MINISTRY MINDED LESSON 6 SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES FOR LEADERS2015 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

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Year: 2015

Title: Ministry Minded Lesson 6 Spiritual Disciplines For Leaders

Teacher: Jerry B Simmons

Series: 2015 Ministry Minded Series

Teaching Transcript: Ministry Minded Lesson 6 Spiritual Disciplines For Leaders

You are listening to FerventWord, an online Bible study ministry with teachings and tools to help you grow deeper in your relationship with God. The following message was taught by Jerry Simmons in 2015.

Welcome back to Ministry Minded. We're looking at lesson six tonight and going to be talking about spiritual disciplines for leaders. And so we're going to start in Acts chapter 2 verse 42. If you'd like to turn there, Acts chapter 2 verse 42. Of course, a familiar passage for us. And we're just going to touch on a couple things and then talk about a lot of practical things. And a little bit, I think, different message than what we're going to be talking about.

The previous sessions have been where, you know, we're kind of digging into some of the meanings and definitions and stuff. And I want to talk a little bit more practically about some of the things that we can do and the disciplines that we need to have as leaders within the church. And so Acts chapter 2 tells us in verse 42, "...and they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers."

And so what we see is as the church is being established there in the book of Acts chapter 2, that they are established and then they continue on. So it's a work that happens in the beginning, but then they continue steadfastly in that work.

And so, you know, they are ongoing, continually practicing these things. And so he talks about the apostles' doctrine, which of course is the word of God, in fellowship, in the breaking of bread together, and then also in prayers. And so there's this things that they practice. Now, the idea here, though, as they continued steadfastly is it's not just stuff that happened before.

you know, for them as new believers. It's not just stuff that happened, you know, for the first month in their walk with the Lord, but that this was the continuing ongoing pattern. They were steadfast in these different elements of the Christian life, of these Christian disciplines or spiritual disciplines of engaging in the word of God, fellowshipping with one another, breaking bread with one another, and in prayer together as well.

And as I see that, as I look at that as the beginning of the church, but then the continuing steadfastly, that's kind of the idea that I want to encourage us in this evening, that some of the things that we do at the beginning, that we learn at the beginning, are things that we need to continue steadfastly in, and yet there's some development that we can have, especially as we look in the context for us as leaders within the church.

Think about these two pictures here. So you have the kid on the bike and the professional racer on the bike. And, you know, how do these two ride differently? The basic concepts are the same, you know, and essentially they do the same thing. They balance, they pedal, they steer. You know, there's some basics that are there. But, of course, you know,

You know, the person racing the bike is going to have developed and refined those skills and push them, you know, very far in a different way than the kid who's riding the bike. And so it's the same basic things, but taken to another level and taken to a different degree. Now, I've been thinking about this this week in terms of the things that

they encourage you to share on the field at the Harvest Crusade. You remember those four things? I don't know if they've changed it. I haven't attended the class for the last couple years. But it was always four things, right? It was read the Bible, pray, fellowship with other believers, and share what God has done. And so the exhortation was, here's what new believers need to be encouraged in. That they get into the Word of God. That they spend time in the Word. But then that also they spend time in prayer.

And learn how to talk with God. They need to get plugged into a church and learn how to fellowship with other believers. And then they also need to let other people know what God has done. And these are the basic, you know, spiritual disciplines. Some basic things to get started in the Christian life.

Now, as we're leaders within the body of Christ, and as we're serving within the body of Christ, like the two examples of riding the bike, I want to take these and take it to, you know, another level as far as it's the same basic elements, but they're things that we need to do as leaders. And so we take it to another degree and we intensify it just a bit. And so, first of all, instead of just reading the Bible, I want to encourage us to feed ourselves spiritually.

That's what essentially it is as they get engaged in reading the word. There's this feeding going on as they're eating and chewing and maturing in the Lord. But then prayer, of course, we need to continue to pray and in all kinds of prayer. But specifically for us as leaders, we need to be praying for the people that God has entrusted to us.

And then fellowship is something that we need to continue to maintain. And so we need to keep ourselves in fellowship. And then instead of just, you know, sharing the gospel or sharing what God has done, we're sharing words from God. We're sharing forth on God's behalf.

to the people that he has entrusted to us. And so I want to walk through these things and share, you know, a little bit about them, but also share with you how I personally work to practice these things. And then at the end, we can have a time of discussion and perhaps you can share some of the things that you do in these things as well. So first of all, let's consider feeding yourself spiritually.

As leaders, as servants, as those who are involved in the church, we need to keep ourselves fed. And this takes us back to session one of Ministry Minded, right? Where we talked about that need to be in contact with Jesus and that need to be continually filled. And it's a responsibility that we have for ourselves.

It's not my responsibility to feed you spiritually. Of course, you know, it is in a sense that, you know, on Sundays and Wednesdays, I'm teaching the word and my job is to feed you.

But you need much more feeding than that. You need much more nourishment than that. And you can't receive from me the nourishment that you need. You need to keep yourself spiritually fed and to be, you know, filling yourself with the things of the Lord and the things that you need to be able to be edified and to grow.

I like what Paul told Timothy in 1 Timothy 4, verse 16. He says, take heed to yourself and to the doctrine. Continue in them, for in doing this, you will save both yourself and those who hear you.

