Cultivating a Healthy Team Culture.
"You yourselves know how I lived among you the whole time from the first day that I set foot in Asia." - Acts 20:18
Leading a healthy team requires living in healthy relationship with the people on your team.
When the Apostle Paul met with the Ephesian Elders in Acts 20 he was able to speak out of the depth of the relationship he had built with them. Paul was not the kind of leader that barked orders out of isolation, but a pastor who "lived among" his people.
Unfortunately, many of us are trying to lead teams in the absence of any real relationship.
No More Harboring Hurt
Horrible things happen when you hold on to something longer than you should. Think about when you had roommates. Maybe roommates are a reality for you right now. If so, this will be especially timely for you.
When you have roommates, few things pose a greater risk to your well-being than “mystery milk” in the fridge. Mystery milk is that carton that sits in the way-back of the refrigerator, typically behind the OJ, purple stuff, soda, and Sunny D. No one ever seems certain where the mystery milk came from or how long it’s been sitting there.
Now, when you’re young and poor, you don’t so much go by the expiration date as you do by the smell and consistency of your milk. This system, while effective, is admittedly risky, right? As a result, any consumption of milk when you live with roommates requires the universally agreed-upon test. This test has two steps:
The Lost Art Of Listening
Listening is a lost art. We love to talk, tweet, and tell everyone what we think about everything, but if you’re like me, you find listening difficult.
3 Types of Elder Meetings
Being a pastor involves a vast number of meetings. Pastoral counseling, church discipline, membership interviews, and meetings with other area pastors all consume a tremendous portion of a pastor's time. In addition to all the meetings already mentioned, the pastoral teams of each local church meet together on a regular basis. Growing up in the Church, I know that not all these meetings are created equal.