Rick Warren on the 3 Privileges & Temptations of Leadership

by: Rick Warren

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Do you think it’s easier handling success or failure?  Thomas Caryle once said, “For every one hundred people who can handle adversity there is only one who can handle prosperity.”  I think most people can’t handle being at the top.  It changes them.  In fact, success destroys some people. There are several legitimate benefits of being in leadership.

• Position — you can become more
• Power — you can do more
• Privilege — you can have more

The extra effort and work you put in get you more position, more power and more privilege.  With each one of these comes a very great temptation that can be your downfall as a leader if you misuse it.  I Cor. 10:12 “So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!”

We’re going to look at the temptations of leadership, an appropriate thing if you read the newspaper.  The three greatest nations of the world often face turmoil because of the abuses of leadership. “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

Today we’re going to look at the temptations of leadership and the antidote.

1.  You will be tempted to misuse your position. 

Have you ever seen anyone get a promotion at work and they suddenly become a little dictator?  It changes them.  They’re a nice guy until they get the promotion.  Then all of a sudden they start treating everybody demeaningly, derogatorily, making excessive demands on people.  Unrealistic demands demoralize people.

Pastors are elders and overseers, and the shepherding of the church is in our hands. But this is not an excuse to abuse the influence granted to us and to exploit people. In fact, the Bible is clear that the church’s shepherd-leaders will be judged far more harshly because of their potential to influence people to move toward Christ or away from Him.

2.  You will be tempted to abuse your power.

You can be a driver or a motivator. Drivers have no appreciation for the people they oversee while motivators are constantly finding ways to empower the people around them. Your role as a Pastor isn’t to hold people down and have them to serve your needs, but to elevate them and equip them to serve Jesus and change the world. In other words, the power God gave you as a leaders isn’t for you, it’s for others.

3.  You will be tempted to profit from your privileges. 

When The Purpose Driven Life went global, two things came into our lives that we never expected – a new global influence and a new financial affluence. Kay and I had to make a decision about what we would do with those resources. We decided to start reverse-tithing. We started giving away 90% of the income we were receiving and living off the other 10%, and I stopped taking a salary. I’m Saddleback’s busiest volunteer!

When you decide to profit from the privileges of your leadership, you give people a reason to question your motives. That doesn’t mean Pastors can’t be compensated in a generous way. It simply means that we have to check the motives of our heart as leaders to avoid any question about why we’re doing what we’re doing.

Coming soon, I want to talk about three ways to keep your integrity as a leader. Until then, beware of these three temptations of leadership.

Tags: Leadership Barriers, Leadership Engine, Rick Warren

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Rick Warren’s 7 Tips for Being a Better Leader by Being a Better Reader

by: Rick Warren

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If you’ve ever been to Israel, you know there’s a real contrast between the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea. The Sea of Galilee is full of water and full of life. There are trees and vegetation. They still do commercial fishing there. But the Dead Sea is just that – dead. There are no fish in it and no life around it. The Sea of Galilee is at the top of Israel and receives waters from the mountains of Lebanon. They all come into the top of it and then it gives out at the bottom. That water flows down through the Jordan River and enters into the Dead Sea. The Dead Sea takes in but it never gives out. That’s why it’s stagnant. The point is, there must be a balance in our lives to stay fresh with both input and output. There’s got to be an inflow and an outflow.

Somebody has said, “When your output exceeds your income your upkeep will be your downfall.” There must be a balance. Most Christians get too much input and not enough output. They attend Bible study after Bible study. They’re always taking in but they’re never doing any ministry. The problem we pastors and church leaders face is the opposite. You’re always giving out, and if you don’t get input, you’ll dry up.

Paul wrote his second letter to Timothy in prison. At the end of the letter he tells Timothy, “When you come, bring my coat, bring the books, too, and especially the ones made of parchment.” (2 Timothy 4:13. ) At the end of his life, while in prison, Paul wants two things… “I want my coat and I want my books.” C. H. Spurgeon commenting on this passage says

He is inspired, yet he wants books. He has been preaching at least thirty years, yet he wants books. He’s seen the Lord, yet he wants books. He’s had a wider experience than most men, yet he wants books. He’s been caught up to heaven and has heard things that are unlawful to utter, yet he wants books. He’s written a major part of the New Testament, yet he wants books.

