Lifeschool 111: How to Avoid Poisonous Gossip in Your Life
Gossip is one of those things these days that is so common in relationships, in our conversations and in our cultural experience, that we hardly even notice it anymore. In this episode of Lifeschool, Caesar will share why gossip is pure poison. You’ll also discover 3 ways to crush gossip before it gets started.
Lifeschool 135: The Best Ways to Be Missional This Halloween
Click to download the Ultimate Guide to Halloween on Mission for Free.
Halloween… that time of year when kids all go nuts, eat too much candy, and then crash after their sugar buzz wears off. But there’s more to it than all that.
Today on the Lifeschool podcast, we talk about what may be the lowest hanging fruit of the year when it comes to relationship building and intentional missional engagement with your neighbors.
The First Time I Tried Starting a Missional Community I Failed
Have you ever tried starting a missional community from scratch?
“Missional” is a label we give to the qualitative and descriptive aspect of how a church or group of people actually lives. My buddy Hugh Halter says it simply,
“It’s about how much like Jesus people become… how much they influence, woo, and transform the culture in which they are placed.”
A family, group of friends or church that lives like this… Sounds good!
Well, a few years ago my friends all thought so too. We were excited to be rebels who were starting a missional community.
Excited, that is, until things progressed to where we moved beyond our weekly meal and discussion about being missional. It was time to start heading out and building new relationships, serving those in need in our city… actually making disciples.
That’s when everyone recoiled a bit.
Let’s Try This Missional Community Thing Again
Now I’ve learned how to make discipleship and mission a reality–something simple that everyone can live out in everyday life.
What I didn’t know back in those earlier days of starting a missional community was that while most Christians want to make disciples and live on mission with God, they also feel way to busy!
Often, when moving toward a lifestyle of discipleship and mission, people become overwhelmed with what they perceive as the risk of their family time, “margins” and sanity!
The secret is moving from “additional” to “intentional” in our thinking.
Discipleship is not a set of activities we need to jam into our lives, or a series classes that we need to take. And a missional community is more than just a weekly meeting of our small group with a name change.
It’s a series of simple, rhythms or “moves” we can easily, and intentionally, engage in our everyday life. Step by step.
Imagine…
- Making new friendships that naturally lead to “doing life” together.
(I can show you how.) - Or knowing how to talk with others about spiritual things without feeling awkward or pushy.
Discipleship becomes a way of life that includes your kids, close friends and neighbors.
That’s what my family and friends now experience.
If you want it… I’m here to get you started without all the headaches, stop/starts and frustration.
The best part? It’s 7 simple steps.
This process takes a little effort and intentionality. But it’s not complicated. And it’s one of the fastest ways I’ve discovered to get started with others making disciples and building community.
(You can do Steps 1 and 2 today!)
I want to give you access to this free Start-Up Guide (including ‘How To Start a Missional Community From Scratch’). Just click the button below and I’ll send it over.
Halloween Brings the Mission to Your Doorstep
Depending on your faith community or brand of spirituality, Halloween and trick-or-treating may be controversial for some of you. But no one can argue that when a national tradition literally lines kids and parents up at your doorstep, that has to be a good time to roll out the red carpet for mission.
Regardless if you really love this tradition and go all out, or if you’re less into the whole dress-up and party thing, and whether you call it Halloween, Trick-or-Treat, Harvest Party or whatever, here are 7 things you can do to leave a lasting impression on people and really prime the pump for future missional opportunities:
Click to download the Ultimate Guide to Halloween on Mission for Free.
What Are the (new) Signs of a Healthy Church?
No one sets out to have or lead an unhealthy church or ministry. But we often find ourselves stuck in a loop of numbers and metrics we’ve inherited, or were imposed on us by the “higher-ups”. It would be great to have new signs of a healthy church.
The 3 Bs
For a long time now, churches have often or only measured three things I call the “3Bs”: Butts (attendance on Sunday); Building size; and Budgets. Are these the signs of a healthy church? Hmmm… I wonder how Jesus’ ministry career would measure up to these three benchmarks?
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ABOUT ME
I am the author of the top selling book, The Gospel Primer. My latest books, Transformed and Small is Big, Slow is Fast came out recently on Zondervan.
I help those with a high commitment to intentional living in the areas of their discipleship, family and mission acquire the leadership skills and tools necessary to succeed and leave a lasting legacy.