Transcription
Hey everybody, and welcome to the Growleader podcast, where we grow leaders that grow churches by helping them reach their full potential. So glad to have you along with us today. My name is Matt Miner, and right beside me on my right is Pastor Lee Domain, and on my left is Pastor Chris Hajes. And this feels right. We haven't done this in a while. This, this feels like a good thing.
"It, it does feel good."
Yeah. Right. I'm glad to be here and had a nice little break. Hope you guys did too, and spent some time refreshing and recharging. Actually did some writing, too. Actually got a new book I'm working on that it's going to come out about this time next year that I'm excited about. We might talk about a lot about it a little bit. But, um, yeah, I had a great time. Celebrated 40 years of marriage.
"That's awesome."
"I tell people I hung in there."
"We know Tammy though."
Exactly. Exactly. No, that's that's...
"If you don't know Miss Tammy, Tammy, Miss Tammy is an angel."
It ain't her.
Yeah. Exactly. No, that's what makes it so funny. Um, but then we had our little Grand Camp where we got our grandkids away for, uh, four days. And I, I jokingly said yesterday in church that, uh, and it's really true, that there's a reason why God gives you your, your kids in your 20s, is because man, in your 60s, it, I, we were so tired after those four days.
So, but anyway, it's been a nice, nice break. I hope you guys had a nice one too. Um, and getting refreshed, recharged. I hope everybody listening has had a chance to refresh and recharge, and maybe some of you guys are still on that time. July is the time where we jump back in and really, um, have so many wonderful things happening. We have Serve Day coming up this week. I hope all the churches listening are participating,
"uh, either on that day or another day in the year where we serve our communities."
Um, and then of course, we have our Grow Conference two weeks and one day from today. Crazy.
"Uh, I'm excited about."
Yeah, we're ready. Of course, it's been sold out for a number of months now, and, um, but we're excited to bring some fresh, new content, uh, to this year's conference, and even some of the things that Church of the Highlands is working on. Uh, Highlands is continually trying to get better, finding places where, you know, it's the lowest slat of the bucket. You've heard me talk about that, where the water's running out. And so just always trying to get better. And then have our Motion Conference, which is exciting, and then jumping into 21 Days of Prayer in August. And I say all that to say, we invite you to be a part of every bit of that, um, either virtually or in person. Come be a part of this season as we jump back into what I believe is going to be one of the most productive fall seasons for the kingdom. Uh, there's, there's the, the, the data is showing that people's interest in, in, in God and people's returning to church is at the highest level in 40 years. To God be the glory. Something we've been praying about, working on. I mean, this is what this ministry, Lee, has been all about. Grow Leader is to help, you know, kind of, uh, find that momentum again. I believe it's here. It's happening. I think it can be a lot better. And, uh, but this is the time. This is the time to really be as focused as ever. So, I'm excited.
"It's good. I, I love the way that you've led our Church of Highlands for so long, and also Grow Leader, and also the way Pastor Mark is leading. There is a lot of value in rhythms for your year with your team. And we've been in the rhythm of, uh, I mean, the last episode that we, we gave you guys with Pastor Rick Bizette, focusing on relationships, uh, getting healthy, but we all get excited around here around July because fall is coming, and it's a massive growth season. Uh, pastor, what do you love about the fall at Church of the Highlands as we get ready to step into the season?"
Well, coming out of one of the best advice that Pastor Chris has ever given me, he says, "Hey, when you want to take time, take time off in June." And that has been some incredible advice. But take more than just a few days off and allow your body and your mind and your emotions, all of that to kind of reset. And so that was gold. That was wisdom you gave me. I failed trying to do it the, the first time,
"but then came together with a great plan. And it has been life-changing for me, for my relationships, for my family. And then what that does is in the rhythm is it tees you up because July is full on with what you guys just shared. You know, 21 Days of Prayer in August. All that is kind of stacking the dominoes, as we say at Highlands,
"to prepare us for the harvest. People are coming back. They're coming back. All the data showing increases. People are hungry, especially in, uh, certain segments, which I know we're going to talk about today, but it's really the Super Bowl. I think of fall as you're entering in the Super Bowl that's going to lead to a lot of life change, salvations, um, uh, just getting people back in church.
"And we're seeing that happen and so we got to be prepared on the front end for that so that we can sustain it, which is why we do the Grow Leader Conference right before the fall. So, we still, why we do our Motion Student Conference right before we send students back to school for that reason. Excited about conference. You are super excited about this content."
