Courtney Lien

INTRO to CLASS: Most influential person in regard to my faith: There was not a person who is older than me who influenced me in regard to my faith, however, one of my friends (who grew up in a very Godly and devoted home) had discussions with me, prayed with me, and became my best friend.

Courtney was hired initially at Glad Tidings as an Administrative Assistant. She did a partially dual role by working as a secretary and doing pastoral care things as well. Courtney was hired as a pastor at Glad Tidings at the age of 24.

Real Life youth ministry: Aaron Holt (Student ministries head), Varsity, Junior Varsity, and someone is in charge of fundraising events. Courtney says that she did have to watch what she said and did because of the way people watched her. I like that she said this because it's not necessarily true that her character wasn't right but other people have different convictions or even scrupals than she may.

Because Courtney is young, mostly because she is in ministry, there are a lot of holiness issues when it comes to music and dealing with the teenagers. Glad Tidings greatly uses the idea of small groups in their youth group (there are 200 teens). They don't do so much large-sized evangelism as they used to because the kids weren't being discipled throughout the year.

I like that Real Life ministry decided to conduct a survey of the students who attend Real Life. This shows that they're not just assuming that what they're doing is working, they're expecting that they need to change a few things. Make sure that any goals you set for your leaders are measurable goals. With their small groups, there is a leader and a small group assistant leader. Once the group is too big, the assistant leader (who has been training under the head leader), then heads up the new team.

Glad Tidings used to head up Invasion, but now they go on missions trips instead and focus their efforts on them. I like that this ministry tries to emphasize the fact that they're family. Also, Courtney said that you have to guard your time off. I can relate to this because I was an intern this summer and though I was given time off, I often didn't take it so that I could get more work done and be more creative with different things.

Host

Here is Rick Warren's latest thoughts on Cell Group, Small Group, home group ministry. He believes that the leaders of this group should be called hosts using the following acronym:

Have a heart for people
Open up your home, business place, etc.
Serve coffee
Turn on a DVD player

• Many people shy away from the word leader. It's scary, intimidating, and makes people run away from such an impossible task.
• Willingness to be hospitable comes much more quickly than willingness to be accountable for other's growth.
• It's not hard to find people who have a heart for others, are willing to open their home, and are capable of serving coffee.
• Turn on a DVD player? This is so that the HOST can play an already recorded Bible study to relate to the people at his/her group and give life experiences.

This seems like a fairly easy way to get people to help out with small groups and helping each other grow. If I had a church, I'd try it...

Dan Miller

Dan is passionate about God and his relationship with Him, his wife, and others. He believes that in order to expand the Kingdom of God, we need to be loving people, helping the community. In the beginning of his pastoring career at Back Mountain, there were fifteen people at his church (viable, reliable, and credible source of help for the community). You must earn the right to speak in a person's life.

When starting at the Senior Pastor position in his new church, he introduced some of the members from the fifteen that were there to different churches in order to not have to fight with people who have different styles of ministry.

Back Mountain church has The Rock Recreation center which has upwards basketball, soccer, flag football, cheerleading, etc. The teams do devotions, memory verses, don't yell at each other, and follow Christian Morals. Dan is a firm believer in looking at the demographics of your area in order to reach the people in your area and truly give to the community.

Dan wants to build a dinner theater, comedy night, cafe, daycare, school, and a 1,000 person seating sanctuary. Also, Dan is extremely visionary. I thought it was interesting that this was mentioned because I tend to be a visionary with the people that I work with. When others are trying to be visionaries, I bring them down to earth because I have no idea how to actualize the plan; however, I enjoy being a visionary myself and having nuts and bolts people to help me.

Pastor Dan asks people who are proposed to be on staff if they're called to ministry and how they're going to win people into the kingdom of God. If they hesitate on whether or not they're called and if they don't have a strategy, they're not fit for the job. Also, Dan wants the staff to be discipled by someone other than himself in a mentoring network. He wants his pastors to run with their ideas and not just have him hold their hands for two years.

I like that most of what Pastor Dan is doing costs a lot of money. I don't have any money. I definitely don't have millions of dollars to build the type of stuff Pastor dan is doing, nor do I have millions of dollars to do what I want to do...in fact, I know that Pastor dan didn't have millions of dollars either. Hmm. I think I'm beginning to trust God more with finances in a different way. I've always known that God will provide for me, but I never realized that God could provide for my dream.