?
• Watch Trust vs Suspicion and discuss the level of trust in your organization.
  • Trust is built by keeping agreements?
  • What spoken agreements does your team have?
  • What unspoken agreements does your team have?
  • Of those agreements, which ones have been broken, resulting in the eroding of trust?
• Watch 5 Big Ideas for Church Leaders and discuss how those ideas relate to your context.
• Watch Becoming a Great Staff and talk about what your team can do (staff or volunteer) to become an even better team.
• Read Tony Morgan’s ebooks and talk about how to implement those teachings and systems in your context.
• Listen to any Catalyst Podcast and discuss as a team.
• Watch this video called Bookie by Craig Groeschel. It’s taking risks and failing forward. Discuss the risks your team has taken and whether or not failure is okay in the culture you’ve created.
• Andy Stanley teaches that 3 keys to an irresistible environment include:
  • Helpful content
  • Engaging presentation
  • Appealing context
  • Which one are you best at? Worst at? What can you do to make sure all 3 are present in every ministry environment you lead?
• Read about the 4 Stages of Leadership on Tony Morgan’s blog. What stage are you and your team leading from?
• Use the Jim Collins Diagnostic Tool to evaluate your team and figure out how you can go from Good to Great (my link).
• Listen to this interview with Erwin McManus and discuss.
• Read this post from the 99% about Creativity, Routines, Systems and Spontaneity and discuss.
• What are our organizational assumptions as it relates to our ministry, team and “customers”? What decisions are we making off of those assumptions? Assumptions could be that parents need help raising their kids in faith, people like singing to worship God, people won’t show up on time, or that most people in our church are reading the Bible for themselves.r
• Read this post about What Motivates You and Your Team, watch the linked video, and discuss how you’re providing the things people want when they serve on your team (paid or volunteer).
• Watch the Upside of Tension. Talk about tensions (not problems) that exist in your ministry and how you’re currently managing them. What needs to change? What are you treating as a problem to be solved when it’s really a tension to be managed?
• Visit another church as a team to learn from them.

What have you used? Any chance you could post a list of things you’ve done and link it here in the comments?

LifeChurch.tv has created some amazing free products in the digital realm for Christians and churches to use. Those products include:

• YouVersion
• Open Free Church Resources
• Church Metrics
• Video Teaching
• Babel With Me

On January 9 they will launch another product designed to help churches have online services – Church Online - churchonline.org/.

LifeChurch.tv was not the first to have services online but they took it to another level and have helped tons of other churches move online as well. I love their innovation and heart for the local church. If your church has thought about streaming services online you’ll want to head to the site and sign up to receive more information.

At our church we believe strong biblical teaching is critical for every age group. In our children’s ministry and student ministry we have volunteers teaching often. Sometimes they’re writing their own messages with help from our ministry staff and other times they’re teaching a script provided by our curriculum. I think it’s important to train and equip them to become the best teachers they can be. Even truly gifted teachers need to learn and grow to use their gift well.

Our middle school environment, EPiC, is one place where volunteers get to teach from the Bible and typically write their own messages. In order to help train and equip those teachers we recently had a quick 3-week group designed to help them learn about preaching and teaching. Our plan was simple:

Week 1 – Read chapters 11-14 of Communicating for a Change (my link) and be prepared to discuss.

Week 2 – Read chapters 15-17, conclusion and Q&A of Communicating for a Change and be prepared to discuss. We also used what we learned to help brainstorm for a message that was going to be taught that week.

Week 3 – Our senior pastor came and shared his thoughts and lessons learned on teaching and preaching.

We met for 2 hours each time and grew a lot in just 3 short weeks. If we had more time we would have read the entire book. We plan to do groups like this regularly and use different sources for information and even focus on different aspects of good preaching and teaching.

How do you train your teachers/communicators?

The Harvard Business Review Ideacast is a great resource for any leader. I’ve shared some of the podcasts with our team and I enjoy the blog as well. A recent post in the HBR Blog Network was entitled The Trouble With Bright Kids.

In that post, Heidi Grant Halvorson goes on to basically state that smart kids who are praised for their intelligence may incorrectly believe their abilities are set in stone and cannot be changed and will subsequently give up easier when facing failure. On the other hand, kids who are praised for their effort were more willing to push through failures and challenges and work harder to achieve the goal. They study they did was simple but if their analysis is even slightly on point, it’s a big deal. Halvorson says:

“The kind of feedback we get from parents and teachers as young children has a major impact on the implicit beliefs we develop about our abilities — including whether we see them as innate and unchangeable, or as capable of developing through effort and practice.”

Of course my mind goes first to how this relates to kids as they seek to learn about and follow Jesus. At its core Christianity is about being saved from our sin, our mistakes and ourselves. It’s about getting second, third, fourth and one millionth chances. It’s about being willing to take risks and get up after failure. Peter made the biggest mistakes, was admonished multiple times, and was rewarded with great authority and responsibility.

I hope in our families, churches and schools we will communicate to kids and students that they are not stuck. I hope they believe that hard work and persistence matters. I don’t believe that kids can do or be anything they want. But I firmly believe they can become who God desires them to be and do anything God calls them to do and that is far greater than anything they can imagine for themselves.

Your thoughts?

On Monday I posted Barna’s new insights into why people leave the Church after high school or college. Here I’ll share some highlights from Barna’s prior research about whether or not having kids leads parents to get more involved in church.

It is fairly common in church settings to assume that people would be more likely to get involved in church after having children. The thinking is that parents will in the very least want their kids to grow up with strong morals and the Church is a place to help them do that. If they do believe in God and Jesus, they may think it is important for their kids to believe the same, even if they don’t live like they believe themselves.

Here are some of Barna’s findings:

• 50% of parents said having children had no influence on their church involvement
• 17% of parents said having children helped them reconnect to the church after not attending
• 20% of parents said having children encouraged them to get even more involved
• 4% of parents said having children decreased their involvement in church
• 5% of parents said having children led them to get involved in church for the first time

While the majority of parents do not get move involved in church after having kids, the 42% who do represent a lot of people and my hope is that our churches are equipped to help them get connected, involved and invested in the church. More importantly, I hope we can lead them to Jesus and help them lead their kids to do the same.

H