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The Second Decade
2008 marks the 12th year of existence for LifeChurch.tv. It’s scary how fast time flies. This week I’ll share some insights I’m learning in the “second decade” of this ministry.
Things I Like Better in the Second Decade
- Right Priorities. As I age (and hopefully mature), it’s nice to not feel like I’m trying to prove myself. In the earlier years, my emotions and self-worth revolved around the numbers. (By numbers, I mean attendance, giving, salvations, and ministry involvement.) In the second decade, I am learning to measure success more by obedience to God than by visible results.
- Deeper Faith. God has been amazingly faithful. Knowing His goodness for a decade in ministry helps me trust Him all the more tomorrow.
- Meaningful Relationships. I love having staff and church friends whose bonds have grown deeper over time.
- Assurance of God’s Power. In the early years, I thought I had to do “awesome” things to get people to come to church and stay. We often seemed to be trying to outperform a previous experience. Now I’m grateful that teaching God’s word and loving His people is more than enough to get the job done.
- Broader Perspective. Nothing can replace experience. Seeing God working in different places around the world helps me to appreciate His broader plan and not obsess with what we are doing.
- My Marriage. Amy and I have always been blessed with a good marriage. But since I’m more in love with God and less in love with the church, our marriage is much better for it.
How is this season better than the last in your ministry?
Visit 
When I first started…I was a 23 year old know it all…now I’m a 27 year old “know I have a lot to learn…”
Honestly I still feel super new at this, and super young, and super unqualified. But instead of focusing on that stuff, I just try (keyword: try) and focus on how God is working in spite of all that, and am SUPER thankful I have a bunch of wonderful people around me from whom I can learn.
The greater blessing would be for most of us to be able to learn this irrefutable truths in our first decade. Thanks for sharing.
I lead a team of evangelists and trained evangelists all over the U.S. for fours years.
When ministry first started it was all about the numbers, people coming and people recieving Christ. That was our boast, and we saw alot of both.
I also saw a lot of people wounded from that as they slipped through the cracks. I felt convicted that quality of ministry was being overshadowed by the pressure to perform. We scaled down, and got back to essentials.
Since then, what God has shown me echoes your perspective. Now at 34, I am a much happier Christian, husband, and father. It is much easier to please an “audience of one”, than chasing the numbers rabbit and burning myself out like a shooting star.
I always rejoiced when someone made a decision for Christ, or learned to share their faith and overcome fear… but now it is much sweeter, and I am much more appreciative of God’s work in people’s hearts.
Form my perspective, this season is much “better” than the last.
Craig,
I’ve been a part of LC since 2001… I’ve seen and felt the change… we all have!
It’s amazing to see the change in the church as you’ve fallen more in love with God… it’s even more amazing to see and feel the change in my own life as we’ve all taken your lead to seek God with more passion than ever before! Thank you.
“Teaching God’s word and loving His people is more than enough to get the job done.”
As a team it is so important to first love one another, love your people, and do the “right” things; that is more than enough to get the job done!
Great Points and Great Reminders. My season of ministry just began 2yrs. ago and I’m lovin’ it. I look forward to LC’s second decade…..
In honor on Martin Luther King Jr.; here is one of his quotes regarding the church:
I’m feeling old however as I enter my 16th year of vocational ministry I’ve learned to quit trying to do & learn to let Jesus live through me. I’ve experienced God’s Grace like never before just in the last 2 months.
I’m with you, Craig. I am at a place where I no longer attempt to get my worth from the things I do. I also realize that desiring the approval of others can, and often does, lead to my downfall.
Your statement about right priorities is so refreshing and right on.
Thank you so very much for all that you do and this blog!
I’ve been working with students for the past 8 years, and I have tried to find my worth too many times in the numbers game. I have learned over the past few years that God wants me to just be faithful, and leave the results up to him. He has blessed and we are growing and I have seen that God does not need me, but he chooses to use me.
Anne, It is funny how the older we get the more we realize what we don’t know.
Joseph, Good stuff.
Avery, You are a blessed man!
Anna, Your words mean more to me than you know. Thanks for giving your life to the cause of Christ.
Scott, Congrats to your team on another amazing weekend. Thanks for the MLK quote.
Kevin, So glad to hear God is sustaining you during this season.
Cindy, So true.
Mark, You are very welcome. Thanks for being a part of the conversation.
Adam, Great lessons!
I am at the point now where I know who I am and who I am not. I know my gifts, my strengths, & my weaknesses. I am finally comfortable in my own skin, which has allowed me to be authentic in all I do. Very liberating.
Craig, “right priorities” is absolutely the primary marker for me in the last couple of years. The main reason? Marriage.
My relationship with my wife takes priority not with reluctance or frustration, but because it is God’s best and because my heart desires it. I think I said this recently on this blog: while the marriage covenant is spoken of frequently in Scripture, there is no “church work” covenant.
Also, the last couple of years have been better simply because I am more mature as a Christ follower (came to Christ in 2000), and I have truly found my “sweet spot” when it comes to how I get to serve the Kingdom.
BTW, Joy (my wife) and I caught one of the IC experiences and had a blast saying, “I am rich!” out loud to the computer.
With now being in ministry for 15 years and planting a church this year…I am learning that family is most important. Of course planting kind of changes the rules a little on it especially when you work a full time job but over the past few years I began to understand that when you go home leave work at work. And on the weekend leave work at work.
The principles by which I do ministry have become much sharper as well. For the first 10 years I can look back and say that God was at work creating me as a pastor. I have a firmer foundation in which to run on now.
I can’t wait for this week’s blogs!