And so you see here, there's the need here to save yourself. It's important for you, but also as a leader, it's important for those who hear you that you take heed to yourself and that you continue in them. You see that ongoing, it's ongoing. It's not just from the beginning or at the beginning in your walk, but ongoing. You need to continue to take heed to yourself and to the doctrine.

And I would suggest that as he says, take heed to yourself, he's referring back to feeding yourself spiritually. Keep a close eye on yourself. You need to keep a close eye on your heart and recognize when you're not being fed. Recognize when you're not growing in your relationship with God. Recognize when you are lacking the nourishment that is needed for you to thrive spiritually.

And so there's a need for us to make sure that we are fed spiritually, that we are filled with the things of God. Now there's some basic things that we need to do in order to feed ourselves spiritually. And so one of those things, of course, is personal devotions. Now again, this is something that we should learn as believers early on. We learn to spend time with God in his word.

And yet, ongoing, this is something that we must continue in. And so we don't read through the Bible once and figure, okay, I've got that down. You know, I don't need to do that anymore. But ongoing, we need to have a devotional life. We need to have time that we spend with God in his word, simply reading the milk of the word, simply receiving the word of God. Now, for me personally, I do this in a couple ways.

So here's a screenshot of my iPad, and this is primarily what I use for my walking with the Lord and teaching and all the things that I do. And so I have the Living Water app circled there on the screen because I use that every morning. I open that up and check out the Bible in three years reading and read that and allow God to speak to me through the reading day by day.

And then I also have the Mantis app that I use for Bible study. And with that, I'm going through the New Testament in one year. And so I open that as well and read the day's portion there. And so what I do is I read through those passages is I simply read. I don't really get into, you know, language details or cross

cross-references or, you know, those kinds of things. It's just a very simple reading through. But as I do, I'm praying and I'm seeking the Lord and I'm asking for Him to, you know, reveal anything that He wants to reveal and speak to me about. And so as I read, I'm kind of in searching, you know, for the highlights. Not, you know, just hitting the high points and ignoring the rest. But those parts where, you know, God's highlighted for me certain passages. Now,

Now, one of the reasons why I like to do my devotions digitally is because I don't have, you know, the old highlights and marks and handwritings and those kinds of things. And I enjoy not having that so that I don't just focus on those things like I would tend to with my old Bible. But it's just...

clean slate. It's just fresh. And I get to, you know, just read and allow the Lord to highlight new things. And sometimes He highlights old things, and sometimes He highlights new things. But I'm looking for, usually it's just a phrase, a snippet, a verse. It's just something that stands out. And for those of you who play guitar, I kind of liken it in my own mind to

You know, you're trying to hit that chord, and it's like, you hit it, and it's like, oh, it's not quite right. And so you're like just adjusting a little bit. And then when you hit it, you go, there's this like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's it, that's it.

And that's how I feel as I'm reading and something that stands out. There's just this, it strikes a chord within me and it's like, okay, the Lord has this for me today. This Lord has this for me to ponder. And so it resonates as I read it. And so I'm looking for that. And then what I do is I note that down. And so I use another app.

called EverMemo, just to save it to my Evernote account. But usually I'll take the verse. So this week, on the 10th actually, 2 Corinthians 11 30 resonated with me. And so Paul says, if I must boast, I will boast in the things which concern my infirmity. And so I just wrote a simple prayer. Lord, help us to learn to rely on you in our weaknesses.

And this isn't earth shattering. It's not like, whoa, I can't believe he had such great insight on that day. I mean, it was amazing. You know, the diamonds that were there. No, it's just simple. It's just a simple thought, a simple prayer. And I try to do this just every day. Every day I get into the word of God and I try to take one snippet, one part of a verse, one passage, and just have a thought to go with it.

And just allow the Lord to speak to me about that. And in doing this, I work to keep myself fed spiritually. It's not always, you know, things that, you know, fall down from the sky and it's like earth-shattering revelation. You know, when it talks about the Word of God, you know, being line upon line, little by little, you know, this is the idea that we're to consume it a little bite at a time, a little bite at a time. And we are to think of it in those terms.

You know, think about, you know, you cannot consume one day, you know, a week's worth of food, right? You can't, you know, catch up. Oh, I missed last week of eating. So I'm going to catch up today and eat all the calories that I missed last week. I'm going to eat those today. That's not going to go well, you know, and you can't do it ahead, you know, fast.

for very far. Maybe you can eat, you know, a brunch and have kind of breakfast and lunch together. But you understand, it's kind of like you have to eat, you know, on a continual ongoing basis. And if you missed it, you know, you can't really make it up too far. You know, if you miss lunch, you can make it up at dinner. But you can't make up for yesterday's not eating by eating more today. It just doesn't work that

way. And spiritually, it's the same as well, that we need to be having this time in the word and the dailiness of it, the regular consistency of it is the most important part. More than, well, I had this great revelation, you know, more than I read 35 chapters yesterday, you know, uh,

it would be much better to read every day than to read, you know, all of those verses, all those chapters in one day and not read the rest of the week. It's that ongoing, continual, dailiness, regularness of it that's important for us. And so, Lord, help us to learn to rely on you in our weaknesses, that we would boast in our infirmities and not try to hide from them or cover them. So devotions is one thing. Another thing, of course, is attending church services.

