Are You A Visionary Or A Vision Vandal

Are you a Visionary or a Vision Vandal

Gladstone Baptist Church – 30/1/05 am

This morning is a special time in the life of our church – we are inducting our church board. Right at the outset, I want to stress to you that the people you will see up in front of you this morning are not a special class of Christian. They are not super spiritual. They do not hold a Heavenly Gold Card or have any greater position in God’s kingdom than do you or I.

But they do hold an important office in our church by the mere fact that they are leaders. Writes to Timothy in 1 Tim 3:1 – “To aspire to leadership is an honorable ambition.” When I look out among you now, I see many leaders sitting among you. What constitutes a leader???

The great military leader Bernard Montgomery said “Leadership is the capacity and will to rally men and women to a common purpose, and the character which inspires confidence.”

J. Oswald Sanders has written “Leadership is influence, the ability of one person to influence others to follow his or her lead”

Many of you are leaders – leaders of ministries, leaders of families, leaders of children. You lead by example and in some cases by authority. I don’t think that there is a Christian alive that is not in some way a leader. Every single adult, in this church is a leader because others younger than you are looking at you to see how you respond; how you live your life; how you minister and serve. You have influence over others and lead them in either positive or negative ways. We all need to be leaders in some way, but I acknowledge that there are leaders and there are leaders of leaders.

John R. Mott who is a great leader in student circles around the world says that a “leader is a man who knows the road, who can keep ahead, and who pulls others after him.”

While school has just started back and most ministries are dusting off the cobwebs and oiling the cogs in an attempt to get some momentum happening. Our board members have been working for several months already trying to refine our vision. They have been mapping out the path for their ministry areas and planning how it is that they can motivate or pull others after them.

What you received as you came in this morning is our church’s vision document. It sets out for you on one piece of paper, what the vision of our church is and some of the steps that we are going to collectively take to try to reach the goals. Last week I asked you what our vision statement for our church was … And everyone answered in unison … “Being the family of God and Bringing others into the family of God”

Over all – that is our vision. To be a family of God and do all that God would have his family do. What does God want his family to do? - to worship, to have fellowship, to become disciples, to ministry and to evangelise the world.

The other part of our vision says that we don’t just want to be family focussed, but we also want to be outward focussed. We want to be bringing others into our family to enjoy all the benefits of our family. That is our vision “Being the family of God and bringing others into the family of God.” But how are we going to do that? How are the leaders of KOGs going to contribute to that goal? How are the Ladies in the Ladies Bible Study going to contribute to our vision? How are the people involved in the maintenance of this church going to contribute to that end? The answers to those questions are on this piece of paper. Each ministry has set out what its goals and initiatives are for this year which will help it contribute to our overall Church vision – “Being the Family of God and bringing others into the family of God.”

The board members we are inducting today have had a large role in helping ministries formulate these visions and goals. But they haven’t done it by themselves. It has been a long process of seeking God’s will for their ministry area and listening to his voice. In most cases, many of those involved in various ministries have been included in the process of reviewing the goals for 2005 and collectively I think we have a wonderful vision of where God wants to take us as a church.

I want to thank God today that he has placed in this church visionaries. A visionary from the Christian perspective “is a person who sees what can be done for God and has a passion to do it.” We need visionaries in this church – People who will dream big. People who don’t focus on the difficulty of the task or the obstacles standing in the way, but gaze off into the distant to what God could do if only we give our lives to Him. As you read this vision document some of you will hopefully get excited about the potential God has brought together in this place. As you read this vision document, some of you might sit and wonder at God’s graciousness and His might. As you read this vision document, some of you may actually get inspired to get involved and lend your weight to the effort begun. People in this category are visionaries and I want you on my team!!!