Archive for the ‘Navigate Cultural Change’ Category

Do you care about the missing emerging adults?

By: Jock Ficken

Will we lose an entire generation plus the next generation? I attended a two-room school in a Nebraska farm town. Fantastic! Farms were small. Families abundant. The generations before me sacrificed for that opportunity. I’m deeply thankful! I had the same teacher for five years in a row, Mr. Walter Brase. The first time I … Continue reading →

4 Ways to Keep Your Church a Fort

By: Jock Ficken

American churches are like forts. 30% of the members ride into the fort once a week and then they ride back out of the fort intending not to be influenced…or to influence…the people who live out on the frontier. And, frontier people have no interest in discovering what fort people do inside their forts or … Continue reading →

Leave Behind & Take Away

By: Sarah Greiner

Do you invest or curse?

By: Jock Ficken

A few years ago I had an early morning flight from Buffalo. Eight inches of snow on the way. “Good thing I’m getting out early,” I told the shuttle driver. His reply? “Ah, this is Buffalo. No big deal.” It’s just the Buffalo environment. Right? Lots of snow? I suppose my driver and everyone else … Continue reading →

A Leadership Jump

By: Jock Ficken

I want you to entertain a sizeable leadership jump! From Recruiting volunteers for programs inside the church! To Developing leaders for the Mission Outside the Church! …because We Can’t Stay Here, especially if we care about most of the younger generation that’s walked away from church as institution. Most of my Christendom world early leadership … Continue reading →

We Can’t Stay Here

By: Jock Ficken

Leaders articulate vision! A preferred future. They also articulate WHY WE CAN’T STAY HERE. My early leader years? Lots of Vision! I ignored WHY WE CAN’T STAY HERE, and then I couldn’t understand why nobody wanted to leave…HERE! I was like Moses trying to convince the Israelites to exit Egypt before anyone realized it wasn’t … Continue reading →

5 Ways to Disciple Young Leaders

By: Jock Ficken

You may have noticed there aren’t many young leaders in most congregations today. Ain’t many young “anybodies” in most churches these days. We risk the death of the church in the U.S. in a single generation. My heart aches with every congregational leader’s lament: How did this happen? How did we get here? But we … Continue reading →

Where is God leading you next?

By: Jock Ficken

I asked a bunch of younger leaders to do the difficult, to challenge some “landing pattern” pastors and spouses and others who have served so well for so long to not squander what might be their largest legacy in helping the Church set sail toward a new season of great mission vibrancy. This “landing pattern” … Continue reading →

Do the Important Stuff

By: Jock Ficken

WOW! THERE MUST BE SOME REALLY GOOD STUFF HAPPENING HERE! That was the response of a couple of leaders attending the conference our congregation hosted some years ago. Several years earlier we had jumped to a multiple campus ministry and had now built the first phase of the new campus where the event was being … Continue reading →

Exploiting Opportunities

By: Jock Ficken

Opportunities abound for most of us, for most of our congregations. Seriously!  But, most of us and most of our churches find it difficult to exploit those opportunities.  A gap exists between what we say we value…and what we actually value!  Leaders and churches oftentimes know it, believe it, but just don’t act on it. … Continue reading →