Bill Hybels & Richard Curtis

In watching Bill Hybels interview with Richard Curtis I felt very motivated and inspired to help the poor. Oftentimes we get so caught up in our own ministry and forget about the desperate need of people all over the world who could use some the excess that we have been blessed with here in America. The story of Richard Curtis ought to put many of us Christians to shame because of how much more he is doing for hurting people when we ourselves are sitting on the sidelines. Richard Curtis chooses to bring hope to people in his movies in a world and box office where people would consider that foolish. He also chooses to use his ability of producing great movies to bring awareness to the problems that are evident in Africa and other countries in need. Without having a relationship with Christ he still finds it to be a great enough need and problem that he is willing to use his talents to the best of his abilities to make a change in the world. I think we can all learn from Richard Curtis’ tenacity in helping the poor and providing hope to people. I also think Bill Hybels should be applauded for taking a step out into the world and hosting this leadership summit so that the world can see and meet great leaders like this.

Final Class Project - Small Groups for a Semester

When looking at the list of class project options immediately I chose the small group option because it was something that I had already started from a previous semester so I figured it would be nice to document the life of the small group. The group consisted of a group of gentlemen who lived on my floor last year and they wanted to continue the group again so I agreed to lead it again. Our starting number was five members last semester and it grew to nine by the end of last semester. This year we started off again with even less because a group of guys from our floor moved to a different building. So I was forced to start over with a new group of guys who were new to the school and new to my style of teaching. At the first floor meeting of the semester I announced it to the floor that we would hold bible study every Thursday evening and we kicked off the small group with a six people. As a group we decided we would go through the book of Romans because we could almost do one chapter per week and we would try to have a meal together each week so it wasn’t simply a group to study the bible but a group who hung out together. The next week some of the guys from last year returned to group, which created an interesting atmosphere. The group I was with last year was very familiar with me as I was with them and because of it we were able to be more open and blunt about our understanding of the text and how it applied to our lives. This new group was not ready for this openness and therefore it created tension. Also, because we already had many connections with each other there were jokes and things from last year that they didn’t understand. Therefore, I had to find a middle ground, which would allow the freshmen newcomers to understand what we were talking about while at the same time keeping the old members interested and satisfied. I did this by shifting the way I taught so that fifty percent of the time I would be speaking to a level that the freshmen could understand and the other fifty I would dive deeper theologically in order to please the more mature in the group. This worked out well because both groups came back in the weeks to follow. We continued strong throughout the first few weeks of school because everyone had the ambition that comes with starting a new semester but after a while this dedication wore off and some of the people did not come back to the small group. I understand this is hard to do with a group of college students who are busy with schoolwork, extra-curricular activities, and employment for them to make time to come to small group. Another difficulty that I found was that it was hard to get in contact with everyone and to remind them about small groups. Each week I would send a mass text message to those who would normally come but I wouldn’t pursue them any more than that because I didn’t want them to feel guilty about not being able to come because I know how hard it is when you feel pressured to come to an event when there are a million things going on. On the contrary, I think they may have needed more reminders because they often would tell me that they forgot. Moving on to a lighter note, as a group we were able to battle with the tough questions of our faith and the particulars of certain passages of scripture. For example, when we dealt with the passage in Romans dealing with the Holy Spirit interceding with us some of us in the room had different views on whether or not this passage implied tongues or not. This sparked a long conversation about each of our experiences with tongues and therefore allowed a lot of healing to go on for those who had bad experiences with people misusing the baptism of the Holy Spirit. It was things like this, which helped me to continue to lead the small group even when I was tired. One of things I was most proud of was creating an atmosphere where all questions were fair game. The guys in the group found that it was rare that they were in an environment where people allowed questioning of the Holy Bible and therefore jumped at the chance to ask any question. I made sure to tell them that I wasn’t the be all and end all for their questions because I am still young and dumb but I did take some classes and I know where we could find information so we could look for it together. It felt good to have a group of guys that were younger than me who felt close enough to ask me for my opinion on things and knew that I wouldn’t act like I had all the answers. Each week we continued to look in the scriptures we continued to talk and ask questions which often led to tangents but were good for our spiritual health. I realized that it wasn’t the curriculum that was what impacted people’s lives the most it was how we decided to dialogue about it and help each other learn and apply it to our own lives. Maybe learning doesn’t happen best in lecture settings but discussion and application. Regardless I learned that I definitely want to be in a small group for the rest of my life because it really changes people’s lives. Amongst the many victories that we had one of the biggest failures that I realized which I am now trying to correct is how the small group is dependent on me. During certain weeks I was away on Thursdays and could not conduct small group. I urged the group to continue to meet but they did not while I was away. Now that graduation is upon me in two weeks I am trying to get more people to lead the final meetings of our small group in order that they become used to a new leader. Overall, I loved the small group experience and this assignment really opened up my eyes to things I need to do better and things I want to continue to do.

