At the end of this session, participants will be able to:

·         describe the privilege and responsibility of leadership

·         evaluate current church mission statement and discuss possible revisions

·         describe and discuss Asset Based Community Development and Appreciative Inquiry

Devotional

Sing:  Lead me Lord. http://www.hymnsite.com/lyrics/umh473.sht

Read: Matt 25:31-46 The Judgment of Nations http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+25%3A31%2D46&version=NIV

Pray: For the Spirit of Truth #597 The United Methodist Hymnal

From the cowardice that dares not face new truths,

From laziness that is contented with half-truths,

From the arrogance that thinks it knows all truths,

Good Lord, deliver us.  Amen

Setting Priorities

Purposeful leadership requires the setting of priorities.

How should we set these priorities?

What standards should we use?

What are the guiding principles?

Read from The 2008 Book of Discipline, paragraphs 131 and 132, Servant Ministry and Servant Leadership. http://umcneb.org/media/2008BookOfDisciplinePDFS/CONS001936QK004001A.pdf

Are you  living a mission of active expectancy? What are the barriers or dampers to feeling this way?

Remembering and acting on ALL the paragraphs of The Book of Discipline, as well as the scripture passages, will guide you in the setting of priorities within a framework of team leadership at your home church.

Assessing Your Leadership and Mission

Use SWOT to analyze your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats.

You can also use ABCD- Asset Based Community Development:

This is an approach based on the principles of:

·         Appreciating and encouraging individual and congregational talents, skills and, abilities instead of focusing on problems and needs.

·         Congregation-driven development and response rather than situational driven by external reasons.

·         Utilizing Appreciative Inquiry in identifying and analyzing the congregation’s past successes to

·         strengthen member’s confidence, inspiring them to take action.

·         Focusing on the power of relationships.

Appreciative Inquiry

Appreciative Inquiry approaches all situations with unconditionally positive questions that address the difficult and sometimes tedious task of visioning and responding by employing imagination and innovation. Instead of a common climate of negativism, criticism, and downward spiraling dialog, there is one of discovery, dreaming, and constructive conversation. Appreciative Inquiry involves discovery of what gives ―life‖ (the power of the Holy Spirit) to a living system (the church) when it is most alive and most effective (in ministry). It uses holistic methods to examine the links between the closed system and the surrounding community.

1. Members of the congregation individually bear the collective memory and tradition of the church family, its history, its struggles, and its successes. This is a prime resource.

2. Calling on that resource, all that has been good and successful must be made visible and must beoptimized.

3. The present conditions of quality, no matter how small they may be perceived, contribute to futurepossibilities.

4. The importance of community must triumph over importance of individual or group.

You can accomplish anything in life, provided that you don‘t mind who gets the credit‖ – President Harry S. Truman.

Say your own prayer of thanksgiving to end this session.

Resources

·         http://umcneb.org/media/2008BookOfDisciplinePDFS/CONS001936QK004001A.pdf  Online Book of Discipline 2008.  Thanks to the Nebraska Conference.

·         Building Communities from the Inside Out: A Path Toward Finding and Mobilizing a Community’s Assets, John P. Kretzmann and John L. McKnight, (Center for Urban Affairs and Policy Research, 1993; ACTA Publications [800] 397-2282)

·         The Power of Asset Mapping, Luther K. Snow, The Albin Institute, 2004

• Appreciative Inquiry Handbook, David L. Cooperrider, Diana Whitney, and Jacqueline M. Stavros, Crown Custom Publishing, 2005

In this session you will be able to:

• Identify or begin to develop a shared vision for the ministry of your church
• Match your spiritual gifts to your mission and vision

 Devotional

Sing: Be thou my vision   http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/b/t/btmvison.htm

Read: Habakkuk 2:2-3

² Then the LORD replied:

“Write down the revelation
and make it plain on tablets
so that a herald may run with it.
³ For the revelation awaits an appointed time;
it speaks of the end
and will not prove false.
Though it linger, wait for it;
itwill certainly come
and will not delay.

Pray:

Gracious and loving God, guide our study today and in the days to come.  May we be mindful of Jesus’s sacrifice and example.  May we consider our privilege and obligations as we develop a vision for our lives and the congregations we serve.  Bless our work we pray in Jesus name. Amen.

 A Shared Vision of Ministry

Vision is defined as the desired or intended future state of an organization in terms of it’s fundamental objective and direction.

