Sharing the Final 10%

In my own life, sharing the first 90% of my heart is the easiest. The first 90% rarely takes any risk.

When it comes to developing intimacy, it usually happens when I share the final 10%. (The final 10% often consists of some combination of my fears, insecurities, doubts, and weaknesses.)

Most likely, like you, I’ve been burned after sharing the final 10%. Because of my hurts, for too long I kept the final 10% to myself.

Looking back, it is amazing how much this barrier limited my relationships.

Now, I’m blessed to share the final 10% with many people.  It is in final 10% I find the most healing, intimacy, and trust.

How about you?

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The Final 10% Relationally

I’ve noticed that when it comes to relationships, it is easy for me to rationalize giving 90%.

• In my marriage, I might believe that when I serve Amy with 90% of my heart, I’m still offering her more than most men do.
• In my friendships, if I’m giving 90% of my best, most would be satisfied with my commitment.
• In my ministry relationships, if I serve pastors with 90% efforts, that is probably way better than most.

Jesus taught us to go the “extra mile” or give our coat as well as a shirt. If I stop serving others when I’ve given 90%, I haven’t given my best.

I’m writing this post on a plane after being at an out of town funeral. Normally, I would have flown home on an earlier flight. Today I booked a later flight to spend a little extra time ministering to the family.

Even though I’m very tired as I type this and I miss my wife and kids dearly, I’m still thankful God gave me the chance to give my final 10% to a family in need.

How have you recently shown the final 10% relationally? How have you not?

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The Bottom Line

Whether in the classroom or on your own, I hope you are a student of God’s word. More than anything else, a good pastor will be built around a love for God’s people and for God’s word.

When a couple is about to divorce, a person is about to die, or you visit the parents of a child who just took his life, I promise you no one will be asking about your education. At those moments, the only thing that matters is that you are submitted to the Spirit of God.

All the classroom education in the world won’t prepare you for what you’ll see in ministry. I hope you’ll learn from other pastors, leaders, professors, and mentors. And I hope you’ll learn on the job as God corrects or confirms each step you take. That’s what I’m trying to do.

Praise God that He allows us to share His word and love.

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Even More Hillsong Reflections

If I heard Brian Houston say it once, he must have said it a dozen times: “Church is about God and people.” In everything Hillsong does, you can sense their genuine hunger for God and love for people.

Even though their church is the largest church in Australia, it seemed small because of their relational emphasis. At each service, they took time to read prayer requests and praise reports.  This helped engage the church members in prayer and encouraged them to keep a ministry focus. The campus pastors (or stage leaders) would also highlight when key volunteers got engaged or had a baby.

This relational focus bled over into the conference. Each day, the leaders highlighted a “delegate of the day.” The staff would choose someone from the 20,000 attending and set them up front in a lounge chair, fed them, and highlighted them to the whole crowd. Some how this gesture made the conference seem smaller.

Most of all, I was blessed by the intimacy fostered between the speakers and key leaders. In the U.S., at most conferences, speakers fly in and out and aren’t expected to do much else.

At Hillsong, even though no one requested it, all the speakers and their families attended all the main sessions. Between and after each session, everyone gathered for extended meals. Even though we were exhausted and jet lagged, this wasn’t a burden. It was deeply meaningful and obviously a significant part of the culture.

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More Hillsong Reflections

The second thing that struck me about the culture of Hillsong was their passion to develop the next generation of leaders.

Developing a leadership culture is obviously a top priority for Brian and Bobbie Houston. They had “sons and daughters” in the faith everywhere. Amy and I had several of the top leaders host us during our stay. Most of them had been saved and discipled at Hillsong before being hired on staff.

The staff was obviously willing to take risks on all sorts of people at every level. On any given weekend, you can find a first-time speaker, first-time worship leader, first-time camera operator, first-time parking attendant.

They also seemed to create more leadership roles than servant roles. For example, each weekend service had a service captain. Many of these were led by lay people. At the City Campus where I preached three times on Sunday morning, one of the service captains was a doctor who also led the service.

Without notice, any staff member or lay leader could be invited to pray, call for an offering, or make announcements. Everyone was gladly ready for anything at any time.

This culture has been multiplied many times over in the dozens of church plants around the world. I couldn’t keep count of all the people I met who’d been raised up at Hillsong and sent out to start new churches.

Here is one take-away that I’m going to apply. Some times when I take off for a weekend, rather than having one speaker fill in for me (or fourteen campus pastors), I’m going to break it up and give twenty-six different speakers a chance to preach two times.

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Not Just More, But Different

I will never be satisfied with a church filled only with people who know Christ. God longs for the “lost to be found.” But for years I found the greatest joy in more people coming to church.

Today, I’m redefining success to not just more people, but different people.

A few years ago, our church was experiencing record crowds of people. But we also had many people who’d been with us for years falling into major sins.

We seemed to be effective at getting people into Church, but were we truly getting people into Christ?

I’ve been set free from being totally driven by attendance. Instead I’m asking God to take those we have into a deeper place of intimacy and knowledge of Christ. I’d rather have fewer and totally committed believers than a large number of lazy, apathetic, carnally minded and unproductive cultural Christians.

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Giving Out

As a pastor, I’ve always seen it as my role to teach people to give. My primary teaching has been to lead people to give to the local church. While I still believe the local church is the hope of the world (quoting Bill Hybels), I am not as focused on what our church can “bring in” financially, but what we can “give out.”

For years I said to myself, “One day, when we have ____________, we’ll be more generous.” The words in the blank changed over time.

• One day when we have a real building…
• One day when we have a bigger staff…
• One day when we have the building paid off…
• One day when we complete the new phase…
• One day when we add these new campuses…

After years of half-hearted promises, I believed God said “Today is one day. It is time to put your money where your mouth is.”
We’ve worked to change our culture to a culture of generosity. (We’ve learned a lot from Dino Rizzo at Healing Place and Chris Hodges at Church of the Highlands.)

Since success isn’t simply bringing money in, we see it as…

• Providing as many free resources as possible to help other churches.
• Making a significant impact on the people in our community.
• Helping meet needs around the world in the name of Jesus.

When it comes to finances and resources, for us success is no longer just what we bring in, but what we send out.

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Sending Out

For years, my emotions rode the roller coaster of attendance. After a strong week of attendance I felt good about myself and life. After a bad week of attendance, I felt like the world was crashing down around me.

I was consumed with bringing people in. Never once did I lay awake wondering why we hadn’t sent more people out.

About ten years into leading Life Church, I started thinking about how big we were (according to some standards), but how little we’d actually accomplished (according to God’s standards). Compared to the real needs of our communities, we had not made a significant difference.

That’s when I got excited about a new measurement of success. Instead of “defining the win” by how many people we brought in, what if success was measured by how many people we sent out?

• How many can we send into our communities to serve?
• How many can we send into the world to evangelize those without Christ?
• How many can we send to help start new churches?

Rather than just celebrating those we bring in, let’s celebrate those we send out!

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