Now, again, this is pretty basic stuff, but, you know, it's for us as leaders, for us as servants within the body of Christ, we need to be fed by others. We need to be fed and part of the work that God is doing corporately. We, you know, do believe that this is the body of Christ, that God has gathered us together for a reason, and we need to be engaged in what God is doing here and the work that God is doing. And so, you know, I would encourage you,

This is one of the reasons why you guys know whenever you're not here at service, I recently started sending you a text message with the link to the message because I think it's really important that you catch up, that you hear what God spoke, that you hear what God shared for the service that you missed, that you stay along with us. You know, as we go through Romans...

that you, on Wednesday evenings, that you stay in line with that, that you're caught up in your understanding where we're at as a body and what the Lord is speaking to us as a congregation. And Sundays as well, as we work our way through the Bible in three years, that you would be in line with that and in tune with what the Lord has been speaking. You know, it's interesting. I don't plan this, but just looking back over the past couple weeks,

You know, the Lord has really, you know, just there's a theme that's been working, that he's been working on for the past few weeks. And I didn't realize it until after I was already, you know, preparing my message for this week. But a few weeks ago, I taught from 1 Samuel chapter 23 about people needing help.

And then the week after that, I taught about, the name just escaped me, of course, because it's right on the spot and it's not in my notes. But I taught about people not being your enemy, right?

And then Richard taught last week, and then this week I taught about the importance of the relationships and how we're to hold on to unity. And there's this people theme, you know, that God's working on our relationships. He's working on our reaching out to one another and our engaging with one another. And so, you know, there's a theme there. And so, you know, it's an important thing that God is speaking, and it's tied together, and not, you know, by my master plan, but the Lord threads these things together.

And so that's why it's important for us to be ongoing and consistent and engaged in the things that are being shared at our services. But then also additional reading is an important part of feeding yourself spiritually, that you can engage not just in the word of God, and that's good. You need to have those devotions. But there's also great value in reading other things that are beneficial and important for you as a leader within the body of Christ.

So one of the tools that I use to do this is an app called Feedly. Again, there looking at my iPad screen. So the Feedly app is basically an aggregator. It's a news aggregator. And so you can subscribe to any type of news site and blogs and those kinds of things.

And so I custom make, you know, my own news feed in this way. And so I get a mix of a few different things in this way because I do like quite a bit of variety. And I get things that I agree with. I get things that I disagree with. I get things that challenge me as well as things that just entertain me. So here's a quick example. So here's, you know, one page.

So just some, you know, interesting...

Casual trivia if you need some information about that. War room information. Moses and Jesus didn't have their dream jobs by 30 either. And so I thought, hey, maybe some young people could be encouraged by that. So I checked out that article. Another couple examples. How could Apple make iOS accessibility even better? You know me, I love technology.

And so these are all different blogs and articles and things that I just, you know, some of them I read, some of them I just glance and, you know, look at the paragraph that is shown there. But it just, it's a way for me to be challenged and a way for me to kind of expand my horizons a bit.

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You know, I've put it all together so that I try to stay up to date on those things and just keep myself fresh. And so additional reading is good. And we need to have that, you know, continual growing, that continual going forward. But then also, I would encourage us to have additional teaching. So church service is great. Personal devotions are good.

But I would suggest for you as a leader within the body of Christ, you need more teaching. You need to be fed more teaching.

then the personal devotions and attending church services twice a week, that's not sufficient for you in order to be able to serve the people and give out to them on an ongoing basis. That you need to be constantly feeding yourself. And so in addition to reading, in addition to attending the services and having your devotions, I would encourage you to also be engaging in additional teaching.

Now, some people do this by, you know, listening to K-Wave. And so you have opportunity perhaps on your commute or whatever, you know, you're able to hear from other teachers and hear from things that, you know, you're able to be fed and encouraged. Personally, the way that I do this is by listening to podcasts.

Now, podcasts, I use this app called Overcast. There's also a podcast app on most devices. And essentially, it's the same thing like the Feedly Reader. So you can subscribe to virtually anything that's out there with a podcast, and you can get the updates automatically. And so I have a list of probably, I don't know, 10 or 15 different things that I get every week.

Luke 19, Nate Holdridge

And, you know, we heard his teaching at the pastor's conference this last July. And I was really blessed by him and encouraged by him. And so I subscribed to his, you know, weekly updates. And so I get his messages. And so I'm able to listen to that. A lot of times on Monday as I'm doing yard work and stuff, I'm able to listen to

these teachings and be encouraged and refreshed. Then I have a couple tech podcasts, which I also listen to. So the Tech Guy and This Week in Tech. Then I got to listen to Richard Bueno, which was an awesome message that Richard shared last week. And so I was able to get caught up and hear what I missed while I was gone. And then also I try to keep up with the Pastor's Perspective podcast. I don't listen to it live, but I just get it updated every day and it's added to my app. And so

And I'm not saying that, you know, everybody has to use these apps or do exactly the same way. I'm just sharing these as an example of, hey, you need to keep yourself fed spiritually. And I would suggest to you that involves your personal devotions, that involves attending church services, but also you want to and you need to develop ways of reading other things and going beyond the traditional things or the ongoing week-by-week things.

