“I am the LORD your God, who brought you up out of Egypt. Open your mouth wide and I will fill it” Psalm 81:10
A vitalized church – usually quite young – is brimming over with God’s life. A re-vitalized church looks something like the following description:
A revitalized church is an established congregation of saints who are once again experiencing heaven-sent life. They are praying and seeing answers. They are bringing people to faith in Christ – because they want to – not because they have been programmed to do so. They love the Bible, not as a trivial pursuit, but as a passionate, personal pursuit. They are seeing miraculous Christian growth in themselves and others. They are not without conflicts and disagreements, but they are handling them with heaven-sent love and patience. They are doing good works out in the community, as above, because they want to. They are worshipping God with help from the Spirit of God Himself, demonstrating and expressing their love and loyalty to God. Within their fellowship they are practicing the one-another commands of the New Testament and using their spiritual gifts to serve their church family.
Pastor: Do you hunger for this?
I talk to many Christ-following pastors and I know that many of them:
- Hunger for churches which are pulsating with God’s life.
- Hunger for congregations that are excited to be working with God in making disciples.
- Hunger for churches which build up new Christians into strong believers.
- Hunger for congregations that grow a steady crop of qualified leaders.
I’ve been studying this subject a lot lately, and I am increasingly convinced that God wants to revitalize our churches. Hundreds of thousands of them.
And speaking of hunger: my hunger is to help more pastors and more churches than I ever have before. I’m helping some now, but I’m still hungry.
I also know that one of the methods God uses to do this is small groups which teach, equip and coach pastors through the unique revitalization journeys which He has in store for their unique churches. A cookie-cutter approach (now I’m back to eating again) will never do and that’s why I wrote The Revitalization Playbook. The Playbook is not a book on church revitalization, it’s a handbook for revitalization; a playbook, like coaches use. It’s full of discussion questions and suggestions for implementing the plays (strategies) immediately.
In the Revitalization Pastor Groups, which we’ll be starting soon, we’ll learn about the “scripted plays” which must be “run” in almost every church which is in need of revitalization. We’ll make it personal and specific, we’ll encourage and coach each other, and we’ll hold each other accountable.
Then we’ll move on to assessing the condition of our congregations, discussing which revitalization plays need to be run in each of our churches and going to work on running those plays.
Here’s what might be the best part: the groups will be FREE, except for the cost of the Playbook itself ($25.00) and the possible purchasing of a comprehensive, on-line, church health assessment tool.
There are two reasons for my making these groups free. First off, while I’ve led somewhat similar groups before, I’ve yet to lead groups using the Playbook. So you’ll be helping me learn to do this well. Secondly, I keep seeing that the churches most in need of revitalization are the least able to pay for consultants and training programs for their pastors. I believe that God is going to keep taking care of me if I keep helping you.
Here are a few details about the upcoming Revitalization Pastor Groups:
- They’ll be open to solo or senior pastors only (because only the “lead” pastor can lead a revitalization effort).
- I’m the coach. I’ve been obsessed with church health and revitalization for over 50 years. God used me as a revitalizer in eight transitional (interim) pastorates.
- The groups will involve only three or four pastors so we can “get personal” and apply everything we learn to your situation. I’ll try to match you up with pastors of churches which are similar to yours.
- We’ll have 1-2 hour, monthly Zoom meetings for one year.
- You’ll also have brief, monthly one-on-one Zooms with me, so we can talk and pray about the leadership challenges unique to your church and life.
- Homework will be minimal. The “heavy lifting” will be the actual leadership you’ll be doing in your church. If you’re not an accomplished leader, we’ll have you learning leadership by taking small, incremental action steps, because very few of us become great leaders by reading books.
That’s enough detail for now. Contact me soon with your questions. I’m making only eight spots available – two groups of four – at this time. This may be the God-given opportunity you need to get your hunger for a revitalized church satisfied. 651-319-1953 or churchwhisperer@gmail.com.
