Articles designed for equipping leaders to take you beyond “men’s ministry” and into discipleship relationships to change the lives of men, their marriages, their families, their workplaces, their communities, and the world.
We’ve worked with thousands of churches, and many would agree it’s hard to stop long enough to reflect on how their mission to make disciples is going.
Here are nine ideas for you to use as discussion-starters at your next several leadership meetings.
In the No Man Left Behind Model, sustaining momentum is the third “gear” in the engine that runs the conveyor belt. It is often the least exciting of the three parts of the Create-Capture-Sustain strategy. And yet it is here that the majority of spiritual growth takes place, and how you can best make sure […]
The purpose of the exercise is to determine if there are gaps between how you want the gospel to impact men as disciples of Christ and the opportunities for impact your church offers men.
Ultimately, a man is not a mature disciple until the truth of the gospel is understood, believed, and lived out in his life. In No Man Left Behind, we use three key words to help us remember this concept:
Today, pastors are more accessible to their parishioners than pastors at any other time in history. Before a pastor’s feet have even hit the floor in the morning, they have emails, texts, and voicemails waiting for them. Yet, we still hear phrases like, “Pastors only work one day a week.” Or “Pastors don’t know what it’s like in the real world.”
There are different levels of relationships among men in the church—the guys who play at the pickup game during open-gym night don’t have the same type of relationship as the two men who deliberately enter into a 12-week mentoring program. Both relationships are important, but they are inherently different in terms of purpose and depth.
Possibly the most important aspect of sustaining momentum is to make sure your men really feel like somebody cares about them. Look for leaders who are eager to show men the love of Christ, not their own Biblical knowledge.
It’s ironic. The more we try to influence behavior, the less real lasting change we see. Such an approach will simply burden men down and wear them out.
From the big momentum building men’s event, to the next step, to…what, exactly? Once you get your men and your men’s ministry off the roller coaster, how do you sustain spiritual progress?
Often the ministries and programs of our churches are like skyscrapers in New York City. Each of them exists without clear connection to other church programs. So getting a man who attends worship to join a couple’s small group or a men’s bible study is like asking him to jump from one skyscraper to another.
Before you can get off the roller coaster, you have to know how you got on in the first place. If a roller coaster men’s ministry is the problem, what’s the cause? In our experience, there are two different “traps” that men’s ministries fall into.
How many times have you seen a ministry expend all of their energy planning “the big event,” only to pack up and go home after the closing “amen?” This is the classic event-driven men’s ministry.
Since 1986, Man in the Mirror has worked with more than 25,000 churches and millions of men. We help churches create an environment where the Holy Spirit inspires men to engage in life-on-life discipleship.
1375 State Road 436
Casselberry, FL 32707
407-472-2100
