Over the next few days, I'll be downloading some of the things I heard while at our biennial GENERAL COUNCIL of the ASSEMBLIES OF GOD in Orlando, Florida.REGGIE JOINER:
'You can't build something that lasts unless you're willing to change what you've built. That is CRITICAL if you plan on being a person or organization of continuing influence.'
Think about that big, hulking, giant mega-computer that used to be on the desk of the big companies when computers first came out. Remember them? They had a few 'megabytes' on them - they cost upwards of $2,000, and the dimension of them was something like 3' x 2.' Monsters. Do you think the guys who built that first computer ever thought to themselves ... "Once we build this thing, we never have to change it. It's good to go now forever."
We have a tendency in life to want to avoid upgrading. But the upgrades are critical; the upgrades need to be constant.There were 55 upgrades between that first 1980 dinosaur computer and the one known today as a 'slim-Mac.' The cost of NOT upgrading our ministries and the way we do things in the church will cause us to wake up one day and be so far behind the curve that we'll never catch up.
The best way to keep a team going forward is to frequently upgrade the vision and 'how-to' of the mission.'
I'd like to think we'd change ANYTHING for the sake of the mission. It is the MISSION that drives us.
* Only 7 days till the scheduled birth of our new grandson (that's what the '7' in the blog title stands for - the COUNTDOWN.)
And be blessed.
2 comments:
Sounds like the conversation we just had...right? Good analogy BUT there is a part of me that still balks at this...you must keep some of the old in order to fashion the new...you don't throw it out, but keep refining and making it better...
I agree with that. The past helps us know what to change. I don't think I was talking about that. But mission still rules over processes and programs. If the mission isn't being served - and the mission is the world - then we have to be willing to change the processes and programs. We'll never get rid of the things that brought us here; we don't want to and we're not trying to, I don't think. But we are still too tight-fisted about what "HAS BEEN DONE" and still have a tendency to elevate some of that to statuses higher than deserved. Old habits die hard. Good discussion. Not surprised.
Post a Comment