Hey All,
Sorry about not posting earlier, but due to complications with time and internet in the hotel I couldn’t blog while I was there. So I’m going to do two posts because there is so much information on what we learned at Saddleback’s Student Leadership Conference.
Discipleship
Wednesday July 12th Matt McGill spoke about the Purpose of Discipleship as a Leader. He gave 10 points.
– It’s not just knowledge
– It’s not just a good life
– It’s corporate
– It’s personal
– It’s not easy
– It never stops
– It’s intimacy
– It’s obedience
– It’s about questions
– It’s about mystery
Matt went onto explain that there is a lot that goes into a leader; however, anyone can be a leader just in different ways. In order to discover how to be a leader it’s important to live out the purpose of discipleship and grow stronger in our faith.
Later on in the day the author and Pastor Kenny Luck spoke of some of the risks we take as leaders that will help us grow in our faith. Kenny started off by telling us:
When You Take Risks for God
1. Your values are clear and so are my convictions
2. You want your impact for God to increase
3. You want to develop spiritual consistency
Kenny continued to explain that we need 3 core convictions to Love God, Love People and Love His Word. When we have strong convictions it’ll make us free and eliminate distractions, detractors and doubts. And to have strong convictions we need to Choose to be God’s Man or Woman (Choose the team you are going to play for), Recognize the Voice of The Holy Spirit and Release Control to the Holy Spirit. And when we want to become a leader we need to make great decisions, but great decisions don’t come from luck. Great decisions:
1. Don’t require great analysis
2. Do require great convictions
3. Simple cooperation
4. Extra information is unnecessary
Ministry
Later on in the afternoon after the students experienced a Leadership Physical Challenge Erik Rees author of the upcoming book S.H.A.P.E. and helps people discover their giftedness at Saddleback Church spoke about the biblical purpose of ministry. He answered the questions:
1. What is ministry?
o It is using what God’s given me to serve others (1 Peter 4:10)
2. Why is it important?
o Honors God, Helps Others, It will give us irreplaceable happiness from God
3. How do you discover your ministry?
o Grasps your role/purpose by identifying your sweet spot.
o Give away the other roles by inviting others to serve
o Grow yourself and team members by investing in their SHAPE.
He then when on to tell us how to give ourselves permission to be what God wants us to be and how to discover our own SHAPE by asking ourselves What do I love doing? Who do I love serving? Why do I want to serve them? How will I serve my target audience (What’s my service setting)?
Later that evening Nick Vujicic encouraged the students to live life to the fullest. Nick Vujicic is from Australia and travels the worldwide sharing his compelling story of living life without limbs. He told the students that nothing is impossible with God and “No matter what you go through, God will always be with you.” He also asked them to be encouraging leaders reminding them that “Your words can break someone or build someone up. Be the difference in the world and you’ll be the change in the world.” After Nick spoke he invited everyone to check out his website www.lifewithoulimbs.org
Worship
Thursday July 13th Rick Muehow and Charlotte Huntington two of Saddlebacks Worship Pastors came in and spoke to the students about the biblical purpose Worship. Rick started off the session by informing us the best book on worship is the bible and told us of the 5 words of worship: Hallelujah (Boast in the Lord), Maranatha (Come Quickly), Hosanna (Save us Now), Abba (Daddy), and Amen (Let it Be So).
According to Rick and Charlotte in order to know how to Worship it’s important to know the 4 Biblical Foundations.
1. Without love there is no worship.
– 1 Corinthians 1
2. It’s accompanied by fear and reverence
– Isaiah 66:2
3. It’s commanded
– Luke 10:27
4. It involves sacrificing your whole body.
– Romans 12
After Rick and Charlotte spoke Jay Strack founder of Student Leadership University spoke to the students about the Biblical Principals of what it means to be a leader. In order to have leadership you need to have influence. Another important principal is God wants you to do your homework. Jay gave us an example of bad and good homework from Numbers 13-14 when he told us of Moses and Aaron who sent out the spies to scout the land. From this chapter we learn that in order to accomplish great things your need to believe in a great God. Joshua and Caleb both believed in a great God; unfortunately the rest of the spies did not, they had what Jay described as “Grasshopper Thinking” (Numbers 13:33)
In order to be a great leader you must:
1. Be Focused
2. Be Fueled
3. Be Faithful
4. Be Finishers
A Great leader has the ability to:
1. See the Invisible
2. Hear the Inaudible
3. Thing the Unthinkable
4. Believe the Unbelievable
5. Accomplish the Imposible