Oswald Sanders in his book Spiritual Leadership says. “The man [and woman] who desires to grow spiritually and intellectually will be constantly at his books.” I remember reading the biographies of both John Wesley and Jonathan Edwards. Both of them were intellectual giants. They stayed fresh by having a book continually while they were on horseback riding from event to event. Everywhere they traveled, they had a book. I’ve seen drawings of Wesley with a book in one hand, reading, not even looking where his horse is going.

Leaders are readers. Every leader is a reader. Not all readers are leaders but all leaders are readers. A lot of people read but they’re not leaders. If you’re going to lead, you’ve got to be thinking further in advance than the people that you’re leading. There are at least four reasons reading is essential.

>  You must read for inspiration and motivation.

Harold Ockenga said, “Read to refill the wells of inspiration.” William Long, who wrote Christian Perfectionand a number of Christian classics, wrote “Reading on wise and virtuous subjects is next to prayer, the best improvement of our hearts. It enlightens us, calms us, collects us, collects our thoughts, prompts us to better efforts. We say a man is known by the friends he keeps but a man is known even better by his books.” Personally, I feel few things get me out of sluggishness than reading a good book. It gets my creative juices flowing. So the first thing I do is read for inspiration.

> You must read to sharpen your skills.

Aldous Huxley said, “Every man who knows how to read has in his power to magnify himself, to multiply the way in which he exists, to make his life full, significant and interesting.” Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body. Your mind is a muscle and just like any muscle, the more you exercise it, the stronger it gets. You cannot wear out your mind. No one ever died of an overused mind.

Just like every other professional, you as a minister, have to continually be upgrading your skills. The way you do that is through reading. Make a list of the skills that are needed for your facet of ministry and then read in those areas.

> You must read to learn from others.

It’s wise to learn from experience but it’s even wiser to learn from the experience of others. All of us learn from the school of hard knocks — trial and error. But we don’t have time to make all the mistakes ourselves. Socrates said, “Employ your time in improving yourselves by other men’s documents, so you shall come easily by what others have labored hard for.” Employ your time reading what other men have already learned and then you can learn much easier what others have labored hard for.

The fact is, you can learn from anybody. You don’t have to agree with everything they do, but everybody has something to teach you. We have assimilated lots of good ideas from many different sources and put them together in a new format and that’s what creativity is. All truth has been around forever. There are no truly new ideas. Creativity is taking existing ideas and making them work in a new way.

> You must read to stay current in a changing world.

If books are any indication of personal growth of senior pastors, a lot of pastors in America stopped thinking when they got out of school. They’re not reading anything new, yet they’re trying to speak on a weekly basis. In today’s society obsolescence comes very quickly. You can write a science textbook and by the time it gets to press it’s out of date. You cannot live out your entire ministry on what you learned in seminary. You have to keep growing and keep learning.

With that as a background, I want to share with you seven tips about how to get more out of your reading:

1. Analyze your reading habits to see what you’ve read and what you really need to read next.
2. Be intentional about scheduling time for reading, then read snippets of books wherever you are.
3. Balance your reading. Read broadly. Include people you don’t agree with. This is how we are stretched.
4. Mark up your books and take notes. If you use a reading app, make highlights and store them.
5. Know what not to read. Know your favorite authors, read the covers and tables of contents and the bibliographies to see if the book is worth your time.
6. Read book reviews and book summaries to process even more books in less time.
7. Build your library. Whether you prefer print or ebooks, collect a library to reference and to leave behind.

And above all, remember that the Bible is our number one priority in reading. You can get so caught up in reading other books that you don’t read the Bible. Make time for God’s Word before reading anything else. It is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. We need to spend more time reading it than anything else.

If you want to be a growing leader of a healthy movement, keep reading. It’s the only way to stay out front.

> Read more from Rick here.

>> Check out Auxano’s SUMS Remix, referenced by Rick above in Tip #6.

Tags: Leaders are readers, Leadership book summaries, Rick Warren, SUMS Bookshelf, book summaries

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Three Ways to Bring Out the Best in Others and Release Creative Leaders for Ministry

by: Rick Warren

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It’s impossible to have a healthy church that experiences multi-dimensional growth without trusting people enough to delegate leadership to them. Having said that, this remains one of the greatest bottlenecks to growth for thousands of churches. And delegation remains one of the hardest challenges for Pastors and church staff members.