"Yeah, you know, so I, I've always tried to bring some of the same because some of the things never change and they need to be reminded. Um, like we'll talk about vision. And, uh, I'm actually writing, uh, a book on a, a book that I wrote in 2014 called Four Cups. And I've used the Four Cups of the Passover Seder as a metaphor, a picture of the Great Commission. And that seems to resonate with people. And I wrote this book in 2014, and it was my best idea and my worst writing by far. And the book didn't do very well at all. Uh, I spent the last six, seven weeks, uh, rewriting that book from scratch, by the way. I mean, I didn't use a single paragraph from the previous book. It's not a, it's not a revised version. And it's a brand new version of this book. And even in the middle of the process, I got some fresh revelations that I'm going to share at the Grow Leader Conference, uh, that I've never shared to any audience before. I'm very excited about that. But not only that, you know, um, we're going to give you some new practices and systems and things that we've learned here,
"under Pastor Mark's leadership. Um, I mean, we, we've made massive tweaks to the growth track that's getting, getting more horsepower out of it and things like that. But when I was preparing all of these, um, topics and sessions, you know, I've been working on them for weeks now to get my main stage. I have four of them. Four main stage sessions. Mark Pettison, John Maxwell will be the other two. I was, it, it just came back to me that really everything is falling into six categories or six areas of growth. And I'm not trying to just reduce everything down to, you know, in that kind of way. But really, the truth of the matter is, if you get six things right, if you get these six things right in, in building a healthy church, uh, I can almost guarantee that momentum and that, I hate to use the word success, but it's, we want to grow the kingdom. We want to, we want to fulfill our growth potential. We want to see all that God has. It's not our success. It's heaven's success that we are, we are good at the Great Commission. And I want to talk about those in this session because I thought it'd be a great kind of a precursor and, and I told you guys before we got started, kind of give, give, you know, uh, the whole conference in a 30-minute podcast.
"Good luck. I can't wait."
Yeah, I know. So that's, that's, that's asking a lot, and we've already spent several minutes already. So let me give you these six. And if you're taking notes, I know a lot of you said, uh, you know, a lot of people watch our podcast even with their staff and team. In fact, you met,
"Yeah. I was in Lima, Peru about three and a half weeks ago. Uh, and, uh, was with Camino de Vida, incredible church. Pastor Taylor and Robert Berger there in Lima. And had a guy, some just pointed at me. He said, 'Hey, Grow Leader Podcast.' And I met him, Pastor Daniel Fernandez in Uruguay. And he said, 'Hey, I listen every single time you release an episode.' So, I mean, I just love that we have people all over the world listening to us. And you're going to see those guys coming up at conference. And you can be there, too, by the way. There's a few, few places left at the Grand View campus for conference, but just appreciate that the local church is, is doing all they can to grow all around the world."
"Yeah. And in this podcast, I mean, you know, I know podcasts, a lot of podcasts are very conversational and relational and and whatever. You know, we try to bring content. I actually every time I prepare for one of these podcasts, I know we have teams and pastors sitting together learning. So that, you know, I want us to have a great discussion together, but I always like to, you know, I want to deliver on the goods, too. Lee, come on now. You know,
"that's you, man. That is you at the core. So, so if, if, if you look at all things growing a healthy church, I, I say they still fall into six things that you're going to keep healthy. And the first one is, I call it simply clear vision.
"And this is what night one is all about at the conference, is making sure that we're all crazy focused. I mean, like intentionally focused on the Great Commission. At the end of the day, you know, all of our churches have vision, and we all do different things, but at the same time, we all have the exact same assignment from heaven, right? And from our, our commander-in-chief, King Jesus, to get out there and reach lost people, pastor the people that we reach, disciple the ones that we've pastored, and mobilize, um, those disciples and to make a difference in the world. And I believe that is the Great Commission. And we talk about it through the four cups of Passover as that metaphor, like I talked about. But at the end of the day, vision has to be clear. And you say, 'Okay, well, then we have that.' But, but I go still go a lot of places, and you guys do too, where they think their vision is clear, and it really isn't. So, you know, they have, they haven't really, and this is how you know when you can go, you go talk to people or ask even the staff. One of the exercises that I do with teams, uh, staff teams when they ask me to help them, I say, 'Everybody, write out the vision, or write out the win, or write out what you're measuring, write out what matters, write out the touch, however you want to say the touchdown line, whatever, write it out.' And 100% of the time, what happens is I get good answers and different answers.