David Kim @ Penn-Del Church Planters Bootcamp

During this church planting boot camp there has been a large amount of information that we have been doing our best to capture. Among this plethora of information David Kim came and spoke to us about recruiting people to join our launch teams as church planters. He was very insightful as to how to we ought to target our specific people who we would choose for our team. I enjoyed the method that him and Dr. McNaughton tag-team explained about allowing them to join the vision in doing something they are passionate about rather than assigning them a role that you need filled. By allowing them to join the vision they aren’t doing something just because they are asked, instead because of their passion they would do everything in their power to do the job because they love it. Also, I like what David said about hiring people that complement your work structure. By hiring people who have strengths in your greatest area of need it creates an environment for the most productivity. Another interesting tidbit that Dr. McNaughton shared was that when asking people to join that we be specific about the roles we want them to fulfill because they may want to take on more responsibility than they were asked to. Lastly, I found it very helpful that they gave a process to getting people on board with steps like being realistic about what is expected and showing them how they are needed to meet a specific need.

Mrs. Anderson

There is a very efficient way to go about discipling new guests in a church and I think Mrs. Anderson has found out how to do it. In her system, she has a method to make sure those who are new guests in her church have a point of connection. From the point that they walk in the door to two weeks after their first experience at the church. This is all a lot of work but it is possible through her coordination of volunteers which she strategically and precisely organizes. She mentioned that she has about 100 volunteers to help her in her ministry alone which is a decent amount of help. Mrs. Anderson makes sure that there is a person there at the church to make each new person feel welcome and accepted. There is a lot of literature that the church provides for the people and a lot of things for them to fill out which makes me a little anxious because in the hustle and bustle of these days it is hard to get people to sit and fill things out. Regardless, they are doing a good job at Christian Life Assembly of getting people connected there and getting them to serve. I wish I had more time to ask her about what the process for selecting volunteers and screening them is but I imagine they have that process figured out.

Deb Bube

I wish every church had the ministry of someone like Deb Bube. Her ministry focuses on organizing volunteers and setting up the creative aspects of the churches services. To be honest when she first mentioned her title I had no idea what she did because I had never heard of that being a part of church ministry before. After she went into detail about what she did I found how necessary her ministry is to a church of that size. I really enjoyed how she presented her coordination of volunteers. Her ministry not only organizes the church but it disciples believers who are looking to use their gifts for the kingdom of God. Her ministry enables them to find outlets for them to use their gifts. This helps the church to use their disciples effectively. I really liked the way she showed us how she plans each year using planning center and mindjet. I had no idea that a church could plan that far ahead but she makes it so easy and effective that I would really like to emulate that in the future. Also, one of the biggest things that impacted me was what she said about how people cant remember 52 different things each year to change their life but they might be able to remember 10 or 12 so if we preach series people can grasp the things that are expressed in the message. And this type of preaching comes with strategic planning. Lastly, I think it was important what she did to make sure that everything ties into what the sermon idea is from the announcements to what is in the church foyer everything plays into what the message is. Deb has a lot of focus and knows how to employ that for the good of the kingdom.