One of the reasons we fail to delegate leadership is our fear of wildfire. We’re afraid things will get out of control – and indeed they will – but limiting control is actually what often fuels growth. We often encumber leaders with too much red tape. Policies and procedures have their place, but we can easily add so much structure that people don’t feel free to lead and make decisions.

The key to motivating creative people to lead ministry effectively is granting ownership. At Saddleback, as much as possible, each ministry makes its own decisions without a lot of oversight from the staff. We believe that the implementers should be the decision makers. When everything has to be passed by a committee or board, we tend to ask why? about every decision. But our initial response to the ideas of creative people should actually be why not?

There are three ways to bring out the best in others and release creative leaders for ministry.

> Give Them a Challenge

People love to live up to a big challenge. Jesus demonstrated this with the Great Commission. He took a dozen average guys and challenged them to go tell the gospel to the entire world. He knew they couldn’t do it alone and they couldn’t do it quickly, but He knew they could do it over time as the church expanded under their leadership.

> Give Them Control

People need permission. I often say that you can have control or growth, but you can’t have both. At least you can’t have a lot of both. You must have some control, obviously, but there’s always a trade-off. Growth happens in an atmosphere of freedom where leaders are encouraged to dream, to try, to experiment, and even to fail and move forward. Burnout happens when we squash every new idea with a skeptical attitude.

> Give Them Credit

It’s extremely important to affirm and encourage those who serve. Pointing out successes, providing guidance and comfort through failure, and reminding people of their calling and giftedness in Christ matters greatly to the accomplishment of the church’s mission. We are wired to respond positively to encouragement and we’re usually motivated to keep going even when things get difficult if we know that our labor is appreciated.

Would you like your church to be stronger and healthier and to grow multi-dimensionally? You must die to self, give away ministry, and empower leaders with permission. And if you’re reading this as a non-Pastor, you absolutely must give your Pastor and staff the freedom to lead and feed by taking the responsibility of ministry.

>> Read more from Rick.

Tags: Creative leaders, Leadership Development, Rick Warren

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Snuffing Burnout: Rick Warren’s Advice on How to Discover a Healthy Working Rhythm and Energize Your Team

by: Rick Warren

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The quickest way to destroy a team is to burn them out. And you don’t have to look around the field of ministry very long to realize that the ministry is filled with burned out leaders. But it’s possible to find a healthy working rhythm and ultimately increase the effective energy with which your leaders serve without causing them to burnout.

Every minute of every day we are using up energy, and every person has a limited amount of energy. If we keep the pace high all the time, we use up the energy people have to give like the way a car with its lights left on will wind up with a dead battery.

This is especially true in times when your ministry is growing. Growth brings change, change brings problems, and problems consume a lot of emotional, physical, and spiritual energy from your leaders.

Here are seven ways to discover a good working rhythm and raise the energy level of your team.

1. Don’t expect every leader to work at the same energy level all the time.

We are all unique, and every leader serving in your ministry is wired differently. Some need more quiet and rest than others. Some work better in organized chaos while some need no chaos at all. At Saddleback, we try to hire workaholics and then force them to calm down and find a rhythm.

2. Be sensitive to external drains on energy and compensate appropriately.

Sometimes leaders have big issues and seasons of transition in their personal lives that affect the amount of energy they’re able to pour out. From health crises to marital crises to pregnancy and new babies, leaders often need time to concentrate on specific family issues.

3. Plan your year in energy cycles.

At Saddleback, we typically move through two major growth campaigns in a year. In the spring and in the fall, we set aside around eight weeks per year when we really focus on adding more small groups and really pushing people to invite their unchurched friends to some big days. Easter, Mother’s Day, and Christmas are all big days for us, as well as special events that surround some of the global issues we’re addressing.

Between campaigns and holidays, we regroup. Most years, we close our offices between Christmas and New Year. Newspring Church and Northpoint Church usually cancel their post-Christmas Sunday services to give their thousands of volunteers a breather. It’s okay that some weekends are intentionally designed to consume less energy than others.