"Yeah. Yeah. So, everybody has a, you know, 'Oh, we think this is what our church is all about.' And the next person on the exact same team says, 'No, no, this is what our church is all about.' And they're all good, they're just not the same. And that's what I say when we have, you know, clear vision, we, we, we can't be going in different directions. We have to all be kind of making sure we know what we're measuring. And,
"I, this is, it sounds clever, but it's true. But you've always said multiple visions is division."
That's what it is.
"Exactly. It's more than one vision. And it, and they can all be good, but they cannot be different. They have, they, they have to, our vision has to be the same. So, one of the things I encourage every church to do is just make sure you don't have to say it the way we say it. I mean, the way we say it, there's a whole story behind that, too, where 'Know God, Find Freedom, Discover Purpose, Make a Difference' came from. But, but you can go to any staff member and practically any church member, and they can tell you, 'That's,
"that's who we are. That's what we're we're headed toward.' Even,
"no matter what event we do, it all comes back to, are we helping? Are we reaching the lost? Are we pastoring people? Are we helping people, you know, find freedom? Are we helping them discover their purpose, get discipled, and mobilizing that local church?
"And it's not a different vision for what happens in kids church, and what happens with student ministry, and what happens with grown-ups. It is the same vision."
"Yeah. There's a commonality of vision. And then there's a consistency behind it. This is overcommunication. Overcommunication in every area of our church and over a period of time because some people are going to adopt later. Yep. They're not going to quite get it at first. And that's okay because it's the same messaging at every campus. It's the same smell at every campus. It's the same consistency of the way parking is done. All of those things kind of set the culture of Church of the Highlands and the vision being the same, no matter where you are."
"And the second thing is, once we have that clear vision, and again, if you aren't coming to the Grow Conference, that's what you would get the first night. I, I'm going to speak for 45, 50 minutes on why this matters so very much. And I've got some new material for this this year in that talk. Um, but then now we have to actually, uh, once we have clear vision, now we have to run plays to to cross that finish line or cross that touchdown line. So now we know what we're measuring and what we count, what, what matters, where that touchdown line is, so to speak. Now we have to run a set of plays, and I call them systems, because what systems are is they simply deliver the vision, and we have to have systems that work. And I want to make this statement, I want to make it really, really strong, and that is, vision cannot change and it will never change. We're never going to stop reaching the lost, pastoring people, discipling people, and, and mobilizing the church to make a difference. But what can change is how we get there. And the plays we run, because I don't think they are eternal. I, I don't think the plays we run, the way we run those plays, the systems that we use to deliver the vision is going to be the same. And that's one of the things that's happening right now at Church of the Highlands. I mean, yeah,
"you know, because we're a large church, it can look like things are working extremely well when they actually aren't working as well as they could.
"And so, when you have a lot of people participating in something, it just like say, 'Wow, that's still going great.' But as we, over this past year, under Pastor Mark's leadership, looked under the hood, we had, we had a few areas that were honestly could have, could be functioning a whole lot better. One of those being the growth track. We're actually revealing one of our systems, is a growth track to help people find their purpose and get on a team. We found some areas where that needed to be improved, and Pastor Mark is going to share those at this year's conference. In fact, I think we ought to get him on a podcast after the conference and let him share for those who who weren't there.
"Uh, but I call them systems have to work.
"And, and how do you know if they're working? Are they delivering the vision? You know, so, and I always, I always tell people, you know, you don't have to do it our way, but you, but stop defending something that's not working. Yeah.
"Um, the right way is the way that works. Are we delivering the vision?
"And the minute you give it attention, it starts getting better. So, even with the, with the growth track, the piece that you mentioned, I mean, I, I led Step One of the growth track at the Grand View campus this past Sunday, and I had to live in the notes because it's all new. And there was a season where we did it the same way for a while. It was almost muscle memory. We're just kind of doing it. Everybody's having to think about it, which means everybody's giving creative input. Hey, this worked, this did not work, and everything's getting better because everybody's,
"Do you have something that you want to, uh, one of the new areas that we've learned that is actually causing that growth track to be more productive? You want to share it? I know we're going to share at the conference, kind of reveal it, but let's go ahead and give them a little appetizer."