Not Every Church Disciples like I do (Discipleship Interviews)

During my interviews today with the members of Freehold 1^st Assembly of God in New Jersey I was able to glean many things from their methods of discipleship. Though at the varying levels of leadership there are different ideas of how discipleship should be done there is still an overall urgency for the need of committed and discipled believers. In the overall leadership when I interviewed the lead pastor I learned that he was looking to make the church the central locus for discipleship by bringing the people into the church and equipping them with the tools necessary for them to be discipled. He provides classes and various ministries where people can get involved in order that they become discipled by being involved in the church ministries. He does not publically advertise small groups but believes that during his sermons he is able to provide the congregation with the necessary tools that they can take home and develop themselves. I think it is interesting to make the church the locus of people’s discipleship experience being that it is where they only spend approximately 3 hours per week. Also, I asked about the size of their congregation and the percentage of people who are attending the classes or involved in the men’s or women’s ministry; and the number wasn’t too high. Thus, there seems to be a gap in the people who are getting discipled on just Sundays and those who are delving deeper into the church community. This opinion changed from the position of lead pastor to that of youth pastor who had a different view. He believes that in the small group setting they are able to break down biblical content amongst groups of friends and peers who would have similar input and struggles. Again, there is no commitment to regular small group meetings but there is at least monthly youth meetings in which the students are broken down into small groups to discuss some material that the whole youth group is discussing. This approach seems better because it allows the youth to break down the hard concepts on their own thus making them less dependent on the church to spoon feed them biblical truth. There is also a 8-week long discipleship class which the youth are able to undergo which would teach them certain biblical principles so that they can process them by themselves. This takes place during the summer time, which often creates a problem because students during the summer time do now want to spend a lot of time in a class learning. Therefore if small groups become an atmosphere where people can enjoy themselves in the presence of other believers who are struggling with the same problems as ourselves then we will not only learn from each other, but we will feel comfortable and grow in relationship with each other. It seems that the struggle with this method and the centralized church group method as mentioned by both pastors is how to get people interested in participating because if it is organized by the church and forced it tends to be less organic and more of an obligation. It seems that the ideas of discipleship that are shared by the lead and youth pastor that discipleship is maturing Christians to walk like Christ are not necessarily captured by the people in the congregation. When I spoke with a regular member of the congregation who has attended for six years they described discipleship as the things that they learn on Sunday morning that make them a better person. When I gave them my input as to how I saw discipleship as helping people know Christ in a more real way so that they can better emulate his characteristics there seemed to be a disconnect because of never getting a true definition of discipleship. Overall, the people of the church are learning how to better themselves and things that are pleasing to God but they aren’t connecting them to Jesus Christ who walked the earth in the flesh nearly 2,000 years ago.

Dave Barnett

There are few people who are willing to walk the path that Pastor Dave Barnett has chosen to walk. In a world that likes shallow church community in which people within the church walls barely bump shoulders with one another. Pastor Barnett has made it his mission to be missional small group pastor who goes out and through his small groups have “skin to skin contact” in which people are deeply involved in one another’s lives. In doing this he creates deep relational change in which people are able to disciple one another through iron sharpening iron tactics. The only frightful aspect of this type of ministry is that it strays away from our typical setting in which we picture church occurring. Therefore, certain things like tithing and organized ministry are hard to “patrol” and monitor through an overseeing leadership. As a result, Pastor Barnett may not know where his paycheck is coming week to week because the tithing structure of a church is not done in the same matter. He requires a leaning on the Holy Spirit that all of our Pentecostal brothers ought to learn from. Often times because of our scars left by our bad “Holy Spirit experiences” we are fearful to allow the Holy Spirit to intervene in our ministries but Pastor Dave Barnett has allowed the Holy Spirit to take precedence in his ministry.