4. Allow staff members to have flexible schedules.

We don’t watch the clock. We watch results. When staff members travel for church-related events, we want them to take a day of rest afterward. When they have evening meetings, we want them to come in later the next day. My mentor, Peter Drucker, said, “Empasize results, not activity.” Some of our Pastors work four or more services per weekend, so we want them to have a day off during the week.

5. Work smarter, not harder.

Ecclesiastes 10:10 says, “If the ax is dull, and one does not sharpen its edge, then one must exert more strength; however, the advantage of wisdom is that it brings success.” (HCSB) There are tools, techniques, and new technologies that streamline the way we do ministry. Use them. And learn from mistakes and failures to avoid wasting energy on what doesn’t work.

6. Focus on the long haul.

James Collins wrote a famous leadership book called Built to Last. Of the 12 values he articulated he found in companies that survived through three generations, ten are found in Saddleback’s original vision statement which we have had since our first year of ministry. Your church can be a mushroom, which springs up overnight, or it can be an oak tree that grows larger and stronger over time with deep roots.

7. Make the work fun!

People rarely succeed at jobs they don’t enjoy, which explains the success of companies like Google, known for their fun and creative atmospheres. The most successful people get paid to do what they like to do anyway! Saddleback Church receives thousands of phone calls every day and hundreds of thousands of emails every year, and we try to give everyone an appropriate response if at all possible. So, we keep things light.

Over the years, we’ve done Taco Tuesdays as a staff. We’ve hiked around our property during a staff meeting. Once we closed the office and we all went surfing even though none of us knew how. We’ve purposely dressed tacky on the same day. We often send the staff home after a staff meeting just for the fun of it, and I’ve been known to start a food fight or two over the years.

The kingdom of God is going to last, and your church needs to be built to last, which requires a healthy rhythm of hard work, proper rest, and a good energy consumption pattern for all the leaders involved.

This is a busy time of the year for your church; ask yourself how you can lead your team to find rest and cultivate joy so that you can head into this year of ministry stronger than ever.

Read more from Rick here.

Tags: Healthy Staff, Rick Warren, Staff Culture, Staff burnout

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The Art of Vision Casting: 7 Critical Keys

by: Rick Warren

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A lot of people have great vision. But you’ll never see your vision become a reality unless you communicate it well to others. Many great God-given dreams die in the vision-casting stage. In fact, there are seven particular things you need to make sure your people understand in the process of sharing your vision with them.

1. Who you are. What’s your church about? Every church should fulfill the five biblical purposes of worship, fellowship, discipleship, ministry, and evangelism. But how you fulfill the purposes depends upon the distinct nature of your church. What makes your church unique? People aren’t the only ones with a particular shape; whole churches have them as well. When you’re communicating vision to your church, you’ve got to help people see how your church is unique.

2. Where you are going. Besides communicating your identity, you need to communicate the church’s direction and goals. Leadership is influence, and the quickest way to tell if you’re a leader is to look over your shoulder. If somebody’s following you, you’re a leader. If nobody’s following you, you’re not the leader. It’s that simple. The moment you have to tell people, “I’m the leader!” you’re not. Leadership is knowing where you’re going and being able to persuade people to come along with you. That’s influence. If you don’t know where you’re going, nobody else will, and nobody’s going to follow you. To communicate vision, you’ve got to communicate where you’re going.

3. Why you are going there. Once we’ve communicated where we’re going, we’ve got to tell our congregations why we’re going there. At Saddleback we do this through Class 101. A membership class is a great place to communicate the why of what you’re doing. People will have a hard time following you to where God wants you to go if they don’t understand the motivation behind it.

4. What it feels like to be going there. People want to be in on fun – and they want to be fulfilled. No one wants to be left out of excitement. To get people behind your vision, you need to communicate to people how fulfilling it will be to join God in what he’s doing through your church. People are looking for significance. You’ve got to let people know they’ll find significance by investing their lives in seeing God’s kingdom expand.

5. What people can do. As a part of vision-casting you need to help individuals in your church see what they can do. Everybody will need to play his or her part in realizing the vision of the church. You’ll need to give your congregation practical and immediate parts they can play in the process. You’ve got to help them see that their individual ministry contributes the progress of the whole. A good leader does that.