"A, a big win is they're not hearing from the growth track host as much. People are getting a chance to talk at the tables themselves with a table host. And so they get a chance to share their story, and everybody's leaving. I don't know if this is too much. Everybody's leaving the first part of the growth track knowing what their testimony is and how to share it."
"That's great."
"Now think about that. That's something that we've added,
"that's new. So more than just introducing a church to them, we're actually helping them connect at a table with a host and even learn how to share."
"Yeah. They get to make sense of their story and learn how to share their story."
"Yeah."
"Wow. That's pretty awesome."
"It is. It's great. It's a game changer. And that's just one of the things that we're going to share that's actually we're seeing tremendous success in. So we have these clear vision. We have systems that work. And the third is, and, and by the way, these aren't any in any necessary order. I'm just giving them to you. But the third is is culture. And culture is that one thing that if everything else is working well, but it's in, but the culture is bad, the other things still don't work. And I say that because sometimes we get churches say, 'Well, you know, we tried this or we tried to do that, that thing that you recommended.' And, um, and I always come back and say, 'But yeah, but talk to me about the culture that you tried that thing in.' Yeah.
"Because I mean, you can, you can take good old seed that'll grow plants and throw it on this table, come back a year from now, and that seed will still be sitting here. It will have done nothing. But if you go put it in fertile soil, it'll produce. So where you place it, where you put these, this vision and these systems determines its success. And man, this is the toughest one, I think, to teach. We, we'll have a session again this year at Grow Leader on some of the things that we're learning about building a healthy, uh, a healthy culture. But this is one of those things that's, that's, I think the toughest thing to teach because it's such an intangible. Like I can tell you what time to have a church service on a Sunday morning, but culture is such a feel, and it's really a personality, so to speak, of the organization.
"And it comes from, at the bottom line, it comes from, are we life-giving or not?
"You know, are, are, are people receiving what we're giving them in the spirit of, 'You get to do this,' or 'You have to do this'? And if there's any one single thing that I think we've all learned,
"Yes,
"about healthy culture, it's, we call it the tree of life. It's, it's, it's putting everything in this environment where people actually want to do it."
"I think even refocusing on, and you've said this for a long time, we probably need a whole episode just on culture, but, uh, your content you're delivering is only going to help you so, so much. And, and then it's about, man, were there hugs in the commons? Was there connection? Uh, is there an accessibility with the team at your church? There's all those culture pieces that that make all the difference in the world."
"Yeah. And I think they, they, they come to really two areas, and it's how we treat people, and it's really, is God there? Is God's presence there? That's a culture too. You know, that,
"did, did I walk in and and sense the presence of God, which we'll talk about that as one of the final points in this list of six. But, but I mean, the cult, the culture is huge, and you see it in, in every environment. That's what makes homes work. What's, what makes marriage work is just, um, you know, just making sure that we, we stay focused. Always led, though. You've always led. I've been here 12 years. You've always led, and Mark is continuing in that area in creating high-touch. It's got to be a high-touch environment. Our culture's got to be, and, and I've seen at periods of time where we've waned a little bit,
"because maybe we've relaxed in certain areas, and the leadership sees it and then addresses it, and we reset. And there's this like going, coming back to it, reminding ourselves, because we'll get complacent at certain times, but it's, we've always go back to this high-touch environment, and then everything starts to change."
"Well, you don't stop teaching that. Every time we have, have had a massive conference like Grow Leader Conference, you will send an email out that says, 'Hey, don't forget,
"'31 Ways to Maintain a High-Touch Environment.'"
"Maybe we should include that in the show notes today, the email that I sent to all the staff."
"Yeah. Um, that just, and all the data is pointing to is relational, and especially this generation, uh, demands this authenticity, this sincerity. You know, I was thinking about that verse. I don't know that I've ever taught this verse, by the way, in a culture lesson, but I thought about this morning when I was preparing for the podcast, that in Acts chapter 2, when the church was exploding, it says, 'with glad and sincere hearts.' Glad and sincere hearts, and they had everything in common and had favor with all the people. And the question, I think the question for all of us is, what would it take for us to, you know, serve the Lord with gladness, glad and sincere hearts, and then have favor with people? And I think it's just something that all of us need to assess and, and make sure we're keeping it."
