Notes from Rick's 1st Session

 

This is some of what I got.  Hope it helps you.

When God wants to renew your church….or any church…He always takes it through the same 5 renewals.  Here they are:

1.  Personal Renewal. 
It starts in the heart.  If God is going to do something in your church, God will first do something in you!  The bottom line is this; fall in love with Jesus again.  It’s about a relationship with Jesus. 
It starts in the HEART.

2. Relational Renewal. 
First I’m right with God, then I’m right with you.
Love God – Personal Renewal.
Love your neighbor as yourself – Relational Renewal.
The gossip goes down and the
Conflict goes down and unity goes up.

Two signs of renewal:
a. The singing gets better. 
When people love God and each other…they want to sing.
     Harmony creates harmony!
b. People hang around longer after church is over. 
They want to hang out together.
     If people can’t wait to leave each other,
           you don’t have a service – you have a performance.

3. Missional Renewal
We have a purpose.  We have an assignment.
We don’t just love each other and no one else.
We have 5 things we are supposed to do. 
Great Commandment and Great Commission.
When we get the purposes lined up in our churches they grow again.

Get these three: Personal, Relational and Missional Renewal…and you’ll grow!

4. Cultural Renewal.
This is after the first three renewals!  You cannot change the culture of a church. Only God can change it and it comes through Personal, Relational or Missional Renewal!
God does this…after the first three renewal movements!
The bigger a church is, the harder it is to change the culture.
The #1 tool for changing the culture of a church is the PULPIT.

5. Structural Renewal.
You can’t put new wine in old wineskins.
As your church gets healthier the structure must change.
There is no perfect structure in a church.  There is no perfect structure in the bible.  There are character traits but no “job descriptions.”
Structure must change as the church grows!

6. Institutional Renewal.
Institutions are always the last thing to change!
    They never institute change. Ever.
Institutions take longer to change. 
Seminaries are 60 to 90 years behind.
Institutions preserve the changes of the previous generations!