 For this session you will do more of the exploration on this topic on your own. 

Go to this website for a discussion of visioning as a secular process and how it might be use in ministry

http://www.reformation21.org/blog/2008/03/some-thoughts-on-church-vision.php

 This website lists 5 steps.

http://www.harderassociates.com/pdf/Five_Step_Visioning_Process.pdf

Peace United Methodist in Orlando, Florida shares how they developed their vision at this website. http://peaceumcorlando.org/templates/System/details.asp?id=44413&PID=651533

 Say your own prayer of thanksgiving to end this session.

 Resources

• Building Communities from the Inside Out: A Path Toward Finding and Mobilizing a Community’s Assets, John P.Kretzmann and John L. McKnight, (Center for Urban Affairs and Policy Research, 1993; ACTA Publications [800] 397-2282)
• The Power of Asset Mapping, Luther K. Snow, The Albin Institute, 2004
• Appreciative Inquiry Handbook, David L. Cooperrider, Diana Whitney, and Jacqueline M. Stavros, Crown Custom Publishing, 2005

 In this session you will be able to:

·         describe the terms mission, vision & focus as it applies to yourself and your church leaders

·         analyze and compare the mission statement of your home church with that of the UM mission statement as found in BOD

Devotional

Sing: Pass It On  go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCjR4dlY33k&feature=related

To sing along.

Read  Matt 28:19-20

¹⁹ Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Pray 

Oh God, you have built your Church upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone.  Save the community of your people from cowardly surrender to the world, from rendering unto Caesar what belongs to you, and from forgetting the eternal gospel amid the temporal pressures of our troubled days.  For unity of the Church we pray, and for fellowship across the embittered lines of race and nation; to growth in grace, building in love, enlargement in service, increase in wisdom, faith, charity and power, we dedicate our lives through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen  (Harry Emerson Fodick, USA, 2oth Cent., Book of Worship #506)

Developing a Mission Statement

Developing a Mission Statement can be a long process.  Some of your churches already have Mission Statements that you may have helped developed. 

The United Methodist have the Book of Discipline to guide each church in g their own mission statement.  Read paragraphs 120-122, 126, 123,124 & 127

http://umcneb.org/media/2008BookOfDisciplinePDFS/CONS001936QK004001A.pdf

Vision is defined as the desired or intended future state of an organization in terms of it’s fundamental objective and direction.

Mission is defined as a formal short written statement of the value proposition of an organization.  Why does the organization exist and what it does to achieve it’s vision.

The mission of the church is to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.  It is that simple.  However, to define discipleship or what does transformation means each person and each congregation must define that for themselves.

Below is a mission statement a church.

Our church lives as congregation of believers who strive to embody the gospel of Jesus Christ by reaching out to others in love, nurturing one another in the life of the church, and sending one another in service for all persons with whom we have contact, principally in the greater community area and in the world throughout connectional affiliation.

What is your church’s mission?  Does it sound like the one above?  Do you even know what it is? 

After much discussion, seeking out meaning of what this congregation wanted, they came up with the following mission statement.

We are a community of Christ-followers growing in the love of God and neighbor.

In the What Every Leader Needs to Know About Mission and Vision several suggestions are given to help you begin the process of defining your mission.

If you are satisfied with your own church’s mission statement you might want to find out when and how it was developed.

If you need to work on your own church’s mission, you might outline some beginning steps.

Say your own prayer of thanksgiving to end this session.

Resources

·         Alban Institute www.alban.com

Resources for congregational excellence, including, books, a magazine, consulting, seminars, podcasts. Search the articles archive under the topic of governance or leadership to find material that meets your situation.

·         Best Practices (www.gbod.org/)

·         Cokesbury www.cokesbury.com Cokesbury is an online bookstore for curriculum, books for church leaders, and official United Methodist resources such as the Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church, the United Methodist Book of Worship.

Welcome to week 2.  Please pray for our fellow classmate Bill Malone who will have a medical procedure and several weeks of recuperation.

In this session you will be able to:

• describe what the “means of grace”
• identify your spiritual gifts

Devotional

Sing: “Sanctuary”   Go to  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LiTy7ndOzw&feature=related/  for sing along

Read John 15:1-5

¹ “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. ² He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes^[a] so that it will be even more fruitful. ³ You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. ⁴ Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. ⁵ “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

 Pray  A Covenant Prayer in the Wesleyan Tradition

  I am no longer my own, but thine.