"Great. We'll definitely include that '31 Ways to Maintain a High-Touch Environment.' We'll send it out. We'll attach it to the show notes. So growleader.com/mpodcast. It'll be there."
"Number four in this list of six, um, is in the area of finance. I mean, at the end of the day, if, if, if you don't have money, if you mishandle money, if the way you talk about money, the way you spend money, all things related to finance, and you know this very well, Lee, um, that, that when this is healthy, the church is healthy. But this is one of those areas that if it's unhealthy, um, that, that I don't know how you can grow a healthy, life-giving, um, church. And so, I'd love for you to speak into some of the, some of even some of the new things that we're learning in this area. And, uh, and by the way, this year, normally we would have a, a financial one day, a financial one day, but we're actually going to move that to a different time, September. That's right. So you can even talk a little bit about what we're going to do in that session too, as well. But,
"talk about that."
"You know, I, I think one of the things you brought up even in, in culture is the culture, and I think giving ties, because really giving is an exchange of trust,
"at the end of the day. It's an exchange of trust. And is God's presence there? Because the most powerful giving on the planet is spirit-led giving, not what you can sell somebody. And I think many times we try to sell people on something that maybe we're not quite living. And you've taught me this, PC, that you can only be culture,
"right?
"And so, in that, what are you doing even within, as a leader, with your own personal finances? How are you managing those? Because your leadership will be dictated by even how you manage that. That if you're struggling and you, and your own personal finances are a wreck, you're going to, that's going to bleed on in, over to the church, and people really can sense that waste. Uh, I, I know, and I've heard this from you, and, and I've tried to apply this even in my own life, to where look for areas, do an assessment. I think for pastors that are listening right now, and you're saying, 'Man, I wish we had more money. Well, I wish we had more vision. I wish we had this.' Well, why don't you examine what you do have?
"And maybe autopsy is not the right word of,
"but to do kind of an audit and look for areas of waste. Look for areas where you know what, we didn't manage that well. Own it. Don't live there, but own it, fix it, address it, and just start living it. And what's going to happen is there's a different spirit
"that comes on. It's like the, it's really, I think the blessing of God that'll come on a certain area when you're stewarding it well. But the small things matter. How you handle this, how you handle that. God holds us responsible for what we do have, not what we don't have. So if I'm a church and I'm saying, 'Well, that's easy for Highlands to say they have a lot of money.' Well, hang on one second. Highlands has been led and managed for 25 years on these same principles. So it's a quarter of a century. Yeah, we're seeing the fruit of that, but it was a quarter of a century of of addressing it, and the little things really mattered. Business people really have a saying, pastor set vision, but business people set the pace of that vision. And both are equally important. And you're seeing this massive, I don't know if you've, you, if people have noticed, but man, I sure have, of where there are so many things that are happening in the business community where they're, they're being sought after and to come and let me coach you with this, and let me help you as the faith-based entrepreneur, and all these different things. And all of that's beautiful. And business people are diving into that 'cause they're hungry. Pastors, listen to me when I'm saying this. They're hungry. But them fulfilling anything outside of the purpose that God's created them is never going to bring fulfillment.
"So if they're inside your church, create a place for them to actually use that gift. And at the core level, people talk about our legacy team, or they talk about the spirit of generosity, and all of that, but at the end of the day, it's discipleship in the purest form because Colossians 1:16 says we're created by God, but we're created for God.
"Right?
"And so, if we're created for God, anything outside of that purpose is never going to bring us to true fulfillment and impact.
"So, the question, because there's the stewardship side. What do you do with what you have? Where do you get it?
"Yep. But how important, and I want you guys to answer this. How important, we got to be careful about what we communicate about even workplace theology. I think sometimes we've, how, how much does it help people to give when they're reminded, 'Hey, this God's in the work that you're doing when you go out during the week?'"
"You need to affirm them. But I think the church should be leading in that area. Exactly. Not, not some secular organization that's going to coach them. I think the church should be leading in that area. But we've got to create a place for them. We've got to affirm them. What changed in my own life as a business person for 40 years was a pastor affirmed me in my calling. And it's like, 'No, no, no, no. You, man, you guys set the pace of the vision of our church.' And I'm like, 'I never saw it as that. I never, it was a spiritual gift of giving as a, even a spiritual gift. I had lived it for 25 years, but never knew it was a gift until my pastor or him, PC, called said, 'Man, you have the gift of giving.' I'm like, 'What's that?' I didn't even know it was a spiritual gift. This is the, this is the, this is the bottom line that, that when whenever giving is happening, it's not the win for the church or the ministry. It's the win for the person doing the giving. Whenever they have this sense of, I talked about it yesterday in the, in the spirit of generosity. I called this the message I preached yesterday here at Highlands, the Samaritan Way,
"because you had all these different players in the Good Samaritan story of the ones that, you know, were obviously the robbers were, were the takers. Yeah.
