Feeling a bit beat up lately...

...TAKE HEART: 

God's Got Us Covered

For we are not struggling against human beings, but against the rulers, authorities and cosmic powers governing this darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realm. So take up every piece of war equipment God provides; so that when the evil day comes, you will be able to resist; and when the battle is won, you will still be standing. Therefore, stand! Ephesians 6:12-14

As I read this passage I am taken by a few portions that lead me to pause when considering my opposition:

• I am not struggling with people
• There are forces of another realm poised to interfere with my ability to stand in faith
• These very forces are controlling the darkness I encounter daily

Suddenly I realize in just a few short sentences that I am fighting something I am totally unfit to fight.  My fight is not with an enemy I can beat, it is not on a field that I can walk and it is not going to be fair.  If I were to stop reading after Paul explains the nature of my opposition, I don't think I would be blamed for cowering in the corner: But because of the rest of the passage, I can not choose to retreat-I need to SUIT UP and STAND FIRM – (The following is from skipmoen.com)

Paul was fond of military metaphors. This passage about the armor of God certainly is one of his best. When he concludes the thought, he supplies us with an exclamation point by using this particular word, stenai. It is actually a derivative from another verb, histemi, a form that means, “stand firm” or “endure”.

Take a closer look at Paul’s thought. Paul tells us to put on the whole armor. Don’t forget any part of it. Do everything necessary. Once you have taken care of being properly outfitted, stand firm. Now ask yourself what’s missing. Is this how you would advise a combat unit? Would you tell them to “lock and load” and then just stand there? Our usual military operations are not quite the way God does things. God expects us to come prepared for battle, but He does not ask us to make an attack. We have only one battlefield task. Hold the ground that God wins. Don’t retreat!

It seems a little stupid, doesn't it? Why go through all the trouble of putting on Kevlar vests and helmets, picking up riot shields and an M-16 if you're not going to fight? Then the light goes on. It’s God’s fight, not ours. Remember what happened to the Israelites when they thought they could go to battle on their own, even with God’s ark? (1 Samuel 4:1-11). If God isn't handling the battle, we lose even if we are marching around with a cross. Symbols mean nothing. God’s presence is the only real weapon. Nevertheless, we do have something important to do. We have to hold our ground. Take a stand. Don’t retreat. God will engage the enemy but we have to be ready to hold the line. Our armor is not there to make us invulnerable as we attack. It is there so that the ricochets and shrapnel won’t kill us while God is destroying the opposition.

Here are the Rules of Engagement. One: Let God lead. Two: Trust His battle plan. Three: Defend the ground He gains. Four: Don't retreat.

Gut Check Time

• If you engage in a battle when God’s not on the field, don't expect to win. 
• If you're suffering defeats at the hands of the enemy, maybe you need to check the Rules of Engagement. 
• Are you fighting under a symbol or are you holding your ground in the presence of the living God? 
• Are you leading the attack because it seems like the right thing to do or are you standing fast on the ground God gains?

One Thing...

Is this One Thing enough ...

Psalm 27

4 One thing have I asked of the Lord,

that will I seek after:

that I may dwell in the house of the Lord

all the days of my life,

to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord

and to inquire in his temple.

Soul Nourishment

Soul Nourishment First (Mueller)


From the autobiography of George Mueller

It has pleased the Lord to teach me a truth, the benefit of which I have not lost for more than fourteen years. The point is this: I saw more clearly than ever that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was to have my soul happy in the Lord. The first thing to be concerned about was not how much I might serve the Lord, or how I might glorify the Lord, but how I might get my soul into a happy state, and how my inner man might be nourished.

I saw that the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the Word of God – not prayer, but the Word of God. And here again, not the simple reading of the Word of God so that it only passes through my mind just as water runs through a pipe, but considering what I read, pondering over it, and applying it to my heart. To meditate on it, that thus my heart might be comforted, encouraged, warned, reproved, instructed. And that thus, by means of the Word of God, whilst meditating on it, my heart be brought into experimental communion with the Lord.

I began therefore to meditate on the New Testament from the beginning early in the morning. The first thing I did, after having asked in a few words the Lord’s blessing upon His precious Word, was to begin to meditate on the Word of God, searching as it were into every verse to get blessing out of it.

When we pray, we speak to God. Now, prayer, in order to be continued for any length of time in any other than a formal manner, requires, generally speaking, a measure of strength or godly desire: and the season, therefore, when this exercise of the soul can be most effectively performed is after the inner man has been nourished by meditation on the Word of God, where we find our Father speaking to us, to encourage us, to comfort us, to instruct us, to humble us, to reprove us.

