Christianity Today recently asked more than 1800 church leaders how much cash reserves they keep on hand.  Here are the results:   How does your church match up? Read more here… Todd

Nigerian pastor Chris Oyakhilome has painted himself in a bit of a corner recently when he said that he thought that masturbation was not a sin. He was forced to respond to the controversy on one of his recent TV shows. Nigerian evangelists have LOTS of influence. See if you can follow his rationale here. How would you respond to the question:  Is masturbation a sin? Here’s how Perry responded a few years ago. (You’re welcome, Perry, for bringing this up again). How would you...

Daphne Daly writes: The fact is that yes – the Bible does say that it is wrong for two people of the same sex to be together. However, it also says that it’s wrong to take the Lord’s name in vain. The Bible is very clear on what is sin is and what sin isn’t. It is also clear that there are no levels of sin. If someone commits murder, engages in sex outside of marriage or even lashes out in anger – it is all the same. Sin is sin. The Bible clearly states that Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead for our sin. He asks for very little in return. He has asked us to be...

My friends William Vanderbloemen and Tony Morgan are planning a special one-day event on how to develop healthy leadership teams at your church.  Here’s the scoop: One of the questions both Tony and William are often asked by churches is, “What are other churches out there doing?” Bring your church staff to this one-day gathering where Tony and William will coach you through best practices of effective church leaders across the country. We’ll be discussing leadership development topics including: Health: Where are we healthy, and where can we improve? Strategy: How will we...

Hats off to Community Bible Church in San Antonio for donating $100,000 to Childress Memorial Church of God to help  replace their building after a devastating fire last week. Actually, the church has been the scene of six fires over the past two months.  All are suspicious in nature. Here’s how it went down, according to a news report: After seeing reports of the fire that destroyed the Childress Memorial Church of God in Christ Saturday, Pastor Robert Emmitt of the Community Bible Church knew he had to help. “I came into church and one of my pastors…said, ‘What’s going on?’ I...

It’s the little things that make a difference and grow customer loyalty.  That goes for business and for the church.  Church first impressions make a huge difference with new people walking through the doors of your church. Is your church going out of it’s way to give a great experience? Matt Steen and I discuss and example of how a great business (Southwest Airlines) went out of their way to give one of their customers this kind of experience: CLICK IMAGE TO WATCH Church First Impressions and a roll of toilet paper (Length: 6 min 31 sec) Subscribe to MinistryBriefing on YouTube What do YOU...

Adam McLane writes: A lot of youth workers have been asking me about Snapchat, a mobile picture sharing service that is popular amongst some segments of teenagers. I know there are some innocent uses out there. I’ve even heard from youth ministry folks who use it to connect with their students and crowd-source ideas. But I also know of some horror stories. Stories of regret and exposure to things their eyes didn’t want to see. Matt Steen and I discuss on this edition of MinistryBriefing. CLICK IMAGE TO WATCH Snapchat and Teenagers (Length:  7 min 00 sec) Subscribe to MinistryBriefing on...

You don’t often think about churches as being seductive, but Scott Cochrane thinks that there are actually five types of churches that  steal a pastor’s heart if you’re not careful… Seductive churches include: 1.  The church you WANT to lead Don’t get caught up in your fantasy church. 2. Your former church Don’t constantly thrive to make your current church your old church. 3.  Someone else’s church Don’t covet your friend’s church (I think this might be the 11th commandment) 4.  The ‘good ole days’ church Don’t wallow in...

Ron Edmondton writes: In my job, I hear far more junk than I care to hear. The larger our church gets, the more mess we encounter among the people to whom we minister. We have designed our church to reach hurting people, so we are simply reaching our target audience, but some days it is more difficult than others to hear such sad stories. One part of the drama of messiness that always frustrates me is how gossip begins about other people’s problems. As if dealing with the consequences of sin is not enough, many times some of the hardest repercussion is the gossip that occurs about the people...

Many churches start a new year with a special series to set to pace and tone for the year.  Take a moment to tell us about your first series of the year, and why you picked it! Thanks for your quick...