Youth Leadership Resume: Intimacy

A Christian leader has a piece of the puzzle that a non-Christian doesn’t have: a relationship with Jesus Christ. Many people would ask what in the world this has to do leadership, but I would say “everything!”


Jesus didn’t lead like other people. He spent a lot of time drawing the line between the world’s leaders and the way that his disciples were supposed to lead. Living the Christian life gives a person a sense of leadership that others don’t have.

Now, let’s get one thing straight. We don’t read the bible and culture a relationship with Jesus in order to become better leaders. In fact, a Christian leader is called by God through their relationship, in order to serve. The Christian leader is also equipped by God through Spiritual gifting and sanctification, the process of being made more like Jesus. So rather than us using God to improve our means, it’s quite the other way around. God uses us as leaders to advance his kingdom and to equip His people to serve Him.

Our relationship with God, in fact, makes us worth following, and gives us the true way of leadership. This being the case, teaching our students to foster a relationship with God should be of high importance to us.

That is easier said than done, obviously, because we don’t see our students every day. It’s hard to help them set up lasting habits even with something as important as a relationship with God. That means we have to work even harder and smarter in helping our students do so. We have to partner with parents, work with our students, and model intimacy for our students in our own lives.

If we are to have a generation of Christ-followers as leaders in all areas of society, they will have to have an intimacy with God that informs their purpose, calling, and leadership.

Question: How are you teaching intimacy to your students?

Training Tomorrow’s Leaders Today,

Matt

Youth Leadership Resume: Humility

Humility. I’m not real good at that. I tend to go the other way: rampant, arrogant pride. So does most of the world.


Leadership goes hand in hand with pride. After all, you’re in charge. You’re the man (or the woman). You get it done. With all of that, it’s no wonder that most leaders do not show any humility. Even though this makes sense, it’s not the way it should be.

At its core, humility is recognizing who and what you are. If you are a Christian, then you know that everything you are comes from God. If everything you are comes from God, there shouldn’t be any room for pride, but rather worship, praise, and thanksgiving.

Many leaders, even Christian leaders, seem not to make this distinction. A young Christian leader is going to need to learn humility early, and continue to work on it as they gain in respect, influence, and stature. The higher up they get, the more they will probably struggle with pride.

Pride is an easy trap to fall into, and the world expects high-placed leaders to be prideful. But imagine a group of leaders who gave glory to God for results rather than glory to themselves. Now that’s counter-cultural.

In the course of our leadership development, we have to address humility. Humility, in its naked form, shows just what a person believes about God and themselves.

Question: how are you teaching humility to your students?

Training Tomorrow’s Leaders Today,

Matt

Youth Leadership Resume: Integrity

Over the next week, I want to talk about three elements of character that are most important to a leader. As Christians, we find ourselves in a world that wouldn’t agree with most of our character traits. We seem weak to the world; we seem different. I think different is good, but all too often Christians, in an effort to fit in with the world and not be seen as an outsider, will adopt the world’s standards.


If young Christian leaders are going to have an impact in the world at large then they must remain different. We must be set apart. The three elements of character that I have picked to write about this week represent what I believe are the core aspects of leadership that set us apart.

The first character trait is Integrity. My dad was big on integrity, and I grew up hearing that word every day. Unfortunately, many people didn’t grow up with my dad.

Integrity, at its heart, means doing the right thing all the time, even when people aren’t looking. I think that last part is the most important, because it talks about more than behavior; it talks about attitude. I can follow the rules to a person’s face, and as soon as they turn around, dump all the rules out the window. That is a sure sign that I don’t have integrity. I’m following the rules because it gets me ahead. Integrity is when we do what’s right because it’s right.

In a world of situational ethics, instilling integrity in our kids isn’t easy. In fact, it’s an uphill battle. But it’s a battle worth having. In fact, it’s a must. People follow a person with integrity. They look up to them. They’ll follow them because people with integrity are so different.