By the blessing of God, I ascribe to this mode the help and strength which I have had from God to pass in peace through deeper trials, in various way, than I had ever had before.

How different, when the soul is refreshed and made happy early in the morning, from what it is when, without spiritual preparation, the service, the trials, and the temptations of the day come upon me!

May 9th, 1841

Your helplessness invites you to pray

Listen, my friend!  Your helplessness is your best prayer.  It calls from your heart to the heart of God with greater effect than all your uttered pleas.  He hears it from the very moment that you are seized with helplessness, and He becomes actively engages at once in hearing and answering the prayer of your helplessness.  Ole Hallesby

All these Things

Have you ever wondered where all your energy goes at the end of your day? Do we really spend every ounce of it in the service of others and wind up with nothing left for the service of our souls. It’s hard. We keep on keeping on, every day, week and year just hoping that we will have enough to meet the needs that are before us. Our focus can become somewhat shortsighted by our most pressing need-You know-We all can fall into the mindset that says, if I only get (fill in your blank) then I’ll be happy, satisfied, or content.

Jesus called His disciples to develop an attitude that focuses upon developing a still soul and not a satisfied self and He explained it this way: “Keep focused on the Kingdom of God and then all these things will be added.” Matthew 6:33
What are the “ALL THESE THINGS” in our lives: Income, food, shelter, clothing, and stuff-Material stuff? And apparently Jesus was teaching His disciples about the problem of worrying about these things. As you read through the beatitudes in Matthew’s gospel, it’s helpful to do a brief word study on “worry”. In the Greek, the word has a root that means to divide into parts. So when we worry about something, we can easily become divided in our hearts and minds over the material issues while forgetting that we live under the watchful loving care of a heavenly Father who is ever mindful of our daily needs.

Let’s seek God’s Kingdom together shall we. If you agree please know that when we say yes to seek God’s Kingdom, we say no to worry. Seeking God while worrying about our stuff cannot exist without being divided in our soul. Certainly, we can be satisfied when we seek to oblige our material needs but if you’ve been around for any length of time, that satisfied feeling lasts for just a moment. And yet, when our souls are still before the Lord our King, we are content knowing that all needs are being met in His good time.
This evening, be encouraged knowing that we serve a Mighty King who saves our souls, satisfies our needs and quiets the self through His ever present loving care.

A Peacemakers Prayer

This prayer is posted on hispeace.org and is authored by Ken Sande. Let's all start here as we lead our church into understanding how to cultivate a culture of peace.

Oh Lord God,

Today I am called to be a peacemaker,
but I am unfit for the task.

By nature I am a peace-faker
and a peace-breaker,
so I myself need help.

Others ask me to understand and guide them,
but my ears are dull, my eyes are dim,
and I lack the wisdom they need.

But you, Lord, have all they need,
so I come to you for supply.

Make me fit for your purposes,
so I might serve them
and honor you.

Cleanse me from my own sin
so I will not add to their problems;
take the logs from my eyes,
so I can remove the specks from theirs.

Fill me with your Spirit
so they may benefit from your fruit:
love, joy, peace,
patience, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

Give me wisdom from above
so I might be pure and peace-loving,
considerate and submissive,
full of mercy and good fruit,
impartial and sincere.

Open your Word to my eyes
and to my heart,
so I will have a steady lamp
to light our path.

Strip me of my own agenda and desires,
so I might look only to others' good
and be absolutely worthy of their trust.

Help me to model everything I teach,
so others can see the way.


Give me humility to admit my weaknesses
and confess my wrongs,
so others might do the same.

Draw me again and again into prayer,
where you can strengthen and correct me.

Make me submissive -- help me to show
that I myself am under authority.

Help me to treat others
as I want to be treated,
so they may see
the essence of your Law.

Make me creative, versatile, and adaptable
so I can adjust to the surprises ahead.

Help me to accept others
as you have accepted me,
and thus bring praise to your name.

Give me faith and perseverence
so I will not doubt your provision
or abandon your principles,
even when others fight against them.

Grant me the gift of encouragement,
to give others hope
and help them believe
that our labor is not in vain.

Help me to model your forgiveness
so relationships are healed
and your Gospel is revealed.

Grant me discernment so that I may read
the deep waters of others' hearts,
sort fiction from fact,
and know when it's time to act.