But then also additional teaching that I would encourage you. In order for you to be able to continually feed and minister to people, you need to be continually fed and ministered to. And so I would encourage you to be developing that in yourself as well, that you would, you know, have opportunity to hear from other teachers. And I would even encourage you, you know, the things that you read, the things that you listen to, make sure that it's not just, you know,

Your favorites. But even allow some of the challenging ones in there. Maybe the ones that you're not so excited about. That you would hear from them as well.

You know, those who teach the word of God, those who preach the word of God or write the word of God, you know, they may not be our favorite. It may not be our favorite style, but it's valuable for us to learn to receive from those who bring forth the word of God in a way that it's not our favorite, you know, but we're able to develop and mature and grow as we receive from them. And so feed yourself spiritually. As Paul said, take heed to yourself.

This is important. Make sure that you have a thriving relationship with God, that you are being fed, that you are being filled, that you are full spiritually, that you are just having a lot of input in the things of the Spirit. Now, that doesn't mean, you know, there's no room for

entertainment or other enjoyable stuff. As you can see, I had in the mix there, you know, different things. I mix it up quite a bit. And so I have, you know, technology and other stuff mixed in with the spiritual stuff. But that's part of how I keep myself fresh and keep myself fed and keep myself wanting to hear from God and receive from Him.

And so the spiritual discipline for leaders, number one, is to feed yourself spiritually. Make sure that you're engaged in the word of God in multiple ways and allowing God to minister to your heart over and over and over again. Well, the second thing I'd like to encourage you in is to pray for your people.

Pray for your people. Now, you might wrestle with the your people, you know, phrase a little bit. Of course, I know they're not your people, but they're people that God has entrusted to you. And so, I think it's fair to say, pray for your people.

God has entrusted people to you as a leader within the body of Christ, as one who has been called to make disciples. You're called to minister to those people. And as a leader, you need to be praying for them. And the Lord really ministered to me in this area a while back as I looked at the example of the Apostle Paul.

And you can look at his letters. Eight out of his 12 letters, he specifically mentions how he's praying for them. In Romans chapter 1 verse 9, he tells the Romans, I make mention of you always in my prayers. In Ephesians 1.16, he says, making mention of you in my prayers. In Colossians 1.3, he says, praying always for you. In Philippians 1.4, he says, always in every prayer of mine. In

In 1 Thessalonians 1.2, he says, making mention of you in our prayers. 2 Thessalonians 1.11, he says, therefore, we also pray always for you. In 2 Timothy 1.3, he says, without ceasing, I remember you in my prayers. And in Philemon 1.4, he says, making mention of you always in my prayers. I think it's interesting how the Apostle Paul had this kind of prayers for the people that he ministered to.

These are the people that were on his heart, the people that he had, you know, he had planted churches in those cities, or he was planning to, you know, go visit those cities. He had ministry with the people that were in those cities, and so he's keeping them in prayer, and he's mentioning them in prayer. And I think that word is interesting and important. He says, I make mention of you, making mention of you, making mention of you, making mention of you.

And it was a little bit freeing for me to kind of consider this with the Apostle Paul.

As at first, I started thinking about the Apostle Paul praying for all these people and then condemning myself for, you know, my lack of prayer life. But then, as I considered, he says, I make mention of you. So he doesn't say, Richard, I prayed for you an hour and a half every day. And Jake, I pray for you three hours every day because you need it. And, you know, he doesn't, it's not like that. He says, I make mention of you.

And there was a little bit of freedom that just kind of like, hey, he's just saying, I bring you before the Lord, but it doesn't have to be, you know, this exhaustive, elaborate, you know, incredible thing. I make mention of you. I bring your name to the Father always in my prayers.

And so you're always on my lips. You're always on my heart. And I'm lifting you up before the Lord. And there's this ongoing continual thing as he says, always. I'm praying always. I'm making mention of you always, always in every prayer. Praying always without ceasing. Making mention of you always in my prayers. And so you can see this ongoing. It's just this continual thing where he is praying for his people.

He's praying for those that God has entrusted to him, for those that God has put upon his heart, and he sees it as an important thing to continue in that. So he's always, always, always, without ceasing, making mention of people in his prayers. And so the Lord instructed me through that and gave me some encouragement to do something similar. And so again, I do this digitally. You don't have to do it digitally, but I would encourage you to figure out a way to pray for your people.

And so what I finally worked out was actually using a to-do app. Now, I used to use a prayer app that was designed specifically for prayer, and it worked pretty well, but it kind of had some problems, and it wasn't well-maintained. And so I switched over to just a regular to-do app and decided, okay, I'm not going to put any of my to-dos in there, but I'm just going to design it to be used for my prayer time. And so this particular app is called To-Do, but any to-do app can do the same thing.

And so I open it up every day and I have the notifications and it tells me who to pray for every day. And so I have it set up so that I have this constant prayer list that's changing all the time. And so I'd like to walk you through some of the categories that I pray through. And so first of all,

You can see here, this is kind of zoomed in so you can see it, but it lists for me who I had to pray for today. Now, I put this together after I prayed for the people and stuff, and so you could see it clearly. But, you know, initially I think there was like 35 items, you know, on the prayer list. And so I just left one in each category so you can get an idea. Yeah.

So the first thing I pray for is I pray for groups of people by name. Now, I'm super analytical, and I'm not saying this is the right way or this is the way that everybody's, this is just the way that I do it, okay? So again, you know, just trying to give yourself an example so that you can work out how God wants you to pray for your people. But it's a tough task to pray for every individual in

Within the church. And so what I did is I broke it up by day. And so on day one of the month, I pray for the people with the last name A.