"But then you had the priest and the Levite, who were the ones who were just the avoiders. They're just like, they were just going around the need. But the Good Samaritan stepped into that. And the win, I mean, obviously the person who was receiving the, the money and the bandaging and the, in the hotel room and all the things that he provided was a win for that guy who had been robbed. But the Good Samaritan was the one who, I, I am convinced, was the most fulfilled in the story.
"Yeah.
"That, and we've got to help people find the joy of generosity. That's why, you know, First Corinthians chapter 9, you know, that, we don't give under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver, someone who just enjoys the process. So the question becomes then, what kind of ministry, uh, vision, leadership do we need to provide so that becomes a reality? And that's one of the things that we're going to take an entire day for those of you listening, September.
"We're going to do a, a Grow Leader One Day. If you've never heard of a One Day, it's where we take single topics. We've done a One Day just on groups. We've done a One Day just on team. We've done just on the Sunday experience, on the worship. This is going to be a One Day on finances. You need to get registered for it. It's going to be right here in Birmingham in September. U, we can include that in the show notes, or you can go to the website, the Grow Leader website, and see this. But we'll talk about not only the spirit of generosity and creating the culture that I'm convinced makes all that possible, but then stewarding it well and raising up legacy givers, etc."
"And, and also even on an operational side of how to manage the money and in principles, even from an operational perspective. One thought that I had when we were prep, when we were preparing for healthy finance, both prosperity and the lack thereof can be challenges. I know people who prosper. I know people.
"So there's an element of surrender. I think that's really required in our lives as, as a believer. And I think business people, when they connect to kingdom purpose, everything changes for them. But inside their church, because they have a saying, 'Never let your prosperity outrun your surrender.' Because when you allow your prosperity to outrun your surrender, it's going to cause a lot of problems in your life. And the way you stay surrendered is in relationship. The way you stay surrendered is having a, a great spiritual family, a solid local church, and there's an element that brings fulfillment. So, I would say to pastors, talk to some of your key business people, ask them a question, especially the ones you're close to. Uh, it's a powerful question. Ask them the question, 'Are you fulfilled?' You may have a big balance sheet. You may have, and I'm telling you, there are so many business people that are out there. The answers to the giving question, they're sitting right in front of you, pastor. What we've got to do is create a pathway for them to connect to the purpose inside the church, and then that fulfillment will happen. And when that happens, it's on."
"That's so good. We got a lot to say about this."
"I love how, I love how passionate Pastor Lee is about it because really, it's the, it, it comes across as, 'I want you to find the thing that I found.' It's this,
"that's exactly right.
"Yes. It's in your eyes, like, 'If I can find the business leader and let you, let you see what I found, I want you to have it, too.' It's great. But we need a whole day to actually teach all this. So that, that's coming, that's coming up. And we have a couple more I want to give on this list before we run out of time."
"So again, if, if, if you're asking me to give you this 30,000 foot view of a 3-day conference of all the things that we give, it really boils down to these six things. We're going to have clear vision. We're going to have systems that deliver that vision that works. You got to have a healthy culture. Got to have a healthy attitude, spirit of finances, all things related to that. The fifth one is all about the team."
"Yeah. In fact, it's, it's the number one most requested topic by you all who interact with Growleader. You constantly ask us about hiring, firing, uh, discipling team members, creating pipelines for team members. And you're right, by the way, that is one of the most important things for you to solve. Never take your eyes off that ball. Jesus was right. We don't have a harvest problem. Luke 10:2, we have a worker problem. The harvest is plentiful. The workers are few. And one of the most important things, and I'm doing an entire session at Grow Leader this year on building healthy teams. And when I say teams, I'm talking about staff teams, governmental teams, volunteer teams. We call the dream team. Um, but just making sure that you're constantly invested in that. And I would say to you, pastor, because we're kind of running out of time here, but I would just say the first thing that you can do is make sure every week your calendar reflects the fact that you're developing other leaders."