Give me boldness and courage,
tempered with kindness,
to confront others in love
so they might see their errors
and find their way back to you.

Help me to prepare thoroughly
and not presume upon your grace.

Make me just and fair,
so that even if people disagree
with my counsel they will believe
that I treated them well.

In short, Father,
please give me the Spirit of Christ
so that I might walk in his steps
and guide your people
into the path of your peace.

Perspectives from Peacemaker Ministries on Vimeo.

Hey Team. Welcome back to the Zone. Let's do our best to allow Christ to keep our perspective focused on HIS purpose for peace. See you all soon!

Stay Tuned

Stay Tuned

Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brothers to dwell together in unity!Psalm 133:1

Unity results from extreme Devotion to Christ not just from cultivating organizational uniformity

One hundred religious persons knit into a unity by careful organizations do not constitute a church any more than eleven dead men make a football team. The first requisite is life, always.A. W. Tozer -

Living in the outflow of the Trinity

Life springs from the fountainhead of Christ Himself. It is only from Him that we "Live, Move and have our Being"(Acts 17:28) . So life is new life that flows into us from Christ - this very life is the same life that Jesus is living this very moment. This NEW life in us is life eternal coming from the Father, flowing into Christ, it raised Him from the dead and is now flowing into us through the Holy Spirit. None of this could be happening now unless the Father, Son and Holy Spirit offered this life in the unity with which they live. The unity of the Trinity is seen in God's expression of Divine love (John 3:16).

The Fruit of the Devoted

Our response to this eternal flow must be the focus we give to our lives. Paul encourages us to live with minds and hearts concentrated on things above-Col. 3:2, not earthly things. One avenue to accomplish this focus is through an active devotional life founded on a passionate desire for God's Word. Unity, therefore is a fruit of the devotional life focused on Christ who is "above all things" Psalm 138:2.

Seeking First

It was Jesus intent that we live in unity in order to demonstrate the agape love of God. John 17:23b May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. John goes on to say in his epistle that our love needs to be in actions and not just words, 1 John 3. But our love when founded in unity which flows from devotion to Christ is pure love since it comes from the source of agape. So we can cultivate this love in unity as we seek Jesus FIRST, Seek His Kingdom FIRST, Seek His Righteousness FIRST-Then all other things necessary for life will be added.

Stay Tuned

Has it ever occurred to you that one hundred pianos all tuned to the same fork are automatically tuned to each other? They are of one accord by being tuned, not to each other, but to another standard to which each one must individually bow. So one hundred worshipers [meeting] together, each one looking away to Christ, are in heart nearer to each other than they could possibly be, were they to become 'unity' conscious and turn their eyes away from God to strive for closer fellowship. A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God. *

Welcome Back to the Servant Zone

Directed to SERVE:

Jesus had a supernatural way of unnerving His hearers. Using verbiage like “vipers, white-washed tombs, love your enemies and Whoever wants to be first must take last place and be the servant of everyone else.” He consistently saw people with question marks circling around their heads. One thing is sure, Jesus certainly made people think-And to that point, I say Amen.

As leaders who have come alongside of the vision of the Sanctuary, it is important to understand that the same phrases Jesus used for the original twelve He uses for us and wants us to think about them. Ask yourself, “What is He saying?” “What does that mean?”, and “How can I apply that to my life?” are all very important questions that need to be personally wrestled out. So, as servant leaders at the Sanctuary we have been called to think and act in accord with the words of Christ. Here we go: The word of the Lord (Paraphrased)…

Serve the least

Be of one mind
Look after the need of others

Reach out to hurting people who need to find real hope

Speak to one another with Psalms, hymns and spiritual songs

Think on praiseworthy things

Guard your heart

Love one another

Touch the hurting

Keep yourself pure

Enjoy the journey

Of course Jesus said so much more and He continues to speak today: Through the life of the church, the soft voice of prayer, and the color of the sunset, Jesus still speaks. Listen, think, think some more, count the cost. Now make the commitment and take the first step- This is our response as a servant leader.

The Bait of Satan Review

Hey all. At the beginning of our 50 days of Prayer we were challenged to read John Bevere's book, "The Bait of Satan". After several weeks of prayer and reading, I thought it may be helpful to put together an executive summary that might help condense the ideas that are relevant to understand and put into practice. Please know that the following summary is not original, it comes from the blog of a Nathan Bluedom. Why reinvent the wheel. Please read through it and know that we will be involved in this ongoing conversation.