On day two, I pray for the people with the last name B. On day three, C, and so on and so forth. So day 10, I pray for the people with the last name that start with J. So Ronnie Juarez is an example of that. And so I prayed for him as well as the Jacobos and, you know, everybody else that started with the Js. And so in this way, I'm praying for different people every day.

And it gives me an opportunity to pray for everybody at some point within the month, but also not to just be in, you know, the habit or routine of praying for the same people every day. And I can easily get caught into this routine where then it's always the same prayer every day, you know, same thing, just da-da-da-da, you know. And so this way it keeps it fresh for me. And so I'm praying for different people every day based on the day of the month that it is. Now, one of the things that prompted me to do this was there was occasions where I

I would realize, hey, I haven't seen this person around. And I would begin to think back, when's the last time I saw them? And it's like three, four months ago I saw them. And it would cause me concern because then I would realize, I haven't thought about that person for like three or four months, much less prayed for them. And I realized this is terrible. This cannot go on. I had to deal with it. I had to do something about that. I wasn't continuing to pray for the people that God had entrusted to me.

And so, you know, I was, I tried, you know, different things and finally have, you know, worked out this way where it's been able to keep me continuing to pray for people. Now, I'm not perfect and I don't always do everything every day, you know, perfectly or anything like that. I'm not trying to say that, but

But it just keeps it ongoing. It keeps it in my mind. It keeps it in my heart so that I continue to pray for the people that God has entrusted to me. And so I pray for, as best as I know, you know, as best as I can, I pray for everybody who attends Living Water and try to do that, you know, at least once a month on the day that's appropriate. But then I also have another group, and that's for new people.

Now, new people, I pray for every day. So, you know, for Ronnie, you know, I pray for him, you know, once a month on the 10th, I pray for him and the rest of the J's. But new people, the Lord put on my heart to be praying for them more frequently than that. And so they are set, this category set, so it repeats every day. And so basically what I do is I pray for them every day for a month. And so I pray for them every day for a month.

And the idea is, after a month, I have a good idea of whether or not God's planting them within this body or if he has something else for them. And so it gives me an opportunity to pray for them and seek the Lord on their behalf. And so, you know, Johnny is an example here. I usually, you know, put the day that he attended or the day that the person attended. And that way, you know, I get some kind of context for when they were there and, you know, how long I've been praying for them and such.

And I continue to pray for Johnny because he was around for a while and then he kind of disappeared and I never got to know him more and I don't have his contact information. So I continue to pray for him just because the Lord still has him on my heart and I pray that we'll have more opportunity to minister to him.

Um, and so I pray for new people. I pray for them for a month and I pray for them every day and just pray that God would establish them wherever he wants, you know, and that we would be able to minister to them. So along with that, just a quick side note, uh,

When you have opportunity, as we talked about last week, about loving strangers and introducing yourself and getting to know them, a lot of times I'm not able to connect with the new people, so I don't know their name, and it's really hard for me to pray for them if I don't have their name. So if you meet someone, you know, God brings and you connect with them here at the church, please do. Give me their name.

so that I can pray for them and I can, you know, lift them up before the Lord. And so Richard's really good about this. He helps me, you know, know the people's names and I can be able to be praying for them for the month. Well, then I also pray for ministry leaders.

And a while back, as we met with the ministry leaders, I asked each one what their most difficult day of the month was, or the day of the week was. And so each one said, you know, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, whatever. And so I pray for them on whatever day they said was the most difficult day. Now that might need to be refreshed. So Dave, I don't know if, you know, it's the same day anymore now that you're in a new schedule and stuff. But, but

it's, you know, something I want to do, that I need to do, that not only am I praying for the people, but I'm praying for whoever, you know, the Lord has raised up to help me lead and minister to the body here. And so I have a, you know, extra time of prayer for the ministry leaders. And so day by day, the different leaders I pray for according to whatever day they shared was the most difficult day of the week for them. Then I pray also for the connections. I

So we've been talking about connections here at the church for a while. It's those opportunities that you have to connect with somebody, to pray for somebody, ultimately desiring to have the opportunity to share the gospel or encourage them.

And so one person I continue to pray for is Chris, and I continue to have contact with him. And so connections I pray for every day. And when we have an encounter, like this past week, Dave and I got to pray for a man named Craig who came by. I'll pray for those new connections, um,

I'll pray for them usually for a week or two, depending on how the Lord's stirring up my heart. Sometimes I pray for them longer or shorter, and then I move on to new connections that the Lord brings. But I try to pray for them, and so those connections that we

we have, you know, take place within the body of Christ as well, I pray for them. So every day these connections are repeated. So you can see kind of the pattern. Some things are monthly, like the different name groups. Some things are daily, like the new people, like the connections. And there's just different things that are happening. And it keeps it fresh. It keeps it different all the time for me. And I don't get sucked into, you know, the routine of the same thing every day all the time.

Well, the final category is the Sunday evening service. And this has its roots in, you know, on our typical Sunday evening services, we would have the time of sharing prayer requests. And so I would add those to my prayer list as well. And then I would be praying for those.

