Careful around the bruises!

Our son Eli recently had minor surgery and was sent home with a low level pain reliever and instructions for us to be careful around his healing incisions and bruises. Man, did we ever! And times we didn't, we all paid the price.

Our congregation has recently gone through some 'minor surgery' to help us see better and work better and we too have some healing to do. Some people have moved away for jobs and new people have come in. Some of our assumptions about what was good and not so good about us were shifted around and modified pretty substantially.

As we go through the processes of healing from what we've learned through the John Ellas' study of our congregation and the many things that have happened since then, it's really great to know that much better things are ahead, but it's also important to remember that we're still in the healing and recovery processes and we need to be 'careful around the bruises.' So what might that mean for us a church leadership?

1. We need to be careful about what we say and how we say it. During times of transition, people often listen to hear what they want to hear and will even reintepret things to fit what they want to hear. We need to make sure we understand each other and make sure that when we speak to people about what's going on that we take the time to have them reflect back what they heard us say so we can know we're clear with each other. Not doing this can result in us 'bruising each other' unintentionally over and over.

2. We need to grow through pain. A part of recovery to health is making sure that you're going through rehab so that when you're 'healed', your whole system or body works like it's supposed to in every day life. Unlike years past, doctors today get you up walking around soon after surgery so that you can heal 'normally' and not delay recovery and normal life. We need to encourage our members to 'get back into it' with active involvement in worship, Life Stage Groups, small groups and into the ministry and outreach that come out of those. Not doing this will let us 'get stiff' and/or too comfortable in the wrong position.

3. We need to avoid assuming too much or too little. A lot of things that we need to do next are things we tried in the past but for a variety of reasons it didn't 'take' (i.e. most of our people and even us as a leadership weren't ready to really 'hear it' yet). Some of our members are way more up to speed than we often think, they've just been waiting for a moment like this. And vice versa. Think about it. We need to ask a lot of questions about what's been happening up until now and why. We need to not assume we're walking into areas/ministries in which people who went before us had bad intentions, were incompetent or are unaware of our 'new and better' way of doing things. Not doing this will cause us to unintentionally insult people who've worked hard to bring us to this point and/or cause us to perpetually reinvent the wheel.

4. We need to see the trees in the forest. In times of transition, we can get caught up in the healing and recovery process of the whole body and not pay attention to the health and growth of individuals. We need to make sure that we are focused on doing things that will cause relationships to grow and thrive - Life Stage Groups, small groups, and ministry teams. Not doing this will result in us being surprised that "Brother So and So" burned out or had a moral failure or _____________."

5. We need to help each other see the forest. Recently, my wife put our son, Eli in my arms while I sat on the couch. I immediately felt that he was very hot and feverish and said so to Ranell (my wife). She walked back over and said, "Not only that, he just spit up all over you." Very quickly we both realized that the heat I felt was him spitting up on himself and my arm and not a fever. We need to work together as leaders to make sure that we're seeing and sensing the situations we dealing with correctly and not making a judgement on what we feel at the moment. Not doing so can result in us making judgements and decisions based on wrong, incomplete or misleading info and send us 'back to the hospital' because we took the wrong meds.

Okay, that's probably too many mixed metaphors in one blog post, but you get the idea that growing together in a local church requires ongoing attention, care and most especially prayer for God's wisdom and guidance! Remember to be careful around the bruises and before we know it, we'll be up and running stronger than we were before!