Steve DeFrain & Don Heller

When I see the ministry that Steve DeFrain is doing I see a hometown hero for us students at Valley Forge because he is doing exactly what we are learning about in our discipleship classes and fleshing it out in real life. Steve is reaching the people who our “comfortable” are afraid to reach and put in their buildings. Thanks to the transparency of Don Heller he was able to allow us into the life of someone who God grabs a hold of and changes for his purposes. Don was known as a rough and rowdy guy but through God’s grace and the service of Steve he as changed and is now the campus pastor at their churches new plant in Phoenixville. That is the exact style of ministry that Jesus did when he took fishermen and tax collectors and through his love and care was able to rehabilitate them to good standing with God then turn them into ministers themselves. I loved Steve and Don’s commitment to lifting up Jesus above all things and being a light to the darkness. In a world that curses darkness rather then illuminate it Steve and Don enter the darkness to be a light for Jesus. I especially liked their take on them having 52 super bowls and how every Sunday is a big day for them and how their main goal is to get unsaved people to know Christ. Also, I think Don showed us how the local church ought to be a place of rehabilitation he summed it up in one quote, “Jesus saved my soul, but Journey Church saved my life.” I think if other churches could show this same commitment to bringing people to Christ we would go a long way.

Andy Stanley

In the realm of vision casting Andy Stanley is well known for his ability of defining and propagating his vision so that people will embrace and own the vision he sets out for his congregation. In his appearance in the 2003 Willow Creek Leadership Summit Andy Stanley left his viewers with three principles that ill help them to get their vision to “stick”. Meaning to get people to be willing to change and take part of the vision. He said that first we ought to cast our vision strategically. He made this point that we ought to be careful with plans and strategies because they ought to be able to change but rather the vision is only refined and does not get thrown out when a plan or strategy goes wrong. Another important aspect that he said was to celebrate vision. Part of getting vision to stick with people is getting them to enjoy the victories of achieving their vision. For example, in a church that pushes discipleship when there is an example of someone achieving the vision the congregation should celebrate so they can see what it looks like when someone achieves the vision. The last point he makes is that we ought to live the vision out. What he means is that our lives ought to not only sell the vision but be a representation of that vision with hands and feet so that people can follow it. I think his methods are very useful and I will implement them into my future ministry because it will help me to stay focused and direct in my mission.

Jess Bousa

The story of Jess Bousa is very motivating and inspirational. Within a few years he went from drug addiction to authoring a book on discipleship. His life is a testimony to how God takes a hold of one’s life and molds it for the use of the kingdom. I liked his ideas on how to plant a church through the means of a non-profit organization. His method creates in roads into the community by allowing people to know Jess and through their relationship he can lead them to a relationship with Christ first through his lifestyle then through conversation. I also admire his willingness to invest in the lives of those who aren’t interested in Christ. He is able to create relationships through being the nicest person the people of Bel-Air have ever met. I am very interested in the method that he uses for small groups. Many small group mentalities have stemmed from an idea of having a group of people from 3-10 in which discipleship is supposed to stem. Jess continues this idea by saying that Jesus mentored in a group of three which he used to change the world because he poured into them. Therefore, as Christians we should take a small group where we can find it easier to be accountable and truthful with. Another very practical step that he put into my mind for the future was the idea of setting time limits for classes for small groups because people don’t want to commit to things indefinitely. With that in mind he uses Nelson Searcy’s idea that a group should study together for 6 weeks, play together 1 week, then serve together 1 week. I think Jess Bousa is truly seeing ministry through Jesus’ perspective and staying relevant to today’s culture.