We need different. I don’t want the status quo in charge anymore. If we’re going to raise up the next generation of leaders, let’s give them some tools to be different. Let’s show and teach them integrity.

Question: how are you teaching integrity to your students?

Training Tomorrow’s Leaders Today,

Matt

Long Term Hope for Haiti

The third and last blog on Haiti this week is going to talk about a long term strategy for rebuilding Haiti.  Specifically, what our churches can do in the long term to help rebuild the country and share God's amazing love with the Haitian people.

Something I've been thinking about is organizing the church into teams of people with a specific skills mix and sending them down in shifts to help with rebuilding projects.  It would take a great amount of planning and coordination, but could really help when a full-scale rebuild is underway.

First, what will the Haitians need in the long term? 
Architects
New infrastructure
Consultants
Construction Workers
Carpenters
Teachers
Long Term food supply.
Counseling
Temporary workers in proffesional jobs where people were lost
and the list goes on.

Does anybody in your church fit this list?  How about your list? 
The resources to help rebuild this country are right here, under our very noses.

I'm curious.  What can your leadership team alone supply in the way of expertise or skill?  I'd be interested to hear from you.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

Passports at the Ready

I got this comment about Haiti relief efforts the other day from Michael Rhodus, a friend of mine from Excelsior Springs:

"my church is urging people to get the passports. When this phase is done we will be sending teams down to help a missionary we help support in Carfu . He was out out country when it hit , but arrived there a few days ago with a medical team.I would like to go if it is safe enough.Pray about it. We are also taking up offerings to help him. He does not get money from the Red Cross."

What a fantastic idea!  One of the things about the disaster in Haiti is that the relief efforts will not be short term.  We will be at this for a long time.  Not knowing where the biggest need will be, we should be developing short term (money to good organizations) and long term (may I suggest mission trips and long term relief teams) strategies. 

Getting your church in gear with passports and whatever training you can give them is a good first step in preparing for a long-term relief strategy.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

Haiti-Do Something

This week I'm going to put a pause to the normal leadership stuff and talk about ideas that have been coming in for helping the people of Haiti.  My prayer is that we can share some ideas and by communicating help the people of Haiti better.
My prayer in all of this is that the church rise up as one and flood the nation of Haiti with food, water, shelter, support, rebuilding effort, workers, and of course, the gospel.
One idea that came to me yesterday really caught my attention:  A benefit concert.  I expect that at anytime, the worldwide music community will start having benefit concerts for the people of Haiti.  Why can't we do the same?  Surely in your community there are some bands and a central location that you could use to put on a benefit concert. 
 As for me, I love the idea.  After talking with my leadership development team last night, we decided to start putting it together.  It's going to take some work.  In fact, it's going to take a lot of work.  But it's worth it.  I'll let you know what organization we will partner with to get the proceeds to Haiti. 
In the meantime, share some of your ideas with me.   Let me know what you're up to to help the people of Haiti, and how your leadership team is getting involved.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

Student Leadership and Haiti

Over the last couple of days, my heart has been breaking for the people of Haiti.  I cannot imagine the devastation, pain, and loss that they are going through.  There is only so much that pictures and news reports can convey. 
As I have been wrestling with my own response to this crisis, I was thinking that this situation would be a perfect opportunity to allow our leadership students to plan and execute some relief programs for the people of Haiti.  It is an opportunity for them to share the love of Christ with a devastated people and to learn and grow themselves.
I can't tell you how this is going to go, because we're just starting it.  My team is still deciding where the Lord will have us work, and how.  I will keep you updated on what we have decided to do, and how.  Like me you might be figuring out just what your response to this crisis will be.  Maybe you've decided to involve the leadership of your youth, or maybe your whole youth group (whatever the leadership team in my group decides to do will involve the whole group). 
Whatever the case may be, and whatever you've decided to do, I'd like to ask that we share those ideas with eachother as much as possible.  While this is a good opportunity for our students (and ourselves) to learn, the focus must be on the people of Haiti, and sharing the love of Christ with them.
I'm anxious to hear what you are doing, and eager to get started on our own projects for this ravaged people.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

