Leadership Summit 2008 - Session #4

I would love to post about Sunday as we had the largest crowd EVER for a non holiday Sunday and I was officially water logged from baptizing so many believers and dedicating so many babies. It was life at its best! But I will save that for another time. For now, let's just say, GO GOD - you are absolutely blowing our minds these days!


I want to press on with the Leadership Summit talks. We are on session 4, which was delivered by John Burke, the Pastor of Gateway Church. He was one of my favorite speakers. Enjoy...


The younger generation is spiritually hungry but CYNICAL.

A tag line for Gateway Church is:

“Come as you are...no perfect people allowed.”


What kind of soil do you think people need to grow in?

I Corinthians 3 - The Bible says, “God has been making it grow...”

Burke says, "Spiritual leadership is all about creating the right soil for people to grow healthy and flourish!"

To do so, we have to be willing to get our hands DIRTY, in the organic soil, to grow them up in Christ. See Matthew 9 – Jesus hung out with messy and broken people.


Great LEADERSHIP for God is always MESSY:

1. First we have to cultivate the soil WITH GRACE. The world does law – we do grace.
2. Help move barriers out of the way so people can experience God. For example, hatred toward gays is a barrier to people coming to Christ and grace. There are many cultural barriers out there preventing people from grace. Our job is to remove barriers.
3. Cultivate the soil with authentic confession. Relational re-connection to God and others. Our job is not fixing people – God does that.
4. Provide constant connection to God’s Spirit. Stay connected to God and provide that connection. When you do, fruit happens. Remember Jesus said, "Abide in me and you will bear much fruit." (John 15)


Thanks Pastor John - I want to get and keep my hands dirty for God!