6. How you’re going to do it. Share with your congregation how you’re going to move forward. Be specific. As soon as you share your vision for your church, people will want to know how you’re going to do it. Let them in on the strategy. It’s going to help the vision become more reachable in the minds of your congregation.

7. What the rewards will be. Tell your church what the benefits will be for fulfilling the vision that God has for you. Focus on the spiritual and emotional benefits. What will it be like when Jesus tells you, “well done good and faithful servant”? That’s the most important reward we’ll get from doing what God calls us to do.

Vision-casting is an important part of your role as a pastor. God has a vision for your church. Your job is to help your parishioners get behind that vision. You’ll need to communicate these seven things when you do that.

Tags: Recasting Vision, Rick Warren, Vision casting

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Rick Warren on Preaching for Life Transformation

by: Rick Warren

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If God’s objective for every believer is to transform us into total Christlikeness, then the objective of preaching is to motivate people to develop Christlike convictions (to think like Jesus), Christlike character (to feel like Jesus), and Christlike conduct (to act like Jesus). Every other objective of preaching is secondary. At the end of the sermon, if people aren’t being transformed in how they think, feel, and act, I’ve missed the mark as a preacher.

To put it another way, the ultimate goal of preaching is not information. In fact, giving people a greater knowledge of the Bible can cause pride to develop in our hearers rather than humility if that information isn’t translated into obedience. And the goal if preaching is not merely instruction either. Preaching certainly includes instruction, but there is more to preaching that mere behavior modification. The goal of well-rounded preaching is transformation and obedience.

If we preach with life transformation as our goal, then the result will be believers who are more obedient to the Bible, and we call obedient believers disciples. Just look at the challenges Jesus gave as He taught people – He continually expected people to DO something as a result of hearing Him.

“Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.” John 13:17 (NIV)

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.” Luke 10:37 (NIV)

“But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand.” Matt. 7:26 (NIV)

“For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” Matt. 12:50 (NIV)

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven” Matt. 7:21 (NIV)

“If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching…” John 14:23-24 (NIV)

“Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it” Luke 11:28 (NIV)

Pastors, we are in the business of producing repentance. And repentance is more than being sorry, it’s more than confessing sin, and it’s more than changing some bad habits. Repentance involves a total change of our thinking to be in agreement with God, which affects our emotions and moves us to act in obedience.

Repentance is changing minds at the deepest level –  the level of beliefs & values. We preach to produce the ultimate paradigm shift for people – the very transformation of their lives. And it’s serious business!

Read more from Rick here.

Tags: Preaching, Rick Warren, Transformation

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8 Ways to Give Definition to Your Ministry

by: Rick Warren

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Ministry is too important to be done haphazardly. How we’re leading in the core of our churches has to do with life-changing, eternity-consequential decisions. Therefore, we need to think through what ministry is all about. Sometimes we are more strategic about our grocery lists than our approach to ministry.

The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body–whether Jews or Greeks, slave or free–and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. Now the body is not made up of one part but of many. If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason cease to be part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has arranged the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. 1 Corinthians 12:12-18 (NIV)

Two thoughts… First it says the body is a unit made up of many parts, which are arranged by God. In other words, God wants order in His church. Why? Because God is a God of order. So we need to evaluate our ministries and ask, “Is there order? Are we getting the maximum return out of the ministries that we have?”

There are eight components to ministry that help us to focus our efforts. And the more you focus on what you’re trying to do, the less energy it takes to do it. That’s a principle of life that applies directly to ministry.

What Is Your Purpose?

The business of the church is developing disciples who live effective lives for God’s glory. That’s what Ephesians 4 is all about, which says that we’re all built up into maturity for ministry and for mission. We’re in the disciple development business. We attract and win members, develop them to Christlike maturity, then mobilize them for ministry in the church and a life mission in the world. We do that in each stage and segment of their lives. Our product is changed lives. Our theme is helping people develop their lives to the fullest.

What Are Your Values?

The second question is a question about values. Take some time to write out a list of the theological and cultural values that are most important to you as you lead your church. The Pastor is the primary culture-creator in a church, and every leader creates culture within their ministry by sharing and living out some key values.

Who Are You Reaching?