Mini-Me Leadership

What kind of leaders are coming out of your leadership program?
This is a very important question. The purpose of leadership development is not to turn out clones of you. I can’t think of a more egocentric way to pollute the world. What the world does not need is another you. I’m sorry, but it’s true. What the world needs is a man or woman that God has created specially and specifically for their own task.
Let’s stop trying to turn out mini-me’s and let’s start partnering with God to help Him turn out the kind of leaders that He wants.
Our job as leadership developers is to work with and hone our students as individuals, allowing them each to become what God has intended them to become, not what you are. This is very difficult for some leaders to put into practice, because they are very familiar with what trained and honed them as leaders. Each of us are different though, and each of us are going to need a different “program” to train us as leaders.
Let me give you a good negative example. I am a reader. I read voraciously. I learn from reading, and I love it. Right now I am mentoring a young leader who is not a reader (not that they don’t read, but they don’t read like me; see how egocentric this can get?). At first, I tried to make them read. That didn’t work so well. When that didn’t work I found out what kind of a learner I was dealing with and began to teach to their strengths. That worked much better.
What this means for us is it’s not going to be easy to train new leaders. It’s hard, messy, and time-consuming. But nothing worth doing was ever easy.

Training Tomorrow’s Leaders Today,
Matt

Not of Your Church

Last night I took our youth group on a little trip.  We went to a church in a small town on the other side of Kansas City that was running a ministry for young mothers.  It's called Baby Grace Ministries, and is run by Anne Farmer and Juli Yocum.  This is a great ministry whose effectiveness is clearly visible.

The students that I took really enjoyed it, and I think it did them a lot of good to get out and see others in action.  This reminded me that it's so important to learn about and celebrate the things God is doing outside of your local church.  Youth can get so used to the things in your own church that they forget that there are other churches doing other things.  Sometimes they forget that those other things serve and glorify God just as much as the ministries your church participates in.  And sometimes, if we're not careful, our youth will begin to think that their church is the only one capable of doing things right or worth doing.  We have to guard against this kind of pride and arrogance.

Here's why I think visiting other churches and ministries is effective:
1.  It gets the kids off of their home turf.  Students need to see that God is worshiped and served in more places than just your church.
2.  Students gain an appreciation for other people and denominations when they see them in action.
3.  People from different churches and denominations think differently and have a different culture than do the people that we serve and worship with regularly.  Letting our kids see and experience different people will broaden them and perhaps give them new insights they might not have received staying on familiar ground.

Question:  What have been some successful trips to other churches, denominations, or ministries that you or your youth group have taken?

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

New Year's Resolutions Part 3

My last resolution is also the hardest.


Resolution 3: keep my resolutions.

I’m sure you can recall making a resolution, being very excited about it…for about a week, and then just lamenting the fact that you can’t keep your resolutions (if you can’t recall anything like this happening, then you need to be writing this, and not me).

Keeping my resolutions is a mixture of keeping the excitement, the determination, and the importance of my task at the forefront of my attention. Here’s my plan of attack for this year:

Read. A lot. Reading always keeps my attention focused. Two of my dominant strengths are input and learner. I love to read, and it helps me stay focused on the task at hand. It also keeps my subject close to my thoughts at all times.

Collect Blogs. I’m collecting quite a few leadership blogs on my igoogle page. I’m finding that over time I’m refining them more and more, so if you think that reading blogs about your resolutions will help you stay focused, here’s a couple of tips:

1. Look for blogs that are relevant to your resolution; in my case: leadership. If you want to get involved in some other blogs, then sort them in another file, another reader, or another page, so you can concentrate. Given the choice of reading a blog about work or about your favorite sports team, you know which one you’ll pick.

2. If you find you aren’t reading a blog or that it’s not helpful, delete it. It will only clog up your reader and make it less likely that you’ll wade through the bad stuff to get to the good.