"The Bait of Satan" is about learning to overcome bitterness. It is about learning to deal with offenses, and forgive the person who has offended you. An offended person is one who has “taken offense” when someone mistreated him or her in some way. This may also include offended people who believe they were mistreated when they were not.

These are the points that Bevere made which stood out to me:

Dealing with Difficult Situations

• If we are in a situation where someone is offending us, we are not necessarily called to leave that situation. We are not necessarily called to fix the situation either.
• If we become offended and leave a difficult situation, we often fail to learn the character lessons that God wanted to teach us.
• If we become offended and leave a situation angry, we can become spiritual vagabonds. For the rest of our lives we grow more and more offended and isolated, and develop a persecution complex. We blame everyone else for our unhappiness.
• Immature Christians often try to protect themselves in difficult situations. They do not see that God has brought them into this situation to help them acknowledge their own character flaws.
• The way we view the difficulties we have left behind will determine how we will react to our next difficulties. When we leave one situation bitter, we will carry that into other relationships. No one is able to develop a healthy relationship with someone who is running from bitterness.
• We should not leave a bad situation until we feel the Holy Spirit leading us out with peace. We should not react to the difficulties in the situation. Instead we should be moved by the Holy Spirit.
• If we leave a difficult situation without the Holy Spirit’s leading, it may take many years before we see the offense we have hidden in our heart. God will eventually make us face our problem, even though we may avoid it for many years. If God does not, we may never come to grips with our own character flaws.
• If we do leave a situation with the peace of the Holy Spirit, we won’t feel compelled to defend or explain our difficulties to others.
• We should not enter a situation or relationship, like a church, unless we really know God wants us to join. We will not be able to leave the situation until God releases us.

Reconciliation

• If we won’t forgive someone deep in our heart, then we are waiting for vengeance – even if we only want to see them do a small thing. We have made ourselves the judge and are demanding justice before we forgive. What if Christ did this?
• God wants us to make it our top priority to help a brother who has stumbled, and not try to prove ourselves correct in our judgment of him. Even if the offense was his fault, we should humble ourselves and try to be reconciled.
• When a brother offends us, sometimes we confront him with a wrong attitude. We want to tell him his sin more than we want to be humbly reconciled. The only way to pursue peace and true reconciliation is to maintain an attitude of humility at the expense of pride and our personal rights. Pride defends. Humility is willing to yield and tries to find agreement.
  When we are ready to forgive an offense, we are eager to find a way to make peace.

Other Points

• Listening to the Holy Spirit – It is important to stay tenderhearted to what the Holy Spirit is saying to us. We need to be acutely sensitive to hear when the Holy Spirit is telling us that we have a small area of bitterness growing in our heart. We should not be afraid to examine our own heart. A sign that we are truly examining our heart is when we want to hear the insights that other people have about our attitude, and we are searching for what God wants, and not simply standing up for our rights.
• Selfish relationships – If we are easily offended, then our relationships are based on what others can do for us and not on respecting them the way they are.
• Faith – Offences is tied to our trust in God. If we succumb to offenses, it is because our faith is weak. God will need to shake our faith to strengthen it.
• Bitterness – The story of Absalom is a good example of how a person can become angry over a legitimate offense, but then allow bitterness to grow in his heart until it causes much evil. Absalom judged his father David, and then allowed his bitterness over his injustice to rule his life. This happens today when a leader’s faults make his followers angry and bitter, until they try to overthrow him.
• Offending for the truth – If we teach the truth, it is inevitable that we will offend people who do not love the truth. Jesus did this. If we compromise the truth to keep from offending people, then we will lose God’s anointing on our ministry. We have chosen our relationship with our friends over our relationship with God. Jesus left those who were offended by the truth behind and moved on.
• Offending for our rights – We should be careful not to offend someone by flaunting our more liberal understanding of an issue. We should not offend someone who has a weak conscience. Jesus did not owe the temple tax, but he chose to pay the tax in order not to offend those who would not understand his actions if he did not pay the tax. He did not stand up for His rights.