Put me to what thou wilt, rank me with whom thou wilt.

Put me to doing, put me to suffering.

Let me be employed by thee or laid aside for thee,

exalted for thee or brought low for thee.

Let me be full, let me be empty.

Let me have all things, let me have nothing.

I freely and heartily yield all things

to thy pleasure and disposal.

And now, O glorious and blessed God,

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,

thou art mine, and I am thine. So be it.

And the covenant which I have made on earth,

let it be ratified in heaven. Amen.

 Practicing Spiritual Leadership

If we are to be effective spiritual leaders, we need to have strong relationship with God in Christ.  John Wesley describes a way to develop this relationship through the” means of grace.”  The means of grace are disciplines that help us encounter the presence , spirit and power of God.  Three such disciplines are Prayer, Searching the Scriptures and Holy Communion.  These Spiritual formation must be taken seriously: ―We cannot just think about it, read about it, or talk about it.  We must live them..

Becoming Spiritual Leaders

Spiritual leaders have gifts and talents that they use in their ministry.  Go to www.umc.org/spiritualgifts to listen about these gifts and take an inventory of your gifts.  Also check out Romans 12:3-8 for a list of them

No one has all the gifts.

All members are needed.

God gifts persons as needed for the faith community.

 http://umcneb.org/administration/bookofdiscipline.htm

 From The Book of Disciple of the United Methodist Church

Section IV. Servant Ministry

¶133. Christian Discipleship – The ministry of all Christians consists of privilege and obligation.  The privilege is a relationship with God that is deeply spiritual.  The obligation is to respond to God’s call to holy living in the world.  In the United Methodist tradition these two dimensions of Christian discipleship are wholly interdependent.

¶134. Our relationship with God – Christian experience growth and transition in their spiritual life just as in their physical and emotional lives.  While growth is always a work of grace, it does not occur uniformly.  Spiritual growth in Christ is a dynamic process marked by awakening, birth, growth, and maturation.  This process requires careful and intentional nurture for the disciple to reach perfection in the Christian life.  There are stages of spiritual growth and transition: Christian beginnings; Christian birth; Christian growth; and Christian maturity.  These require careful and intentional nurture to come to maturity in the Christian life and to engage fully in the ministry of all Christians.

¶135.Our Relationship with Christ in the World: Obligation – The ministry of all Christians in the United Methodist tradition has always been energized by deep religious experience, with emphasis on how ministry relates to our obligation to Jesus Christ. The early Methodists developed  a way of life that fostered reliability, and their methodical discipleship is best expressed in the General Rules that John Wesley first published in 1734, which remain in the The United Methodist Book of Disciple, pages 71-74.

Please look these up. http://umcneb.org/media/2008BookOfDisciplinePDFS/CONS001936QK003001A.pdf

 The ministry of all Christians consists of privilege and obligation.

What will our living out the privilege and obligation look like?

What are our personal privileges and obligations?—be very specific

What are congregation‘s privileges and obligations?-–again, be very specific

 Say your own prayer of thanksgiving to end this session.

 Resources

http://www.hymnsite.com/  List most of the hymns in the Methodist Hymnal.  Select a hymn and you may select the tune to be play by bells, piano or organ and words appear.

This session can also be downloaded from

Session I

In this session you will be able to:

·         describe what is means to be a leader

·         define the meaning of “spiritual leadership 

Devotional

As you begin this session and each session begin by singing a song.  In the Resource section below are websites to use for singing.

Sing: “The cry of my heart is to follow you.”   Go to http://www.turnbacktogod.com/it-is-the-cry-of-my-heart-to-follow-you-song/  for sing along

Read Hebrews 10:24-25

²⁴ And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, ²⁵ not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Pray

O God, the Holy Spirit, come to us, and among us; come as the wind, and cleanse us; come as the fire, and burn; come as the dew, and refresh; convict, convert, and consecrate many hearts and lives to our great good and to thy greater glory; and this we ask for Jesus Christ’s sake.  Amen

Session One Presentation

Many of you come to leadership in the church because someone asked you to chair a committee.  Every wonder why you were asked?  Was there a need and you had some skills and ideas to contribute?  As a church leader you called not just to be a leader, but a spiritual leader.  Did you know that?  We will explore this concept by your readings and discussions.