In other words, at what stage of spiritual development are the people to whom you are speaking? In most churches, you will have a mixture on Sunday morning. But as you launch ministries and design processes and prepare sermons, remember that you have people at various places spiritually to think about.

You’re moving some people from the community into your crowd through evangelism. You’re moving others from the crowd to the congregation through fellowship. Others, you’re moving from the congregation to the committed by involving them in ministry. And still others are ready to move from the committed into the core to live out their life mission. And those who are living their life mission are bringing others into the crowd so that the cycle continues.

What Is Your Strategy?

Answer these two questions: Where would I like to see my church be six months from now? And, a year from now? Write your goal down in a sentence, and feel free to add it to the comments below. If you could dream your wildest dream and the ministry you’re involved in right now, how would you see it or a year from now? Now, listen to God. If possible, withdraw from the noise around you, take a deep breath and just wait on the Lord. Then ask God this question, “Father, where would You like to see my ministry six months from now? How would it be different?” As an idea comes to your mind, write it down.

What Systems Do You Need to Have in Place?

What does the word “system” have to do with the church? Remember, the church is a body, and your human body is made up of nine systems. You have a circulatory system, respiratory system, nervous system, a structural system, a digestive system, and so forth. When one of those systems gets out of order, it’s called illness or disease. God wants you to have a healthy body and the body of Christ needs healthy systems too.

What People Do You Need to Hire or Empower?

Who do I know that ought to be a part of this ministry but isn’t? Who could I recruit to serve with me? Who is right under my nose that I should be empowering for leadership? Come up with at least one name, maybe two or three, and write them down. Jesus said, “The harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. Pray for laborers.” When you get a name and you put it down, you can start praying for them.

How Are You Adding Value to People’s Lives?

This is one aspect of ministry – serving people by adding value to their lives. How does this ministry serve people? Are we meeting the real needs that people experience? Those needs can be physical, emotional, spiritual, and social. All four are legitimate needs. The Bible says in Luke 2:52 that “Jesus increased in wisdom (emotional and intellectual) and stature (physical), in favor with God (spiritual) and man (social).” A ministry that adds value to people’s lives finds ways to minister to these needs in a balanced way.

How Can Your Structure Increase Your Effectiveness?

Saddleback Church is structured according to five purpose teams. Each of the purpose teams of our church relate to the five purposes of our church and the five targets that we have for moving people forward in their lives. We have a Membership Team which helps cares for and supports the membership of the church through lay counseling, prayer, and recovery ministry. We have a Maturity Team that oversees our thousands of small groups. Our Ministry Team helps people to plug in according to their SHAPE. Our PEACE (Missions) Team carries out our calling to take on the global giants threatening our world. We’ve gone into every nation on the planet and are now infiltrating every possible people group and planting international campuses. And our Worship and Creative Arts Team leads our church in its corporate worship life. We have a few other teams that overlap or support these, but our approximately 400 staff are organized around our purposes in a structure that lets us maintain healthy systems so that we can move people forward and produce mature disciples.

This might be a good time to do some real brainstorming and writing. Begin by asking God to help you define your ministry for greater effectiveness.

Tags: Rick Warren, Strategy, Values, Vision, ministry definition

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4 Simple Rules About Where Your Church Meets

by: Rick Warren

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Pastor Rick Warren loves to tell the “moving” story of Saddleback – about how they moved so often in the early years of the church it became a standing puzzle on Sundays to figure out where they would meet the following week. Here’s how he tells it:

If you’ve ever heard the story of Saddleback, you know we moved from one location to another for twelve years before moving onto our campus in 1992. We met in 67 locations in our first 15 years of existence — and broke every church-planting rule that says you must have a consistent meeting location! We grew to more than 10,000 in attendance before we had our first building.

So I’ve never believed that meeting locations are critical to a church fulfilling its mission.

But where you meet to worship is still an important ministry tool for your church. Here are four simple rules we’ve learned at Saddleback throughout the years.

• Don’t let the shoe tell the foot how big it can get – Never be afraid to think outside the box when it comes to making the most out of your worship space. When your meeting space begins to limit your growth, then it is time to think creatively. Add another service. Find a different venue. Do whatever it takes.