And these are also repeated every day. So I pray for these Sunday evening prayer requests every day. But I also use it as just kind of a general category. So if someone comes up to me and says, hey, can you pray for my mom? She has this situation. Then I'll add that to my Sunday evening service category. And so I'll be praying for that every day until I see, you know, some type of resolution, some type of answer to the prayer, or, you know, some other thing that, you know, lets me know, okay, it's not...

to continue to pray for that anymore. So two examples that are in here is the Missionary of the Month. That's what MOTM stands for. So I pray for the Missionary of the Month every day. Another example is Rick's recovery. And so obviously that's not over. So I continue to pray for that and lift him up before the Lord. And so these are the special needs, you know, the more urgent things that I'm praying for and lifting up before the Lord. And so in this way, you know, I try to keep myself with these different categories of

for the people that God's entrusted to me. And it's something that I endeavor to do to be faithful to the Lord in taking care of the people that I'm responsible for, that I'm gonna give account to. And as I'm praying for the people,

I'm praying something specific many times based on what I shared a few moments ago, what the Lord shows me in my devotions that day. So again, 2 Corinthians 11, verse 30.

If I must boast, I will boast in the things which concern my infirmity. And so my prayer that day was, Lord, help us to learn to rely on you in our weaknesses. And so as I prayed for Ronnie, as I prayed for Johnny, as I prayed for Dave, as I prayed for Chris, as I prayed for Rick and all the others who were on my list that day, that was the focus of my prayer. That was what I was praying for them.

And so then the next day, different devotion, different word from the Lord, different prayer for the different people that are on the list. And again, for me, you know, this is important for me to keep it fresh, to keep it so I don't get stuck in a routine and I don't just, you know, recite, wrote, you know, and just say prayers over and over again without having any heart or meaning to it. But that I really have, you know, genuine prayer for the people that God has entrusted to me.

So again, I'm not saying everybody, you know, come up with this complicated system and have, you know, five different categories that repeat on various levels at different times of the month. I'm not saying everybody has to have this. This is the way that my mind works and this is the way, you know, I help keep myself in this constant state of prayer for the people that God's, you know, entrusted to me, that I'm responsible for. But whatever you do, work out some way to pray for your people.

And so you can do that, you know, with a legal pad and a pen. You can do that with sticky notes. You can do that with, you know, reminders or whatever. You can do that in a variety of ways. But as a leader within the body of Christ, you need to be praying for your people. And I always like the example of Samuel in 1 Samuel chapter 12, as the people prayed

Samuel or rejected really the Lord from ruling over them and Samuel being the spokesman and received the king instead and wanted the king and then they realized their error as God showed the sign and wonder and it stormed and rained when it wasn't supposed to and they freaked out and said, oh no, we did something wrong. Hey, please don't stop praying for us. Please don't stop working and speaking to us.

And so Samuel responded in 1 Samuel 12, 23. Moreover, as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord in ceasing to pray for you, but I will teach you the good and right way. And I think it's interesting here. Samuel says it would be a sin for me to stop praying for you.

And I take that to heart as a leader, as one who's entrusted with people. Remember in Hebrews chapter 13, it talks about those who have authority within the body of Christ as those who will give account for the souls of the people, that we will give account. And so it would be sin for us to not pray. It would be sin for us to cease to pray for the people that God has entrusted to us. And I think it's interesting, he goes on to say, but I will teach you the good and right way.

That these two are connected. That I can't teach the people of living water the good and right way if I'm not also praying for the people of living water.

that these two are linked, that these two are linked inseparable together, that if I'm not praying for the people of living water, I'm not going to be effective. I'm not going to be prophetic. I'm not going to be able to speak on behalf of the Lord the good and right way. And I think the effectiveness of the teaching is connected to the consistency of the prayer.

And so it would be a sin for me to cease to pray for you, to cease to pray for those who God has called here at Living Water. And so I encourage you, work out a way, find a way to be able to pray for your people. Who's God entrusted to you? And make sure you're spending time in prayer for them. Well, another aspect of spiritual discipline, of course, is fellowship.

And this is one that we all need to be encouraged in continually. And that is keep yourself in fellowship. Now, I say it's something that we need to be encouraged in continually because, well, it's a common thing. It's a known thing that leaders are often lonely, you know, and there's the saying, it's lonely at the top, right? But for us as believers, listen, for us as leaders within the body of Christ, it really shouldn't be that way.

it really should not. And this is something I think that we need to work to correct. It's not something that will happen automatically, but it is a reality that many leaders battle loneliness. In fact, if you just do a quick search, you know, lonely church leaders, you'll see example after example, article after article, all kinds of help, all kinds of books written, all kinds of things addressing this issue of loneliness and

for leaders within the church. Now, there's also, you know, all types of materials for loneliness for leaders in general in the corporate world and such. But even specifically within the church...

Well, one example is leadership is lonely. Are you? Churchleaders.com, you know, it's an article there. Why you're a lonely leader and that's okay. And I would kind of wrestle with that and I would say, yeah, there is some elements of loneliness where, you know, as a leader, sometimes the burden of decisions fall on you and, you know, there is that. But at the same time, we need to understand that we are not alone, that God hasn't called us to be alone. We're not in this all by ourselves.

And we need to keep ourselves in fellowship. H.B. London, who is the head of pastoral ministries at Focus on the Family, did a study and made a declaration that at least 70% of pastors in the United States claim they have no friends. And this is, you know, something that's not good. This is not appropriate for someone to say, you know, I just don't have any friends.