Portrait of the disciple Andrew by Andrew

I am Andrew a fisherman from Galilee. I am the brother of Simon Peter disciple of the great Jesus Christ savior of the whole world. Christ found me as I was casting my net with my brother and he told us to follow him and he would make us “fishers of men”. My entire life I had not been of tremendous value to the religious portion of my society. I was not one of the chosen few who was allowed to continue in the ways of the Rabbis. No, I took on the family business and became a fisherman. In a world that would consider me worthless Jesus saw me as someone worth turning into a disciple. There was something about him that I knew I couldn’t resist when he called me. It was as if I knew I were going to be a part of something greater from the moment he said my name. I had no idea what fishing for men meant but the Christ promised he would make me one and now I am bringing people to the gospel changing truth which is through Jesus. This concept of being a disciple was not new to me since I had spent time following John the Baptist who always told us about one greater than he coming who would save the Jews. I was used to following John’s teaching, though his ways of life were rather eccentric, and it caused me to have an expectancy for the Christ to come. Once he did come it was like my expectant heart was ready for the truth of the gospel and I was open to hear more. When John the Baptist pointed out the Jesus Christ was the savior of the world I instantly called my brother to come and join me to follow him because I didn’t want him to miss out on the opportunity of following the messiah. Some people even credit me with being the first one to use the name Messiah for Jesus Christ. When I think about who Jesus discipled me I think about how Jesus took me from a life that would have been seen as worthless and used me to change the world. He spent time with me and was willing to choose me as a disciple even though I wasn’t a religious person. But because he took time and cared I was willing to change my whole life to follow him. Another aspect which was important was Jesus was willing to spend time with me in a more intimate setting with less people. Jesus simply didn’t preach to me along with the thousands who followed but he chose me to be one of the twelve. He was even willing to bring me into a smaller group with James, John, and Peter when we were on the side of the Mount of Olives outside the city. In that setting, he proved to us that he was didn’t consider our questions and disbelief as a negative but rather he encouraged us and answered the questions which plagued our minds. Throughout my entire life I had not felt an atmosphere created with someone in which I didn’t feel judged not only for my lifestyle but for my questioning. Jesus made me feel comfortable to share with him my questions and he cared about me. Even when I doubted Jesus when I brought told him that all we had were a few fish, he was willing to show me that he is sovereign. Thus, my experience as a disciple of Christ was amazing because not only did he choose me when I was seen as insignificant in the world, but he was willing to have more intimate conversations with me and address my doubt and misunderstanding without judging me. Because of the great impact that Jesus had upon my life through our friendship and discipleship, I have been accredited with being the disciple who is known for always bringing someone to Jesus. Jesus not only trained me how to follow him but then gave me motivation to go out and make more followers of Christ. I guess this is what it means to be a fisher of men, to realize that life without Christ is meaningless and through relationship we become those who want to bring more people into that meaning. Even after his death, Christ showed used us to bring more people into relationship with him and proved himself to us. Christ never forgot about us even though he wasn’t walking with us physically like he did previously but he sent us the Holy Spirit. Thus, a good disciple maker never abandons those he disciples. This relationship has changed my life because of the realness of Christ and how he loved me regardless of my faults.

Marcus Buckingham

Marcus Buckingham in a world that focuses on people learning how to work to fix their weaknesses we encounter a method that attempts to have people use their strengths to succeed. In my own life I am one who always spent my time trying to cater to my weaknesses. But in realizing that if I work towards my strengths I can achieve more. The idea of managing around weaknesses is very interesting because it almost poses one’s weaknesses as something that will never change. This is hard for me to swallow because I do not like giving up on things and it seems like “managing” around my weaknesses means giving up. I think Marcus explained this well when he said understand your strengths and use that to overcome your weaknesses. By use of my strengths I can learn how to cope with my weaknesses. Also, I found it interesting what he said about how we in the United States learn about things by studying the bad in attempts to get the good. One of the best things Marcus said was that you learn excellence by studying excellence. Though I think it its still good to keep in mind the things that may cause one to fail, I like the concept of focusing on one’s strengths in order to succeed in the arenas one knows they can. For example, I know I am not good at soccer so I am not going to try to become a soccer player but I would use my passion for something like construction and use that to play soccer if I need to. Overall, I think Buckingham’s method is very useful and I would like to incorporate it into my future ministry.

