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3 people asked Jesus into their hearts today. That never gets old. One person who was wearing a brace and walking on a cane was healed. Walked out without the brace or use of a cane. Praise and Worship was awesome 76 Golf World trip this afternoon was rained out. We will reschedule. God really touched some peoples hearts today!! Thank you Jesus! Looking forward to a day off tomorrow.

Change you inherent. - Many times, especially for survival leaders, they inherent someone elses mess. The changes that someone else made that have brought the group or organization to its knees. While you don't have to take responsibility for making the mess, you do have to take responsibility for cleaning it up. Listen, don't make it personal. That causes bad attitudes and feelings toward others. Just clean the mess up and keep a sweet spirit about it. Change you caused - This can go one of two ways. You probably guessed it. Bad or good. You can make bad changes and survive. You just can't make a string of bad decisions over a long period of time and get away with it. I knew a pastor years ago who did just this. He followed a hugely successful pastor who had done a great job at the church. But he was determined to make the necessary changes to the church, administration, building and ministry that were going to be "Godly and holy". Well after a ye

Why are so many leaders afraid of change. #1 - Change creates fear. All of us have a fear of the unknown. Change, is about our future. The ultimate unknown. #2 - Change can be expensive. Where is there is little to no risk - change is usually accepted. But if purposed change comes with a high price tag (personal, financial, spiritual, etc.) then we tend to be more resistant. #3 Change intimidates - There is something about change (if you let it) will intimidate you to no end. This can some in a couple of ways. Change will try to bully you into doing something that you don't want to do. It is here that you need to know who you are, why you are here (your God given purpose in life), what your goals, vision and mission is, what your strengths and weaknesses are. Without the knowledge AND WISDOM that comes from these facts and beliefs that you place your faith in - change will toy with you like a cat with a mouse. #4 Change challenges you publicly and to your face. Chang

Before we go on - let's take a moment to consider something. When you enter a group or organization as their leader, know what stage they are in. Many times a common mistake produces pain. The leader and organization don't match up. In other words, if you're hired to be a success leader, but what they need is a survival leader. Things are not going to go well. Know your talents and skills - be willing to say no to some jobs (no matter how tempting that they are) on the grounds that you know your limitations. Success Leaders - These leaders are just what their name suggests. It seems that everything that they do is successful. You have probably been jealous of one or two in your lifetime. It's as if God just smiles on them. What you don't know is: 1) They probably paid a price to get where they are at. Most likely they were Survival and Stability leaders before they were successful. Remember - leaders who try to skip these two steps usually don't

My good friends Larry and Deanna Shrodes are asking that people who pray please do so for a Pastors teenage daughter in Tampa. Please read about it here and pray. Thanks Russ

I don't know (nor could I figure out) who told me about the four levels of an organizations or groups existence. If anyone can answer my question, please feel free to do so. But those levels are Survival, Stability, Success and Significance. Most leaders can lead in one of these level, some two - others three or all four. So as a leader, you need to ask yourself which level(s) type leader you are. Don't assume for a moment that you already can lead through all four. Take a few moments to ask yourself some questions. - Which level do I enjoy the most? - Which level did I accomplish the most? - Which level frustrated me the most? - Which level did I get defeat at? Remember that no matter where you are at, your purpose is to lead to the next level. Not to camp out where you are at. If you get stuck, get help. If you try to lead at one level for the rest of your life you're going to discover a few things. When people are ready to move to the next level - they will mo

Change is a tough thing for some people to do. It isn't usually because they are anti-change - even though that doesn't happen. It's usually because of bad timing. Those who never change - These people are usually stuck in a time period or culture that was popular in the past. Leadership and management styles usually reflect something that worked long ago. As long as the people that they work with respond well to those leadership styles, then everything is ok. But as time goes on, this becomes harder and harder. Eventually people who don't change fade away. Those who fight change - These people are different from those who never change. They will fight what they don't understand. They will fight what seems threatening to them. They will fight anything that will devalue them. Those who embrace change - These people don't do so foolishly. They see what needs to happen and determine if it is the right thing to do. They don't change for changes sak

Change is tough. Being a leader is tough. Leading change is tougher. Without fail - someone resists change. There are a number of reason for this and there are just as many ways to deal with it. However, what I see many young and immature leaders do is quite honestly - wrong. Let's review a few things. Some will fight . I have already spoken about how you choose your battles and why. But for some leaders, they fight change because it gives them a reason for their existence. I could blog about this all day, but let's boil it down to this. Some leaders fight to justify their existence. A crisis always keeps a group or organization in survival and sometimes stability mode. But if the leader isn't a success leader he or she can create crisis to justify their job (and not even know it). Some will change for change sake - Always a bad idea. Pick and choose change wisely. To keep things in a flux of change 24/7 only makes everything look good - but it never accomp

Let's get a couple of things straight here. Leaders lead change. Managers fight it. That isn't a bad thing - it's what they are suppose to do. Let's look at it this way. Leaders determine the right changes to make at the right times. Thus they change to accomplish their goals, vision and mission. Managers place systems and policies into place that ensure that a) goals, vision and mission is being accomplished and b) keep unwanted change and distractions from disabling an organization or people. You can apply this to the basic of all organizational units. The family. The skills required to have a successful marriage and family today require you to adapt to change - have solid Biblical core values to build your family - and a management style that promotes your family, not discourage it. So here are the components you need for leadership change. - Let leaders lead - let manager manage. Don't let managers lead or leaders manage. That leads to confusion. -