• Make sure you have enough space – When your service is 80 percent filled, you need to start another service. This is one of the reasons many churches plateau. They don’t believe they need to add another service because they have a few open seats available. When you run out of space, you experience what Pete Wagner calls “sociological strangulation!”

• Make sure you don’t have too much meeting space – On the other hand, you can have too much space. Many churches have built a building far too large for them to fill. Too much space can keep a church from growing. If you have 200 people sitting in an auditorium that seats 750, it’ll seem like no one is there. But if you have 90 people in a space that’ll hold 100, it will seem as if your church is the place to be. It’s almost impossible to create a feeling of warmth and intimacy when there are more empty chairs than people.

• The smaller the crowd, the closer the speaker should be to them – As your crowd grows larger, the lectern or pulpit can be moved farther back and raised on a higher stage. If you only have 50 people in a service, put a lectern just a few feet in front of your first row. Forget the stage.

Read more from Rick here.

Tags: Physical space, Rick Warren, Worship

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8 Nations of Innovation for Your Church

by: Rick Warren

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4. Elimination: What part could we take out to make it simpler?

Software designers who are truly innovative ask this question. Steve Case, who founded AOL, says we always overestimate the amount of complexity people will put up with. So at Saddleback, we ask what we can take out to make things simpler. When I moved here to South Orange County in 1980, I was 25 years old. I was starting a church in a place where land was going for a million dollars an acre. I knew I’d need 50 acres someday, but until then, we eliminated our need for a building. We went 15 years and grew to more than 15,000 in attendance without a building. We used four different high schools, camps, banks, parks and tents. In the first 13 years of Saddleback Church, we used 89 different facilities in Orange County. We became one of the largest churches in America before we ever had a building.

5. Reconstitution: What has died, but we could bring it back to life in a new form?

Ask yourself, “What worked twenty years ago and died?” What great idea from the past could you bring back, but in a new format? For 2,000 years the Christian church has done systematic training. Catholics called it catechism. But a few years back, it had pretty much died. We reformatted systematic training for the Internet age, and we’ve had thousands go through it.

6. Rejuvenation: How could we change the purpose or motivation for doing it?

Sometimes changing the how and why makes all the difference. There are probably 1 billion health plans in America. So why did we start emphasizing biblical health through the Daniel Plan? We knew that for people to fulfill their God-given destiny, they needed to be healthy. We helped people change their motivation for both losing weight and exercising, and we changed the delivery system by having small groups work together to encourage one another to get healthy. Listen to this: In 2011, the Saddleback Church family lost an average of 4,000 pounds a day! Why? We provided a new motivation and created a new delivery system for dieting.

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Tags: Developing Leadership, Innovation, Leadership Engine, Rick Warren

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8 Nations of Innovation for Your Church

by: Rick Warren

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7. Illumination: How can we look at this in a new light?

When you’ve been working with something for a while, it’s hard to look at it with fresh eyes. I remember a number of years ago, our bathroom mirror cracked. Here was this big crack that went down the middle of the mirror, and it really bugged me at first. I told my wife, “We’ve got to change that.” Yet I didn’t. A couple of days later, I said, “That mirror really bugs me,” but again I didn’t change it. About six months later, it occurred to me I still hadn’t changed out the mirror because it no longer bugged me like it did at first.

We have an amazing adaptability. We just get used to stuff, and all of a sudden, we don’t see the problems anymore. We no longer see the critical issues like we should. So it takes some new eyes to come in and see what you need to do in a new and innovative way. Ask your congregation what they see. Ask them, “How could we do this in a different way?” Find out what innovations they suggest. And take a look at other churches and see how they do things differently from you.

8. Fascination: How could we make it more interesting?

Whatever you’re doing, try to figure out how you can make it more interesting or attractive. For instance, we wanted to create a sense of expectancy in our weekend services. We wanted our services to start with people sensing God in our midst and that lives were about to be changed. So we thought, “What would encourage this spirit of expectancy?”

We came up with several factors: having members praying for the services all week; having members praying during the services; having enthusiastic members bringing their unchurched friends to the service; having a history of life-changing services; music that celebrates the transformational nature of God; and a worship team that faithfully believes lives will be transformed during the service.

If you ask the right questions, they will lead you to the right answers. And the right answers will help you build a solid strategy for your ministry. Then believe that God will lead you to success.

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