Strategic Planning Archives - Helping Churches Thrive

Ten Questions To Identify Your Church’s Actual Mission

Does your church have a mission statement? If it’s an evangelical church, it probably does. What does it say? More than likely, it says something to the effect of: “We exist to make disciples” – defined as growing, devoted followers of Jesus. Writing a mission statement is a “slam dunk” because this imperative is so…

INTRODUCTORY THOUGHTS – Strategic PlanningTemplate #1

Some say that strategic planning (hereafter: SP) is a trend in the business world and therefore shouldn’t be applied to the church. However: The fact that it’s trendy in the business world doesn’t make it wrong. SP should be judged by Biblical and practical criteria, on its own merits. Planning, with humility, the fear of…

PURPOSE: Strategic Planning Template #2

Is there a difference between mission (what the church is supposed to DO) and purpose (the ultimate reason for why the church EXISTS)? 1. Some evangelical writers/thinkers say “no,” there is no difference and leave it at that. 2. Other evangelical leaders confuse the issue (in my opinion) by coming up with several purposes…

FINDING OUR MISSION: Strategic Planning Template #3

Jesus wasn’t always easy to understand but He did make the church’s mission clear and simple. Study Matthew 28:16-20 – There is only one command here in the original language. What is it? Three participles (ing words) describe how the command gets done. What are they? Going – this is the action that we must…

OUR DESIGNER DISCIPLE: Strategic Planning Template #4

“Designer disciple” is not a great term. It conjures up all sorts of images and most them are not good. But I’ve never heard a better term, so for the moment, we’ll stick with it. The concept is not to be confused with the “Saddleback Sam” or comical “Green Bay Gary” type character who is…

FOCUS GROUPS – Strategic Planning Template #5

In my experiences of helping churches with strategic planning tasks – clarifying their purpose, mission, designer disciple, values, vision and strategy – the most controversial part of the process has always been the possible choice of a target or focus group. A focus group is a demographic niche which a church deliberately decides to concentrate…

VALUES – Strategic Planning Template #6

Valuable Thoughts On Values: Values are the underlying assumptions and beliefs about what is important, that guide our decision making and our behavior. They are what’s important to us as we seek to achieve our purpose, fulfill our mission and realize our vision. They are a big part of a church’s CULTURE. Values…

VISION – Strategic Planning Template #7

The creation of a vision statement vies with the identification of a focus (or target) group as being the most controversial aspect of the strategic planning (hereafter: SP) process. It has, in fact, been said that there are two kinds of pastors in the world: those who love talking about vision and those (probably a…

STRATEGY – Strategic Planning Template #8

Introductory Quotes: Do you agree or disagree? Why or why not? “For most churches, doing anything intentionally would be an improvement.” Anonymous “Vision is worthless without strategy.” Attributed to Aubrey Malphurs “…anyone who fails to define their strategy is not only foolish but also demonstrating poor management of the time, talents and treasure of their…

Four Bottom-line Truths About Vision

Vision is like the weather: everybody’s talking about it but nobody’s doing much about it. Let’s try to de-mystify this a bit, and maybe we can do something about it. Vision is simply a dream, a mental picture, of a better future. As leadership begins with dissatisfaction with the current state of things and a…

Demystifying The “Vision Thing”

Vision is like the weather: everybody’s talking about it but nobody’s doing anything about it. If nobody’s doing anything about it, it’s because practically everybody is confused about it. Demystifying the “vision thing” has become a passion for me. It doesn’t have to be painfully confusing. And a single, unifying vision really is vital, not…

Mission And Vision Contrasted: Why Pastors Need To Share Their Dreams

SUMMARY: Sharing your church’s mission is good, but also sharing what you believe God wants your church to become (your vision) is even better. Here’s why: You’ve probably heard management and leadership contrasted: “Management deals with what already exists; leadership deals with what will or should exist.” “Management deals with present realities; leadership deals with…

A Different Way To Download A Vision

Just about everybody knows that vision is important. It gets us dreaming and praying and moving in the same direction. When a Christian ministry believes it has received a vision from God, it’s very powerful. The “catch” of course, is how we get this vision from God. There are innumerable opinions on the subject as…

Three Advantages To Choosing A Focus Group

In my experiences of helping churches with strategic planning tasks – clarifying their mission, ideal disciple, values, vision and strategy – the most controversial part of the process has always been the possible choice of a target or focus group. A focus group is a demographic niche which a church deliberately decides to concentrate on…

Eight Ways To Choose A Focus Group

The congregation’s leadership team worked through the delicate discussion about the wisdom of choosing a target or focus group. As usual, some good people reacted to the concept of seeking to identify a God-chosen demographic group for their church to focus on reaching for Christ. The objections centered around fairness, exclusivity, prejudice (or “respect of…

QUICK GUIDE – Discipleship Pathways – Strategies For Discipling

Increasing numbers of evangelical church leaders believe in “intentional disciple-making.” This means having a plan, a system, a process for bringing new believers to maturity in Christ. We encourage every church to decide on a discipleship pathway for their own congregation. It may be very imperfect, but an imperfect discipleship pathway is far better than none…

Is Planning Unspiritual?

In a recent post, Ten Planning Principles From The Book Of Proverbs, I shared the results of a study I did on the subject of planning in that heaven-sent, down-to-earth book. I concluded at the end of my short summary that God commends planning which follows the principles found in Proverbs and He will bless pure-hearted, prayerful…

Ten Planning Principles From The Book Of Proverbs

Is strategic planning Biblical? Is it wise? Is it helpful? The Book of Proverbs answers these questions with a resounding “Yes!” if we follow the following principles: 1. Planning, thinking deeply about our future work, is legitimate and wise. Don’t just “go with the flow” while claiming to be spontaneous or Spirit-led. (Somebody said that “Only…

Change The Values – Change The Church

I still believe in the importance of having good, simple, understandable, non-obtrusive, biblical, church structures. Top notch constitutions, by-laws, covenants, ministry descriptions, guiding principles, can’t, by themselves, produce healthy churches. Bad ones, however, can make healthy churches almost impossible. But structure doesn’t count for much compared to the values in the hearts and minds of…

Book Review: I Once Was Lost

Delightful. That’s my one word review of the book by Presbyterian pastor Don Everts and InterVarsity Christian Fellowship coordinator, Doug Schaupp (IVP Books). The two have extensive experience in leading college-age postmodern skeptics to faith in Christ; more than two thousand of them, in fact. Their book is based on a great deal of listening…

Four Ways Great Churches Keep It Simple

“Out of complexity, find simplicity.” Albert Einstein Not everything in life is simple, of course. There’s doing your taxes. Or getting your new computer up and running. Sigh. But the longer I live, the more I value the genius and the hard work which it takes to arrive at the elegant simplicity that is on…