If change is inevitable - then how do you guide it? Well there are lot of excellent models out there that one can use - my purpose here today is to help you build a good foundation to guide change with. #1 - Determine what can and cannot change. - Quite simply, what are you willing to die for? There are some core values of your life that you will not give up. As a Christian, one of those things is what you believe in. The Deity of Jesus Christ - Salvation by Grace - The Inspired Word of God (to mention a few) are not negotiable. There are some things that you love that you will not sacrifice. Your marriage, your kids and your friendships. When change challenges any of these core values or things that you love (and you need to know what those are by the way) then you can tell change - No. But matters of personal choice may be negotiable. I am not a dancer. In fact I was raised to believe that dancing was evil and from the devil. Now do I believe that there is some dancing th

Yesterday I said that change is inevitable - it's going to happen. So how do you deal with the people of change? The first question you have to ask is, "Do you want to deal with them in a healthy way or not?" Fight them - Now I have to say here, in all honesty, sometimes you need to fight people who are trying to implement changes. I'll address why you might want to do that tomorrow, but for now I admit that all change (or proposed change) isn't good. For example, giving condoms to elementary children isn't good. Legalizing marijuana isn't good. I think you get the idea. But when you decide to fight, something is going to happen that isn't avoidable. The Us vs. Them mentality. There are going to be at least two camps (probably more) who will entrench themselves for a battle. Who will win? That's easy - the one who has the highest threshold of pain. When the price of change or the fight becomes too painful - and ones threshold of pain

Change is inevitable. Change is indisputable - it's going to happen. If there is one thing that will never change - it's change. So how do you deal with change? Fight it - You don't like what is happening and you have to do something about it! This addresses your values and attitudes. You only fight what threatens you in some way. Whether it is real or perceived. You need to ask yourself if the fight is worth it. Is the change taking place something that violates your core values - or are you just fighting something that you don't understand. Another reason why you might fight change is if you perceive that it diminishes or eliminates you. in that case, your survival skills will kick in - this is a BAD thing! It's this kind of thinking that leads to the ends justifying the means. Ignore it - Denial still happens. Maybe if you don't pay attention to it - it might just go away. Completely ignoring change isn't acceptable. There are fads and tre

We had a great day at FFWC! People are starting to get excited about seeking the baptism in the Holy Spirit. We have the greatest youth group in the world. I love Rolo McFlurries from McDonalds (OK that has nothing to do with church) New people in church this morning. They all had been here a year before - now their back. Worship was awesome. Finding peace in your home does take a lot of work. We serve the best spanish coffee in the world (according to some pastors who sampled some of it this week)

During the month of June my Life Connect Class is dedicated to helping you find peace in your home. If you think that peace is impossible - your wrong. If you think that you have to control everyone and everything in order for you to have peace - wrong again. If you are tired of being sick and tired and you think that you should attend my class Sunday mornings at 9:30 a.m. during the month of June - YOUR RIGHT! Here is something that you might need to consider. This world definition of peace and the Bibles definition of peace are not necessarily the same. In fact - God has A LOT more to offer you. See ya Sunday!

This goes under the category: Not if, but when. I was talking to someone yesterday who said something like, "I knew something bad was going to happen, everything was going to good." But they followed that statement with, "God knows how to keep me close to Him." Believe it or not - Getting things to go "your way" isn't about getting God to do what you want Him to do. It's about the position of your heart and mind. Paul told us to be content in every situation we find ourselves in. The Bible tells us that the joy of the Lord is our strength. So the question you have to ask yourself today is - despite the situation you are in at this moment, are you content? Do you have joy? You see, when we depend on our circumstances to make us content and happy - all we will end up is miserable and depressed. Here is an adage you can use to start you day with - Being with the end in mind. When you determine that you will end your day content and joyful,

Build a Bridge and Get Over It During the month of June I am going to be sharing with you how the Holy Spirit helps you. There are a lot of things in our life that can stop us from living and being who we were created to be. Jesus knew that we would need help to be the Christian He wants us to be. So the Holy Spirit helps us to build bridges over - stress - broken dreams - broken hearts - addictions - this world and it's inevitable doom. There is hope for you and that hope comes from a relationship with Holy Spirit. Discover how you can get to the next level of your life - Build a bridge and get over it.

Last Sunday - I got a sign from God. I might tell you about that later. But you might be wondering, "Really, I can do that?" Yes - but there are few things you need to know before you try. Know why you don't need a sign from God. A sign from God isn't to necessarily bolster your faith. While it will - asking for a sign so you can believe is like asking God to put on a magic show. He doesn't do that and I think you can understand why. You're not asking God to prove His existence - you know He does already. Make it personal. Ask God to do something in your life that is personal and clear to you. Gideons sign was just between him and God. Give God permission to speak into your life. You're asking God to speak into your life and to give you clarity. Be willing to accept whatever God says. While you may not like the answer - have the faith to live by faith. To see a sign from God - you have to have some faith already. What God does will be wonder