Wow! After being in ministry 6 years I realize that I don’t know it all and can’t do it all! I’ve tried. I have learned to work smarter and recognize the gifts and abilities of the people God has surrounded me with. I have tried to become a better communicator and networker. One of the ways is through http://www.flocksdiner.com where a friend and I podcast our weekly sermons. We have close to 5,000 downloads a week! God is awesomely showing me that he can use me to reach people that I don’t know. I look forward to the next season and more growth, both spiritually and numerically.
good stuff craig. perhaps my favorite post from you to date! I appreciate your transparency.
Craig, thanks for sharing with all of us in such an informal and personal way. Your transparency is so refreshing and frankly challenging, I want to be just like you when I grow up!
I suppose that one of the greatest lessons I’ve learned is that I can’t be the Holy Spirit in a persons life. I mean, if He can’t draw a person to change who am I to think that I can? My responsibility is to love, share and communicate the gospel to people, the rest is between God and the person. Secondly, I have learned that the Lord desires me to minister to Him just as much as He desires me to minister to others. It’s so easy to get busy doing “stuff” for Him that we forget Him. Here’s an old quote I like…
“It is one of the ironies of the ministry that the very man who works in God’s name is often hardest put to find time for God. The parents of Jesus lost Him at church, and they were not the last ones to lose Him there.” Vance Havner
last season was like a winter day at a drive-in located in siberia, in a convertible with no heater, watching the invasion of the tomato people over and over and over - cold stale popcorn (meetings), finger nail torture (decision making process), hand in disposal (money, money, money), and walking a pack of wild coyotes w/o leashes (leadership). all of which had to be done to get to this season of :
a box of LC chocolates - most of which taste pretty darn good. my gosh - is LC telling me that a ‘church’ is not a training ground for navel gazing, group think, and visions of self absorbed grandure?
i like the new season, it makes me want to see Christ lifted up and give away stuff
craig -
i echo what so many have already said…i started as a 21 year old hothead know it all…now i am a 29 year old asker of questions who really feels like he has no clue!
i’m learning to take myself less seriously and take the divine potential in others more seriously. my job is not to do the work and invite others in…my job is to help others see the work they could do and release them to do it. at least that’s what i am learning and seeing now…
thanks for this post..looking forward to the rest of the week. your humility and transparency is so refreshing to me…it’s clear why God is using lc the way He is!
I wonder is it easier to “measure success more by obedience to God than by visible results” because you write this sitting among such success with visible results? As a growing church were still trying to get to another level of influence in our community (more people and more life change). A lot of churches compare (which is not always good but can be used as a measuring stick) what and how they are doing church to what and how you are doing church. It just seems easier to write this among such great success, any advice to those who are still trying to grow? How do you balance the “obedience to God” with “visible results” while staying focused?
Ryan asked, “How do you balance the “obedience to God” with “visible results” while staying focused?”
Great question.
Can anyone help with some wisdom for Ryan?
I’ll give you some thoughts on the subject later.
In my ministry (YFC/friends), I last season would read my messages off of paper because I felt like I had to have security in case I forgot the message…this season I’ve learned to trust God and to put down the paper and let the Holy Spirit speak and remind.
Oddly enough, lately I’ve been in a reflective mood myself, Craig. Check out my blog posts this week for a blast from the past! It wouldn’t have happened w/out you, Bobby and Kevin. Thanks!
Hola Ryan,
It’s great to look into John 15 for this. You can read through it on your own and pull some great truths, but here are three that I think might apply:
1. Jesus said to “bear fruit”
2. He said to “bear much fruit”
3. He said to “bear fruit that would last”
It’s great when all three of these are blossoming at the same time, but hopefully you see at least one of them evident in ministry at all times. Let God worry about success vs. short coming. The simple fact that you are asking these questions means your perspective is good.
Craig,
Any chance you’d be willing to comment on the deepest disappointments you’ve had in the first decade and how those have translated into different priorities in the second decade?
Ryan, In response to your question… In the past, I was a slave to “whatever I thought would work.” Now, I try to do whatever I feel like God is leading us to do, instead of focusing primarily on the results.
And yes, it might be easier since God has given us some success. But to be honest, my (selfish) desire for results hasn’t diminished with success. My (unselfish) desire to please God is starting to defeat my sinful tendencies.
Jim, Most of my disappointments have been in myself. If I could do the first ten years over again, I’d do a lot different. Most of my faults were (and still are) born out of pride, ungodly competition, and the need to prove something. God continues to “chip away” on me.
Craig, I thank God I have been led to your ministry and I thank God that he continues to work on all of us…. As long as we know that we are always gonna have somewhere new to grow we will never fail him… It is his Love of Us and our Love of him that will continue to grow yOUR ministry… And your Central Team Rocks!!!!!! Keep giving us great wake up calls and doing things differently exactly as you are…
I love what Craig answered Ryan…
God has a funny way of shifting the ways we measure success as time passes…
I think God puts it on a heart to reach people any way they can… and then He teaches them how to do it, and then He teaches them how to do it better. I think it is more of a process than a model… and it is personal…
One thing is sure, it is a lot easier to follow God’s leading than it is to always be focused on the pragmatic…
Again… what “works” also has a tendency to change with time…
Abraham did what he thought worked… i.e. Ishmael… but God has a way of doing things differently, and ultimately greater than we can fathom or believe… i.e. Isaac, or life from a dead and dry womb that couldn’t bear children (or so it seemed)…
Stick with God’s leading.. and the rest He will take care of… that’s my cent and a half…
I feel like this season God is telling me to silence myself, and just be still. Not to try to be so involved that I lose the intimacy that we have.
[...] I’m really digging Craig Groeschel post on doing ministry in The Second Decade. [...]
i quickly learned that ministry is about more then preaching. i have learned (somewhat) patience (i’m under construction still). most of all i have learned to consecrate myself and depend on the Holy Spirit and not just head knowledge.