We recently released our first worship album at Fusion Church.  The goal was to give a gift of worship to the people of our church and I couldn’t be more pleased with how the album turned out.  I’m very proud of our worship band and production team.  The did a great job in every way and it shows in the final product.  They also did it all with the right attitudes and motives and that shines through too as you listen to the songs.

We’ve also had a strong desire from the beginning of this project to bless other churches as well so we’re making one of our original songs available here for other pastors.  It’s our hope that this song will help you and your church draw closer to God as you worship Him.  The song is called You Alone and it’s already a favorite at our church.

You Alone (MP3)
You Alone (Chart)

The full album is available on iTunes, Amazon MP3, and Spotify.

People and organizations tend to look for three elements when looking for a potential leader.  They look for things like great intelligence, powerful presentation skills or even a certain style or look.  How does he look?  How does he sound or come across?  Does he seem to know what he’s talking about?  This is how they measure candidates and, to some extent, the world around them.

God looks for other things when He is choosing potential leaders.  He looks for things like devotion, faithfulness and, most importantly, compassion.

The good news is that if you aren’t particularly brilliant or eloquent or stylish there’s still hope for you to be used in a mighty way by the Lord.  Others may write you off because you don’t stand out in some way that they can see but your real potential is still there.  It’s found in the Lord.

Don’t invest vital energy and effort into winning over those that merely look at externals.  Instead, devote yourself to the Lord.  Stand faithfully with Him through all the seasons of your life.  And, above all else, love Him and others with abandon.  If you do, God will most certainly notice and He will use you in amazing ways.  You will also be fulfilled.

But the LORD said to Samuel, “Don’t look at how handsome Eliab is or how tall he is, because I have not chosen him. God does not see the same way people see. People look at the outside of a person, but the LORD looks at the heart.“ 1 Samuel 16:7 (NCV)

I’ve got some advice for all aspiring church planters. Are you ready? Here goes. If you can do anything else, do that instead.

When we think of things that a pastor has to have to be successful and effective in ministry, we are often tempted to list things like equipment, finances, and certain staff members. While all of these things are very important they are meaningless unless a pastor has three critical elements in his heart.

I wish I could tell you that once your discover God’s calling and purpose for your life that the heavens will open and everything will just fall into place but I can’t. The truth is that you have to fight for it. You have to…

Here’s the deal.  Not everything God says to you needs to be blogged or tweeted or taught.  Sometimes God wants to share something with just you and that’s okay. 

Maybe I’m wrong but it seems to me that when pastors get together most of the time there’s a lot of needless posturing going on.  Everyone starts talking about their next AMAZING series or their OUT OF THIS WORLD event or their GRAND SLAM Sunday service.  If you were an outsider listening in you’d think that no church or pastor ever experienced anything less than the over-the-top, super incredible and amazing.

I think this is not only disingenuous but it’s also harmful.  It places unreal expectations on everyone and doesn’t allow room for pastors to be real with each other.  That in turn kills true fellowship and prevents pastors from genuinely helping and encouraging each other.

I just want to say to all the pastors out there that it’s okay.  You’re allowed to have a less than stellar Sunday, series idea, message,  or event.  You don’t have to pretend you’re hitting home runs every time you come to the plate.  There are respectable singles and doubles and triples in this game.

In general, I think that when people get real they tend to become far more effective.  I hope that, as pastors, we will all strive to become more of both in our dealings with each other.

Pastor Steven Furtick shared his “pregame” ritual this week during his preaching marathon. I thought I would share with you guys what I pray every Sunday before I preach. It varies a little but it goes something like this…

When I first seriously started thinking about re-entering the ministry, I found an amazing website where pastors were sharing information, and their lives, with one another.  The site was just for pastors and it allowed them to “talk shop” as well as help each other in every way possible.  Advice and support was always readily available because of this great site.

Sadly, two things came and ruined the site.  First, blogging took off and a lot of the great folks on the site stopped sharing there and started only posting on their blogs.  Secondly, an more disastrously, a bunch of what I can only describe as “bozos” found the site and started arguing with everyone about everything.  Soon, the noise level totally consumed what little signal was left and the usefulness of the site was lost forever.  I often miss the information and community that was found on that site and I’m wondering if other pastors would be interested in trying to start something like it up again.

I envision a place that’s only for pastors (and possibly church planters).  Every person that wanted to join the site would be verified in some way.  Beyond that, the site would be private.  No search engines would be allowed to comb the site and all content would be secured “behind the wall” so that pastors could talk freely and openly about everything they’re thinking and feeling.  Like a small group, everyone that joined the site would abide by the “vegas rule” in others words what happens on the site, stays on the site.

Now, obviously, for something like this to really work it has to reach a bit of a critical mass.  There has to be a group of pastors that would be willing to use the site frequently and contribute to the discussions going on there.  I honestly don’t know if I have enough pastoral connections to make something like this happen but I sure want to try.

So, pastors, are you interested in something like this?  Would you participate in a private, bozo-free, online community of like-minded pastors?  If so, please head over to a new site I’ve been kicking around at ChurchLeaders.co and submit your email address on the coming soon page.  (Please note that the URL is not a dot COM but dot CO because the M in dot com is for mediocrity.)  If I get a good enough response to give this thing a whirl then I’ll finish the site, launch it and invite every pastor that signed up for a beta test.

Perhaps I’m off base here but I think something like this is needed.  I guess that, in the end, you guys will be the judge of whether or not that’s true.  Please sign up if you’re interested and please spread the word to others you think might want to join the experiment.  Thanks.

I’ve really been going through something lately and I feel like I need to document it a bit here for others pastors and perhaps just for myself. So, here goes…