The Evil of Religion

"The idolatry of your rules is keeping you from seeing what God is doing right in front of your face."
- Greg Boyd

My brother-in-law, being the good-looking stud that he is, shared with me this sermon. Arguably one of the best sermons I've ever heard in regards to how following Christ is not religion, because "in religion rules trump love for others."

Readers are Leaders

"Leaders are readers."
- Unknown

John Maxwell says that an organization won't be able to rise above its leader's leadership capacity. If a leader is growing, the organization grows. And growing comes from learning, and a good source of learning is books (from what I'm told).

Communicating for a Change - Chapter 17+ Notes

7) Find some traction - what's the next step?

- Inevitably, there are times when you are stuck, and need tools to help you plow forward

- Step one, is literal, pull-out-the-stops, fall-on-the-ground prayer... the Lord will use your "stuckness" as a call for you to come before Him for guidance, to deal with sin, to calm anxiety, etc.

- Step two, is going through a list of questions to help bring the message into perspective:
1 - What do they need to know?
2- Why do they need to know it?
3 - What do they need to do? (be creative and specific)
4 - Why do they need to do it?
5 - What can I do to help them remember (not really a "stuck" strategy question, but one to always ask)

Communicating for a Change - Chapter 16 Notes

6) Find your voice - what works for you?

- Being authentic covers a multitude of communication sins... it's huge to just be yourself, and not a stage act of your favorite communicator

- However, being yourself is not an excuse for poor communication skills... boring is not a communication style... boring is boring, as confusing is confusing

- You must allow communication principles to shape your style

- Need to constantly be asking what works and what works for me?

- Experience doesn't make you better, evaluation does. You must always evaluate yourself (listen to your messages, watch your videos, etc.) in order to find the things you will naturally never know yourself, and ask for constructive criticism.

Communicating for a Change - Chapter 15 Notes

5) Engage the audience - what's your plan to capture and keep their attention?

- It's tragic that pastors spending hours pouring into a sermon, only to have no one remember anything or even talk about the sermon afterwards

- Attention and retention is determined by presentation, not information - a principle all marketing agencies embrace. Presentation matters, a lot.

- The stories and messages are always the same, but it's how you frame it that makes the difference, to present it in a way that shakes people out of their apathy

- The more interested we are in a topic, the easier it is to engage us... there is always high attendance when a church is going to talk about sex

- If the interest is high is because that is answering a question people already have, they already have a felt need, and it feel relevant to them. If that need isn't originally felt, the presentation's job is to make that need felt, so the relevancy can be seen. Thus, an introduction might be the most important part of a talk.

- Three questions to ask for introductions (assume no interest):
1 - What is the question I'm answering? How can I get my audience to want to know the answer?
2 - What is the tension I'm resolving? How can I help the audience feel the tension?
3 - What mystery am I solving? How can I make the audience want a solution?

- Five suggestions to help you keep them engaged throughout:
1 - Check your speed - pace can communicate importance, so suggested speak faster than normal, but not overwhelmingly fast that people can't follow
2 - Slow down in the curves - slow down during transitions
3 - Navigate through the text - God's Word should be the most engaging part... to help:

- Pick and make people turn to only one central text
- Don't read long sections without comment... comment along the way
- Highlight and explain odd words or phrases
- Voice frustration or skepticism about a text
- Help people anticipate the main point
- Deliberately read the text to bring notice to that the opposite isn't written
- Have audience read certain words out loud for emphasis
- Summarize text with short, crafted statement
- Use visuals any time you can
- Resist to share everything you learned in your research

4 - Add something unexpected to the trip - unexpected is always engaging... always.
5 - Take the most direct route - being over direct can be better

- Learning to be engaging is a continuing process

Communicating for a Change - Chapter 14 Notes

4) Internalize the message – what’s your story?

- No actor would make simply take out a manuscript and start reading monotone

- You need to own your message, as if it’s a part of you, where you able to tell it rather than preach it

- Do you really expect anyone to remember anything you said if you haven’t?

- If you’re reading from notes, chances are you haven’t internalized it

- Having too much to say is sometimes the equivalent of saying nothing (less is more)

- If something doesn’t support the point, cut it… have your talk read like a story (tension, resolution, climax, conclusion)

Communicating for a Change - Chapter 13 Notes

3) Create a map – what’s the best route to your point?

ME – Orientation – introduces dilemma/topic
WE – Identification – common ground to share dilemma, assuring them this is a relevant topic
GOD – Illumination – Discover what God says about the tension or question
YOU – Application – Challenge audience to act on God’s Word
WE – Inspiration – The “what ifs” of if we all acted upon God’s Word

ME
- Common ground is essential for any relationship
- People desire genuineness, so share your struggles and be open with your weaknesses
- People buy into the messenger before they buy into the message
- Don’t focus on rushing through your content at the expense of the person, don’t make people feel like they are a second priority to getting through everything

WE
- Bridging your struggles to encompass emotional agreement with as many people as possible
- Never transition out of the WE section until you have created a tension people are dying for you to resolve
- Application isn’t a section of your message, it’s the context of your message

GOD
- The meat of the message, being able to share God’s insights!
- Engage the text… don’t brush over it so much that people become biblically illiterate, but don’t go so far deep that people feel like they could never understand the Bible on their own

YOU
- Answer the questions “so what?” and “now what?”
- Think through how this can apply to relational circles (me, family, other believers, non-believers, workplace, etc.) and life stages (teenage, singles, newlyweds, empty nesters, etc.)
- Make sure to address the nonbelievers in your audience as well… simply letting them know your aware of them will help build a bridge

WE
- Really about vision casting (dreaming phase)
- Explain “what if”, if people would actually do the application and what that would look like