Bob Hewlett

One who is seeking to make an impact for the kingdom must be willing to take one many shapes and sizes in order to reach lost people; that is one of the many things I have learned from Bob Hewlett during our interview in class. Bob is a very systematic man who has a set way of doing thing and he does them very well. I thought it was interesting that he uses the method of service to local schools, businesses, groups, and places in order to provide them with an open door to church. In a world who doesn’t know who Jesus is Bob is providing services to the community in a way that puts money where the church’s mouth is. Christians in this generation are charged with the crime of hypocrisy because we speak so much about helping people but never act upon it. Bob is doing this and it makes a lot of sense when you think about planning your resources so they help the non-Christian world to see a better picture of Christ and to also provide them with love and service that they find easy to connect to. Overall, I enjoyed his interaction with our questions and I hope his church is a success in the Downingtown area. I believe it takes his passion combined with a mentality that is open for adaption in conjunction with a heart after Jesus and that creates a successful church plant. 

Daniel McNaughton

Daniel McNaughton spoke from his heart in our last class. He gave us insight into his life which have truly shaped and molded him to become the leader he is today. He spoke to us about his early life and how his questioning of faith drew him away from Christ because people were not able to answer his questioning. As a student today at Valley Forge Christian College this makes me appreciative of my education but at the same time causes me to think again about what I am learning. I have dealt with people who have questions about the Christian faith and because of this I have studied in this area but what about the rest of the students who are not learning this information. This is my final semester at Valley Forge and I cant recall many times when we answered those tough questions like “how do we know our bible is truly God’s word?” and “how do we know that our God is the right God amongst a world that provides many other options?”  It is these questions that our generation is asking but we remain silent in these issues. This seemed to make Dr. McNaughton take a different route in learning how to make disciples and I love his enthusiasm for making followers of Christ. This passion has stirred me to long for a better approach to making a follower of Christ who is able to answer those tough questions that people are asking. Also, I like how Dr. McNaughton dealt with connecting people. In many ways that people often think of he is focusing on connecting people. Even with the groups of people he finds to have the same evangelism focus he would choose to disciple them together. It seems that discipleship occurs in community and therefore it would be beneficial to create genuine community between people before discipling them. If a group of people or pair of people has the ability to be open and loving with one another imagine how much growth can occur. I loved how the 7 attributes have become a major part of the church’s focus on discipleship because it has a biblical base with a culturally relevant and easily applicable method. Thus, this makes it highly useful and manageable. 

Tom Rees

During Jesus’ ministry on earth he was about one thing, making disciples. As Christians, our greatest calling is to do the same and bring people into connection with Christ. The operative word being connection, and when learning how to disciple people into a closer relationship with God connection is required in order to get people to a point of greater desire for Christ. In class this evening, Tom mentioned that having multiple connection points is the greatest way to get people to be discipled. By having multiple points where someone can find a spiritual mentor is very important in order for a church to teach people to be like Christ. Tom also said that small groups are the biggest help for getting people to grow as a disciple. As someone looking to pursue full-time ministry we often get into the trap that we ought to lead the small groups and we never become members a small group ourselves. When we do this we don’t allow for growth to happen in our lives without that connection that we so eagerly advertise for other people. Obviously this is dealing with taking someone of a less committed level and bringing them a level in which they desire to know more. But how do we implement this change in a society of consumers who want a religion tailored to their needs. As church planters, pastors, and church-goers we have to learn how to bring people from the consumer level to the committed disciple level. Therefore, we have to learn methods, which attract people at the consumer level (lights, contemporary music styles, food) and bring them to a place where they can be taught deeper theological ideas in order to understand God better (small groups, classes, ministries). Overall, I am learning more and more how my experiences develop my ministry style and how God uses our own experiences in order to shape how we treat and teach people.