Spiritual Leaders combine skills and faith in a spiritually nourishing environment.  Spiritual leadership helps the community of faith effect transformation in the congregation and the community.  Romans 12:2, 9 is our guide.

² Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

 ⁹ Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. 

Your first assignment is introduce yourself.  Please do so on the assignment tab.  The class facilitator introduction is on the link below.  Spiritual Journey of Winnie Ching

Another guide is from The Book of Disciple of the United Methodist Church 

The link below will get you to the table of content

http://umcneb.org/administration/bookofdiscipline.htm 

Pages 87-96 Part III Ministry of all Christian, Section II can be found on the following link

http://umcneb.org/media/2008BookOfDisciplinePDFS/CONS001936QK004001A.pdf

Scroll down to ¶125 The Heart of Christian Ministry

Section II.  The Ministry of All Christians:

¶ 125. The Heart of Christian Ministry – The heart of Christian ministry is Christ’s ministry of outreaching love.  Christian ministry is the expression of the mind and mission of Christ by a community of Christians that demonstrates a common life of gratitude and devotion, witness and service, celebration and discipleship.  All Christians are called through their baptism to this ministry of servanthood in the world to the glory of God and for human fulfillment. The forms of ministry are diverse in locale, in interest, and in denomination accent, yet always catholic in spirit and outreach.

By catholic we mean universal, as it applies to all humankind.

Read the following poem.  What does it tell you about being a servant leader? 

The Wind of the Spirit

Where does the wind come from, Nicodemus?

Rabbi, I do not know.

Nor can you tell where it will go.

Put yourself into the path of the wind, Nicodemus.

You will be borne along

by something greater than yourself.

You are proud of your position,

content with your security,

but you will perish in such stagnant air.

Put yourself into the path of the wind, Nicodemus.

Bright leaves will dance before you.

You will find yourself in places

you never dreamed of going;

you will be forced into situations

you have dreaded

and find them like coming home.

You will have a power you never had before, Nicodemus.

You will be a new man.

Put yourself into the path of the wind.

        By Myra Scovel 1970

To learn more go to http://bible.org/seriespage/distinctives-christian-maturity-and-leadership

Say your own prayer of thanksgiving to end this session.

Resources

·         Building Communities from the Inside Out: A Path Toward Finding and Mobilizing a Community’s Assets, John P.Kretzmann and John L. McKnight, (Center for Urban Affairs and Policy Research, 1993; ACTA Publications [800] 397-2282)

·         The Power of Asset Mapping, Luther K. Snow, The Albin Institute, 2004

·         Appreciative Inquiry Handbook, David L. Cooperrider, Diana Whitney, and Jacqueline M. Stavros, Crown Custom Publishing, 2005

·         The Wind of the Spirit, Myra Scovel, Hearing God‘s Call: Ways of discernment for Laity and Clergy, Ben Campbell Johnson, Wm. B. Eerdman‘s Publishing Co., 2002

·         The Upper Room Worship Book Music and Liturgies for Spiritual Formation compiled and edited by Elise S. Eslinger, Upper Room Books, 2006.

Websites for songs

http://www.hymnsite.com/  List most of the hymns in the Methodist Hymnal.  Select a hymn and you may select the tune to be play by bells, piano or organ and words appear.

http://www.turnbacktogod.com/it-is-the-cry-of-my-heart-to-follow-you-song/  http://www.umcom.org/site/c.mrLZJ9PFKmG/b.3563949/k.E4C8/Training_United_Methodism_101.htm Go to this website to register for a free online course on Methodist 101.

The concept of leadership varies with the context in which it is needed. Leadership within the church requires additional preparation or requirements. Leaders in the church are called to be spiritual leaders who set an example for those whom they lead. This short course is designed to prepare church leaders to focus on their role as spiritual leaders and to function as role models or examples for others in the congregation.

It is our hope that, by transforming church leaders into spiritual leaders, the church will be renewed and the laity will take on the roles in ministry to which God calls them.

Course Objectives

At the end of this course the participants will be able to: 

• Recognize God‘s call upon them to leadership.
• Describe the spiritual nature of leadership and utilize spiritual practices to aid their personal faith growth and that of their congregation.
• Demonstrate an understanding of the mission and vision of the local church as it relates to the core process of the church.
• Formulate specific purposeful leadership techniques in a process of discovery and evaluation of their church‘s unique missional response.

You find the full course outline in the pdf file in the link below.

Welcome to Concept in Leadership