Steps to Overcome an Offense

Just as our body needs exercise, our anti-offense muscle needs exercise. Sometimes it is easy to keep from being offended, but other times it is hard to resist a strong temptation.
Bevere gave these steps for overcoming an offense:

• Admit you are hurt. Be sensitive to the Holy Spirit’s promptings about this.
• Forgive the person who has offended you and release him from your attention on his guilt.
• Practice and strengthen your ability to forgive others when they offend you. This will help you keep an injury from happening again. Stay free.
• Demonstrate a level of forgiveness and freedom by praying for the person who offended you. Pray like you would want Jesus to pray for you. Pray for the offender’s sake.
• Go to the person and communicate reconciliation, apology and forgiveness to him. Learn to love him again despite his faults. You are going for his sake, not yours. You’ve already forgiven him. Communicating reconciliation will seal your forgiveness of him.
• The Holy Spirit will lead us in this process at a pace that we can handle. It may seem at times that we are only getting worse. But we will come out of the situation a more mature Christian who is thankful for this experience.

Challenges for Me

• When I become bitter, I lose faith in God. I am really angry with God for letting this offense happen. I can always imagine a better world where my rights are always respected, and I become dissatisfied with the world that God created where people offend me. When I am angry with someone, my mind focuses on the wrong that person did to me, instead of focusing on the character lesson that God wants to teach me though this event.
  When someone sins and offends me, I feel I should put him into his place – I want to fix his sins. When I get angry, I prove that my relationship was a selfish one. I wouldn’t get angry if I accepted an offensive person just the way he is, and didn’t try to make him into someone who treated me better. My anger often exaggerates and distorts the situation in my mind so that I can’t clearly see the right solution.
  I know God wants me to overcome any cycles of anger and bitterness that I have in my family before I go into the wider world. If I carry bitterness into the rest of my life, I will be more prone to become bitter with new people in my life. Getting this block out of my life would free me to serve God more effectively.
  

The triple crown of discipleship

Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing. 2 Timothy 4:8

To long for His appearing




Its a great thing to be able to look at the blessings of God in our midst and say, WOW! This is awesome. Sure, its quite another to see God at work and admit that change, repentence and growth are needed too. But when both of those things merge together in my life and I see that God is working out His purposes through repentence, growth, and blessing, the results are a divine recipe for effecting eternal change that will lead me to long for my reward: The appearing of Christ. As a disciple of Jesus, I have to admit that I've been following Him as one who sees Him through spiritual eyes. Sure, I can see His face in the face of the innocent, and watch His hands at work as His people reach out to love the unlovely; and yet I desire to one day see Him face to face. So for now, to keep my vision clear and unobstructed, I need to submit to the active ministry of the Holy Spirit as He leads me into times of self awareness that reveal selfish desires that must go. This time is bittersweet as my old self, old ways, old comforts die off and the new creation life of Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17) grows up within me. I see three things at work in this process: Repentance, growth and blessing-the triple crown of discipleship.

I need to be reliant upon the Holy Spirit to convict and correct me in areas where I need to grow; Growth is the result of obedience to the Holy Spirit's work in my life; And blessing is the opportunity to experience the fruit of God's work in our lives.





Pretty simple, right? Not really. The entire process is dependent upon my willingness to submit to the work God is desiring to accomplish within me and often this work can be quite uncomfortable and sometimes painful. This morning as I was reading Oswald Chambers this one passage just stuck with me:





It is the sick person who really knows what health is. A child of God is not aware of the will of God because he is the will of God. When we have deviated even slightly from the will of God, we begin to ask, "Lord, what is your will?" A child of God never prays to be made aware of the fact that God answers prayer, because he is so restfully certain that God always answers prayer.





Lord, help me to become so restfully unaware of Your will. Not because of disobedience, nor out of disrespect, but out of a heart that knows nothing else but to do what I know to do as led by the very Spirit of God. Amen.

Oswald on Work that demands all your energy

Holiness or Hardness Toward God?
Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest

He . . . wondered that there was no intercessor . . . —Isaiah 59:16


The reason many of us stop praying and become hard toward God is that we only have an emotional interest in prayer. It sounds good to say that we pray, and we read books on prayer which tell us that prayer is beneficial— that our minds are quieted and our souls are uplifted when we pray. But Isaiah implied in this verse that God is amazed at such thoughts about prayer.
Worship and intercession must go together; one is impossible without the other. Intercession means raising ourselves up to the point of getting the mind of Christ regarding the person for whom we are praying (see Philippians 2:5 ). Instead of worshiping God, we recite speeches to God about how prayer is supposed to work. Are we worshiping God or disputing Him when we say, "But God, I just don’t see how you are going to do this"? This is a sure sign that we are not worshiping. When we lose sight of God, we become hard and dogmatic. We throw our petitions at His throne and dictate to Him what we want Him to do. We don’t worship God, nor do we seek to conform our minds to the mind of Christ. And if we are hard toward God, we will become hard toward other people.
Are we worshiping God in a way that will raise us up to where we can take hold of Him, having such intimate contact with Him that we know His mind about the ones for whom we pray? Are we living in a holy relationship with God, or have we become hard and dogmatic?
Do you find yourself thinking that there is no one interceding properly? Then be that person yourself. Be a person who worships God and lives in a holy relationship with Him. Get involved in the real work of intercession, remembering that it truly is work-work that demands all your energy, but work which has no hidden pitfalls. Preaching the gospel has its share of pitfalls, but intercessory prayer has none whatsoever.

M5

In keeping with the purpose of this blog, I've included the following leadership discussion. Please read it, review it and use the blog for discussion. Enjoy!

The Five "Ms" Every Leader Should Know

1. Minister to the needs of your members.
Okay, so that may seem obvious, but one of the critical roles of a small group leader is to shepherd the people in your group. Does the word "shepherd" scare you? It shouldn't. God has provided you with the gifts and abilities to care for those in your small group.
In a healthy small group, the members, as well as the leaders, must be "healthy." In fact, I would say that the success of your small group depends on its health. A healthy small group integrates all 5 biblical purposes into its life (for more information on the 5 biblical purposes, click here), but it's the leader's job to establish the biblical purpose of "fellowship" within the first few weeks of your group's existence.
As the small group leader, you need to pray for and "love on" each member of the group. That means making sure people feel connected with other members in the group, being attentive to what people say in the group - perhaps, for example, you may sense after the first several meetings that one couple in the group is struggling in their marriage. Your job as a leader is to pray for them. After you develop a deeper friendship with the couple, you may even suggest talking to a pastor or Christian counselor.
My point, simply, is that as the shepherd of the small group you need "eyes" to see the needs of your group.

2. Mentor their spiritual maturity.
An effective small group leader seeks to cultivate the spiritual habits of his or her group.
And how do you do that?
You must first know the condition of your "sheep"-those under your care. In the back of your mind, as you lead the group, you need to ask this for each person in the group, "What is the next step in his or her spiritual maturity?"
For an unmarried couple who is living together, they need to get married! That's their next logical step in obedience to Christ. For others, it may be baptism. Others may need to learn how to give or focus on their family or attend church more regularly or step up their service in the church or community.

3. Motivate the "shape" (spiritual gifts) of your members for ministry.
You, as the leader of the group, must model this principle. It's the "trickle down" approach to spiritual maturity. What your members see in you is what they begin to emulate in their lives.
Do your members know what your spiritual gifts are? Do they know you have the gift of leadership? Have you described to them your pathway in becoming a small group leader?
Are your group members growing in their gifts? Where are they serving now? Where should they be serving in 6 months or a year?
One of the key "shepherding" functions of a small group leader is to motivate each member to harness his or her spiritual gifts for service in God's kingdom.

4. Multiply the life and mission of your members.
It's not enough for your members to stay members. Every member must become a multiplier—to multiply their life through passing on the faith to others, through starting a new small group, through training others to assist in the development of the small group.
As a small group leader, your vision must be to see your group collectively—and its members individually—to take the next logical step in development. There must always be movement—growth towards reaching the mission of God's kingdom.
That may mean training another set of leaders to launch another small group. Or it may mean making sure the "empty chair" is always filled. Or, it may mean that you challenge group members to make a difference in their daily lives or profession.
Your role is to pour your life into your group members, so that they will pour their lives into others.

5. Model a surrendered heart.
Pride and arrogance and worldly leadership have no place in a small group. Never forget that what is happening in your group is the work of God Almighty. Not you.
If your leadership is effective, if your shepherding is making a difference in the lives of your members, expect spiritual warfare. That is, expect conflict, struggles, and trials. Satan loves to strangle healthy small groups through, for example, petty conflicts among members.
That's when you, the leader, need most to model a surrendered, humble attitude.
God works best in our weakness—when things are blowing apart—that's when God is strong. What is your Isaac? That is, what do you need to lay down on the altar to be consumed by the fire of God's presence? God loves the confessions and prayers of a broken and contrite heart. Worship God no matter what your circumstances with a thankful and hopeful heart. Your soul—and the very health of your small group—is at stake.Copyright © 2007 Lifetogether.

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