Staying Focused

Apparently - according to my mother who I think remembers everything - at the dinner table when I was 12, I announced that I would get a scholarship to swim in college. From there I became pretty focused, to the point of telling my now wife while dating in high school - "I can't pay much attention to you right now. It's swim season." Yet she stuck around. That's grace - and love! But I was focused....and achieved that goal. Got the girl in the end too!

Athletes who perform at a high level have focus. Leaders who lead at a high level are just as focused. To be a parent who actually leads your children requires focus on them as a priority. For a church to fulfill the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20) requires focus.

Cornerstone is embarking on a change that I'm excited about. It's part of the consultation we brought in last February. We were given 5 prescriptions for moving forward, more focused on the mission of Jesus to make disciples. This past Saturday we start living into one prescription around Board governance and the need to more clearly define roles. It will be a good change.

There are two kinds of churches in the world - inward focused and outward focused. It's not a right or wrong choice for me, although I confess I am partial to one over the other because I believe it is more faithful to the mission of Jesus. Both churches have two feet but lead with different ones. Where the inward leads there is still an outward that follows and vice versa. But they have a different primary focus.

Leading an outward focused church takes a focus on guarding our hearts from distraction to other good feeling, good sounding, seemingly noble pursuits rather than the mission of Jesus to make disciples. Jesus is the ONLY stakeholder we must please. Figure out what Jesus wants and pursue it with focus. He wants disciples.

The primary goal of the Church is not to make everyone feel good. The primary goal cannot be to not offend anyone. There can be no primary goal of making sure everyone agrees before proceeding down a particular path. All of those are great to have and there is a necessity to some, but if they are primary, making disciples won't be. It hurts when someone is hurting. It doesn't feel good when someone is upset. But soothing every ruffled feather will soon become a distraction to the mission of Jesus and a church will shift to an inward focus.

Who do we work for in the church? Jesus, not the congregation.
Who do we seek to please? Jesus, not the congregation.
Who are we focused on producing? Disciples, not people who feel better about themselves.

Here's the secret though. When we work for Jesus, seeking to please Him and produce disciples, the congregation will be pleased as much as any group of human beings can be. The congregation will feel better because ministry will flourish to care for the hurts and needs within. What I have found is that the inward needs are cared for if the outward focused mission of Jesus is primary.

What are you focused on? Are you willing to get rid of those things that aren't helping you focus on your primary mission?

Here's a great blog post on the Warning Signs of an Inward Focused Church