Tag Archives: Orange 2008

Orange Meet-ups

Posted on 29. Apr, 2008 by .

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I went to my first Children’s Ministry conference 5 years ago. It was the Children’s Pastors Conference in Atlanta, GA. I went with two of my staff. Other than them, I didn’t know anyone. Actually, I did know Ryan Frank (I spoke at his church’s camp the summer before).

Orange is my 4th conference since that first one and just the first day has been characterized by meeting new and old friends. At the very start, I met up with the youth pastor from the first church I worked with in Texas (he’s actually my room mate for this week). Then this morning, I met up with the Children’s Pastors I served with at Cross Timbers for the last two years. A few hours later I met spotted Allan Phillips in the hallway and chatted with him for a few minutes. Then, totally randomly, I ran into someone I knew from much further back (actually he spotted me… and I’m glad he did). I ran into Tim Lawrence, the Children’s Pastor from New Hope Family Church in SD. I actually met Tim nearly 8 years ago when I first became a full-time children’s pastor in IN. He moved away shortly after I got there, but he was a volunteer for the elementary ministry. Now he’s in full time ministry.

I’m looking forward to connecting with Jim Wideman, the Kidology group (I heard they’re all getting together for lunch tomorrow) and several others tomorrow.

This is fun!

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Orange 2008: Session One

Posted on 28. Apr, 2008 by .

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The opening session for Orange 2008 was nothing short of amazing. The music was incredible… amazingly incredible. The band Fee (I think it was them) opened with the song “We Shine.” I’ve heard this song before and they did this song at KidStuf on Sunday. I love it. It’s a great song.

Sue Miller spoke for a little bit about how God’s been working in her life through her journey with cancer. She had some powerfully encouraging words to those who volunteer in ministry. Go Sue!

Reggie delivered an incredibly relevant message about what it is going to take to make a difference in this generation… and the generation that we’re leading. He eloquently told the story of the prodigal son. He built his message around comparing the response of the son’s return from the father and from the older brother.

Ultimately, Reggie asked the question: “What if we treated every prodigal like the father treated his returning son?”

He made the following points:

  • The loving father is preoccupied with who is missing… the older brother is preoccupied with himself.
  • The loving father operates from the context of forgiveness… the older brother operates from the context of shame.
  • Loving fathers throw parties… older sons throw fits.
  • Loving fathers confront older brother thinking… older brothers criticize loving fathers.
  • Loving fathers keep the lights on as long as it takes… older brothers close the door and turn the lights off.

What kind of church are we going to be… one like the loving father or one like the older brother?

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Orange 2008: Necessary Conflict

Posted on 28. Apr, 2008 by .

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Okay, there is way, way, WAY too much information to put here on the blog. This was an amazing breakout!!! Nancy Ortberg led this breakout. She, along with her husband John (author of many amazing books) led and served at Willow Creek for many years. Nancy now works as a consultant with teamworx2, a consulting group. Here’s the best I can do with putting all this great information on this post.

She began by encouraging everyone to read anything and everything that Patrick Lencioni wrote.

She defined conflict as “passionate and unfiltered debate.”

Leaders need to be the most self-aware person in the room (not in an arrogant way). Leaders need to be comfortable in your own skin.

Here is what happens when you don’t have conflict:

  • The best decisions will not be made
  • Team becomes a petri dish of mediocrity
  • Politics are created
  • You take risks without buy-in
  • Decisions will be sabotaged (malicious compliance)
  • People sin

The further up you go in an organization, the less truth you’ll hear. So…

  • Demand debate
  • Know your brokenness

So, how do you get it… necessary conflict?

  • Create a culture that encourages debate.
  • Give people on your team “real time” permission for conflict… and applaud it when it happens (allow people to do it poorly so it doesn’t not happen). When there is conflict, it is a team issue. One on one accountability is not nearly as strong as peer accountability.

How do you do this leading up?

  • Ask questions and make observations
  • Have the conversations (don’t avoid the conversations that need to be had)

Nancy shared some amazing points regarding some charts and diagrams that I can’t really duplicate here… all I can say is that it was really, really good.

She did recommend a few books.

Important note: Nancy pointed out that you’re going to have conflict… it’s either going to happen inside the meeting or outside the meeting. What better way to experience conflict in a closed and secure way where people can grow and be encouraged. The alternative is to fight conflict on the outside when it possibly involves people who don’t need to be involved and gets out of control.

Last of all: Conflict is one of the most powerful spiritual formation practices. If you haven’t genuinely said “I’m sorry” in the past month, you’re not building authentic community. Nancy poked fun at “spiritual formation” practices that have been popular over the past 2000 years. She said most books and practices have been written/developed by introverted men (her husband as one of them). Necessary conflict is a powerful force for spiritual formation and growth. WOW!

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Orange 2008: Creatively Wired Meetings

Posted on 28. Apr, 2008 by .

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This pre-conference breakout was led by Jennifer Tamborello who served on the original kid stuf team at North Point and at one time directed Kid Stuff. Here are some of the notes I took from this excellent breakout.

If we are not creative, we are not effective. It is imperative that we infuse our meetings with creativity.

Leaders need to be creative:

  • to design relevant environments.
  • to find effective solutions.
  • to communicate a bottom line (what do we want people to know when they walk away).

Six stages of the creative process:

  • Define: Establish a written brief (clearly define what you want to create).
  • Acquire: Random brainstorm ideas (no rules and no bad ideas).
  • Framework: Creativity happens in a sequential order… form helps clarify. Structure enhances creativity.
  • Compress: Reduce to the best ideas (this is the time where we throw out ideas).
  • Pause: Sleep on it. Allow ideas to incubate… allow time to process.
  • Solidify: Add detail and action steps (creativity needs an administrative step).

Good ideas never happen without leadership. Somebody has to have the final say.

Jennifer shared that in a creative meeting, there needs to be 6-10 participants. Everyone needs to know where you are in the process (what problem, event or series are we being creative about). Invite the people who know the audience best (Jennifer talked about how as they created for family production, they realized that their target were 4th grade boys, so she invited 2 mothers of 4th grade boys to be in the creative meeting).

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