It's understandable. Now, please understand, I'm not condemning anybody. I can understand. I can relate. And especially in some of the things that we've gone through over the past 11 years, I understand where that comes from. But at the same time, I see it as a responsibility on myself to

to keep myself in fellowship. And so many times, not necessarily all the time, and so again, I'm not condemning anybody out there, but if I have no friends, just speaking for myself personally, it's because I have not kept myself in fellowship. It's because I haven't done anything to maintain friendships. Think about the example of Jesus in Mark chapter 14, where

As it was the night of the betrayal, it says in verse 32, then they came to the place which was named Gethsemane and he said to his disciples, sit here while I pray. And he took Peter, James, and John with him and he began to be troubled and deeply distressed. Then he said to them, my soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death, stay here and watch. So Jesus had his group of disciples and he says, all right, you guys sit here, I'm gonna go pray. But then notice what it says, he took Peter, James, and John.

He had Peter, James, and John who were closer to him. And he shares with them a little bit deeper than he shares with the rest of the disciples. It says that he began to be troubled and deeply distressed. And in another gospel, he tells them this. Hey guys, I'm exceedingly sorrowful even to death.

And so he opens up to Peter, James, and John a little bit more than the rest of the disciples. He has these guys and he shares with them. He's more vulnerable to them in a sense. He's more open with them and shares with them. This is what I'm going through. So notice what he says though. He took Peter, James, and John with him.

Jesus says, all right, you guys come here with me. You guys stay close to me. He took it upon himself to bring these guys closer and to open up to them and allow them to understand and to know that he is troubled and deeply distressed. And then notice he says in verse 34, he said to them, my soul is exceedingly sorrowful even to death. Stay here and watch. My soul is exceedingly sorrowful. Here's what I'm going through. Stay here and watch.

We also know from the other accounts that the instruction is to watch and pray. Jesus didn't wait for them to notice that he was exceedingly sorrowful, even to death, and then come and pray for him. And this is something the Lord really ministered to me along, not, actually not that long ago. It was something more recent, where it was last year, and there was a battle of depression that I was going through. Not the

There was a couple battles. But anyways, actually, I guess it was about two years ago now. And it was at Sosimo's graduation that the Lord really spoke to me and said, it had been a long time I'd been dealing with this. I'd been just depressed and discouraged, all kinds of things going on in my head and my heart. And the Lord spoke to me and said, you need to meet regularly with Pastor Sisko and George.

And so I talked with them at Sosomo's graduation, not graduation, but ordination. And I said, hey, would you guys be open to meeting with me? Let's do lunch once a week. I just really feel like God told me to do that. And so ever since then, you know, we missed some weeks, but for the most part, we meet once a week. And it's amazing. It's really, it's made a huge difference for me to call them and say, hey, would you guys want to meet? Now, here's what happens often, because we're all busy, right?

If I don't initiate, if I don't text Pastor George and Cisco and say, hey guys, you guys good for lunch today? Let's meet at 12. If I don't do that, then we don't meet. I have to keep myself in fellowship and initiate and say, hey guys, I have to take George and Cisco with me and say, hey, let's sit down. Let's have a meal together. Let's spend some time together.

And it's not that it's like, okay, it's not a planning meeting. It's not, okay, let's get into some spiritual deep truth. It's, hey, how are the grandkids? Hey, what's going on in your life? You know, how are things going? We're just talking. We're enjoying life together and having a discussion conversation together. And of course, we also do get into deeper things as the time or the situation is appropriate.

But it's just that fellowship together. It's amazing. I didn't know that I needed that kind of relationship because I'm so, you know, just in my own mind, I think I'm just independent, right? I've always been independent. I've always been like that and just all by myself. But I didn't know. And the Lord had to teach me. I need, I need those kinds of guys in my life, those kinds of friendships, those kinds of fellowship in my life. I think Paul's another example of that.

In 2 Timothy chapter 4, he's writing to Timothy. He says, And so it's interesting. Jesus grabbed Peter, James, and John. Here's Paul. He has guys with him, but they've all left for various reasons, some good, some bad.

He just has Luke with him now. And so he writes to Timothy and says, Timothy, be diligent to come to me. I need that relationship. I need your presence. And don't just come by yourself, but get Mark and bring him with you. And you see the pattern here. Jesus had Peter, James, and John. Paul had Timothy, Luke, and Mark. There's the need for three friends. Now, is that an exact science number? Well, no, of course not. But it's an interesting pattern, isn't it?

But notice how Paul doesn't sit there in prison and think, man, I hope Timothy realizes how much I need a friend right now. And he just comes and visits me.

He writes to Timothy and says, hey, Timothy, be diligent to come. Come to me quickly. I really need to spend time with you face to face and get Mark and bring him because he's useful too. I need him. He's going to be a valuable part of what God wants to do. But he's reaching out. He's gathering. And so he's keeping himself in fellowship. And I want to encourage you, when we talk about fellowship,

Of course, we fellowship before and after service, you know, for a few minutes, week after week and such. But you need to have some deeper relationships with that than that. And you can't just wait for other people to kind of notice, you know, what you're going through and then reach out to you and then, you know, be upset if they don't. You got to be more mature than that. Monitor yourself.