"And I always get asked, like, what does that mean? And it comes back to what you just said, Lee. You have to ask them the question. And that is, 'Tell me what's in your heart. Tell me what, tell me where you're trying to, you know, who you're trying to to be and how you're trying to be developed. And let me just help you, come alongside you.' And I always say, 'You, you disciple the deficiencies. You keep asking them questions and say, you know, tell me about your marriage. Tell me about your money. Tell, tell me about your prayer time. Tell me about, you know, can you share your faith?' Yeah. And when you, when you whenever you hit a roadblock of something that's weak in them, you spend some time and you lean in and you develop leaders. And then there's other ways, obviously, to build systematic pipelines of developing leaders, like the growth track, etc. But honestly, it comes down to organically, are we developing leaders? Are we pouring into our staff? Are we developing our staff? Do we love our staff? You know, and discipling in them. But you never take your eye off of the team ball. Anything else you guys want to add? And I'm going to close this out, but I would just say it's a lot easier to do, to grow that when you, as the senior leader of your church, are talking about the ways that you are growing, how you're going to find ways to grow, because you've always done that. Pastor Mark still does it. So it puts us, it's a culture of, 'Hey, we're all getting better. We're all growing and learning.' That's very good. That's very good."
"All right. So again, if you're getting the Grow Leader Conference in 30 minutes in a podcast, I'm telling you guys, starts with clear vision, systems that work, culture, finances, teams, and then finally, and I want to end on this, and I don't, I don't want to, I don't want to, I don't want to give it just a little nod. This is,
"if this one doesn't happen, you can forget the other five."
"Yeah.
"And that is that God's presence. I call it the God factor. It's the fact that God says, 'You know what? I'm going to bless this.' And then the question becomes, this is a big one, and that is, what do we have to do or not do to get God's presence to settle in on our ministry and our church and our personal lives? Like, are we cultivating and making room for the anointing of God? Because I'm telling you something, people are hungry, hungrier for God. The data is there. They're hungrier for God than ever before. But they can also sniff out a fake.
"Yeah.
"And something that doesn't have that touch on it. And that's why, you know, um, it starts with us. And, you know, pastors, it's time for you to, you know, get your prayer life strong if it's not already, your Bible reading, your time in the presence of God, you know, and, um, and that's why we kind of coming out of the summer, we have this 21 Days of Prayer and Fasting. Honestly, it's strategically placed for two reasons. One is to pull us out of the summer slump because unfortunately, people when they take time off, they take time off from God, too. And it allows them to kind of have a revival of their soul. Again, I'm, I'm inviting every single one of you listening, uh, either do it yourself or with your church, but join us for 21 Days of Prayer. Add some fasting in that time, if you'd like, but we're going to go after God with all of our heart. But the second reason is is to pray in the, the, the, the fall harvest.
"Yeah.
"And somehow, uh, in, in the natural, fall is a harvest season naturally.
"It's, it's so strange that somehow it ends up being one spiritually as well. We see more people come to Christ,
"beginning in August and September and October, and then all the way in, even through Christmas. Christmas has become one of the best ways to communicate the gospel. And so we're praying into that season in every way. And I'm just, I don't know. I just, I want, I want to call everybody that's listening to today to kind of that reset,
"of, of getting back, um, cultivating the presence of God and the anointing of God in our personal lives and in our ministry."
"Well, it is, it is cultivation because it is a culture. So, you can't just do it just for this season. I mean, it's for us as a church, it's every Saturday. It's before Motion Conference. It's before Summer Blast, which is our Vacation Bible School. Before everything we do, there is a culture of prayer for legacy team, whatever it is, it is bathed in prayer. We're really asking God to move. That. I'm excited for conference. That, there's way more. You've got so much more that you want to talk about.
"Um, it's going to be incredible. I can't wait. So, remember, there are seats still available, uh, for the Growleader Conference. You can go to growleader.com/mpodcast, and we'll put the information there. If you have any questions about how to get here, how to be a part of it, email us, and one of our amazing teammates, uh, will, uh, we'll get back to you. info@growleader.com. Excited about it. It's going to be great. It's going to be,
"amazing. Join us."
"I hope you have the best rest of your summer and you're getting ready for the fall. It's a harvest season. It's going to be amazing. We'll see you next time on the Grow Leader Podcast."