Collective Vision (3 of 6)

As the right leadership is put into place, it is essential to begin to share this vision for moving forward and gain the cooperation and passion of others.



This means a lot of prayer, creating buy-in and a sense of urgency within the congregation, and creating simple, logical, progressive steps for moving forward.

I talked some about vision in the first post of this series, but that vision is the vision that God has given me. It's a vision that is easy for me to take hold of, but not so easy for someone else. How willing would you be to follow someone based on word alone? Maybe someone out there is a member of a cult and might have no problem with that, but I actually expect people to approach my words and the words of any church leader with a bit of skepticism. They should expect what I say to gain creedence by producing evidence. It's called assurance.

Until it gets to that point though, I have to begin with this vision and work it into my leadership, who will (ideally) work it out to everyone else. Hint: That's why leadership came before collective vision in this series - it wasn't coincidental.

Since October, all of this has been represented in some way or another in every sermon I've preached, every Bible study I've taught, every meeting I've been in, and nearly every conversation I've had. It's slow going. Sure, some who have been looking for something or someone to follow for a while have jumped on board, but others are late adopters.

My hope this spring was to pull together a vision team to evaluate the current state of the church, determine where God wants Mt. Bethel to be, and make a plan to achieve that vision. It hasn't happened. Churches like Lawrenceville First and Dacula First and some of the others that I've been a part of are used to vision teams/committees and will fight each other to be a part. Not so here. Mt. Bethel is in a different league and of a different mindset.

It will happen though. Maybe not in the traditional way, but it is still possible.

Collective vision, though the second on the list, is just as important as the rest though. Without it, I am left to do the work myself and what good is that? Anything I do on my own stands to be wasted effort and simply futile. I will itenerate eventually. God's vision will not.