3. Always be on the lookout for fresh content and new blogs.



Just Do It! Nothing trumps getting your hands dirty. If your goal is to start a leadership team, then the best way to keep your resolution is to start a leadership team. Tell other people about what you want to do. Enlist their help. You are less likely to drop the ball when it will be embarrassing to do so. Lay your groundwork, and prepare. The more you invest in a project, the more likely you’ll be to carry it off. This week is my jump off, and already I’m putting into play the foundations for expanding my leadership team, and I’m starting to organize a leadership seminar.

I pray that you carry through on your resolutions.

Question: If you have resolutions about leadership, what are they? How do you plan on carrying through with them?



Training Tomorrow’s Leaders Today,

Matt

My New Year's Resolution Part 2

So, my second New Year’s resolution ties in with my first, but it’s a lot more work.


Resolution 2: Share leadership with others.

I don’t mean delegate (although I need to learn to do that better, as well). What I mean is that I’m going to actively seek to build leadership principles and practice with other people this year, namely teenagers. You may not be in to teaching teenagers, but if you’re honest with yourself, you probably know someone who needs to be taken under your wing and shown the ropes.

Teaching leadership can take several forms, and each person, depending on how deep they want to go and how much time they are willing to devote to leadership development, will take a different road. Here’s how I resolve to teach leadership this year:

Mentoring: This is a more one-on-one experience, where just you and another person or a small group sit down and discuss leadership. This is a very intimate way to pass on leadership to someone else. I currently mentor one individual and plan on taking on one or two more this year

Group Teaching: A leadership development team or class can teach leadership principles to a larger group of people. While this tends to still be very personal, it is not as personal as mentoring. This type of platform is good for imparting basic leadership tenants and being part of an overall leadership program. I currently have a leadership team, but plan to expand it this year and deepen the teaching.

Conferences and Seminar Teaching: This type of teaching is good at reaching many people at once, and while you can learn a lot of great stuff, it’s not very personal (although it is a great place to make lots of new contacts that can become more personal). My organization, Next In Line Ministries, plans to do several seminars this year.

As you can see, there’s lots of ways that you can pass your leadership knowledge on. You don’t have to be speaking at seminars to make a difference. You don’t have to Mentor 20 different people to make a difference.

This New Year, resolve to pass on your leadership knowledge, even if it’s to one other person.

Question: How are you passing on your leadership knowledge?

Training Tomorrow’s Leaders Today,

Matt

New Year's Resolutions Part 1

Resolutions can be so cliché. Most of the time they’re gone and forgotten within a week. But with the New Year here, I suppose it’s time to take a stab at them once again.


What’s Your New Year’s resolution? Have you thought about it yet? Have you set them yet?

I have a couple that I’d like to share with you, and maybe even suggest to you. The New Year is a good time to start down a couple of roads that you’ve wanted to for a while, but have just been too busy to start. It’s also a good time to plan, and take stock of who you are and what you’re doing.

With that, here’s the first of 3 resolutions that are on my list for 2010.

Resolution 1: Strengthen my leadership skills

One of the things that has always bugged me is the wealth of information on leadership in the marketplace and how little of it gets back to the consumer. That’s one of the problems with the information overload that the internet is providing us with right now.

There are some amazing resources to explore your leadership out there, and I plan on taking advantage of them this year. I want to strengthen my leadership with as much knowledge and resources as I can, to be the best leader I can be in the coming years. I am deliberately setting aside time to explore my leadership style, my strengths, my learning styles, and my personality type. I am taking a lot of time to explore what Jesus said a leader was and become that leader.

Why is this important: Leadership is an art. It is a skill. It has to be practiced and developed. And, because I want to be the best that I can be. I want to be everything that God has made me to be. I want to be the best leader that I can be for those who follow me.

This New Year, I'm making it a priority to strengthen who I am as a leader. I hope you do, too.
Here's a couple of the books that I'm going to use this year.  Give them a shot and see how they work for you.















Question: What resources are you using to strengthen your leadership?

Training Tomorrow’s Leaders Today,

Matt