Check your own heart. Let God show you. You need friends. And in order to have friends, you must be friendly. What does that mean? That means, hey, get Peter, James, and John and say, come pray with me.

That means reach out and invite people to spend time with you. And I would encourage you to have those kinds of fellowship, to have those kinds of time together with other believers, others that you can share with. Now, as leaders within the body of Christ, that can be challenging because sometimes, you know, we become friends with the people that we're ministering to,

which isn't necessarily wrong, but depending on maturity levels and stuff, you know, there's different relationships that we have with different people. And so I would encourage you to also have, you know, some meaningful relationships with not just people that you're ministering to, but people that you maybe could call your peers, you know, people that are going through similar things, people that have similar responsibilities and can relate to you on that level as well.

And so here's just a couple quick examples of how I keep myself in fellowship. So weekly I meet with Pastor Cisco and George. We have lunch together.

monthly pastor david rosales at chino valley he holds a senior pastors meeting it's senior pastors only and we get together we have lunch once a month and it's pretty interesting it's like unlike any other meeting i've ever been to uh you know for church leaders he you know allows us to have time we kind of basically talk to whoever's next to us as we have the lunch together

And then he'll quiet us down and say, okay, guys, what do you want to talk about? And he just opens it up and allows the pastors to bring up whatever. And we get involved in a discussion about whatever, you know, is on people's hearts and whatever's going on. And so in that, you know, it's interesting to be able to share together the different things that are going on in ministry, the different struggles that are there, the different, you know, highlights and great things and rejoicing and celebrations. And it's a fellowship that is good.

Also, I engage in occasional meetings with other pastors. So I continue to maintain contact with Pastor Ruben, with Pastor Mike over at Into the Light, and people like that. And so I'm engaged in those things as well.

But then also I see the annual conferences as an important part of this. Many times for me, the teachings of the conference are good and the Lord's always speaking to me. But many times the highlight of the conferences are the fellowship times, the times where we get to engage and talk about and respond to the things that the Lord is speaking at the conference.

And so, you know, that's one of the reasons why I always encourage the leaders here. You know, there's opportunities to be involved in the conferences. There's all kinds of conferences available, retreats and such. And it's a good opportunity to keep yourself in fellowship. And, you know, it's easy to think, well, you know, hey, I already heard enough Bible teaching, you know, but it's not always about that. You know, it's many times about the connections that are made there in person, face-to-face with those who are attending. All right, so...

Feed yourself spiritually. That's number one. Pray for your people. That's number two. Keep yourself in fellowship. That's number three. And then finally, share words from God. Share words from God. We need to be sharing with people the word of God, but also the words from God. Paul tells Timothy in 2 Timothy 4, "'Preach the word, be ready in season and out of season. "'Convince, rebuke, exhort "'with all longsuffering and teaching.'"

I think this is interesting. He says, preach the word. We're familiar with this verse. It's normal for us. Be ready in season and out of season. But as he goes on to say, convince, rebuke, and exhort with all longsuffering and teaching, I see something a little bit different.

And that is the currentness of it. As he's preaching the word, you know, okay, turn to Genesis chapter one, and I'm preaching the word. It can be kind of generic in the sense that, you know, I'm bringing forth and bring forth the word of God. But convincing, rebuking, and exhorting, I think have to do more with at the moment. Have to do with, here's what's happening in your life.

And you need some convincing about what the Word of God says. You need some rebuke about what the Word of God says. You need some exhortation about what the Word of God says. And so it's the application of the Word of God to the specific situations that people are experiencing, the specific situations that people are going through. And so he says you're to be convincing and rebuking and exhorting, not just general truth, you know, this is the doctrine of this and this is the doctrine of that, but

But this is how to handle. This is how to deal with. This is how to relate to, you know, these situations and understand what the scripture says regarding the things that you are experiencing. And so for me, I really believe it's important for me as I prepare to teach, and I'm going to talk about Sunday mornings as an example, that I'm looking for, you guys who went through equipped to preach, you understand, I'm looking for a prophetic emphasis that

I'm looking for something. It's the word. I'm going to teach the word. I'm going to teach the passage. I'm going to teach, you know, what the Bible says and what the Bible teaches, but also to have that emphasis, to have that highlight that it's beyond just general teaching, just here's the information, but here's the message.

here's a specific emphasis that I believe is from God to help us understand what God desires for us. Now, currently, what we're doing is we're going through the Bible in three years. And so what I do is I, on Tuesday, sit down and I read through all the chapters for the week and

usually once or twice, and I'm looking for different things that God might highlight, and like I shared earlier, where it resonates, you know, and it's like, okay, I know God wants to speak more about these things. And so as I do, I take notes, and so usually what I do is I summarize the chapter. So 2 Samuel 14, that's Absalom's return. Chapter 15 is his conspiracy, and then David leaves Jerusalem, and chapter 16 is

and Ziba and Shimei, and you know, you get the point. And so I just kind of, you know, get a sense as I go through the chapters to get a sense for, okay, this is what happens in this chapter, so I can look back at it and pray over it and consider what God has to say. And then I'll write down some thoughts about, well, maybe God wants to share about this or that. And so looking at it a little bit closer, I thought about 2 Samuel chapter 16 and 19 and talking about bad decisions and

And then in 2 Samuel chapter 15, I thought about letting God defend you as David there, you know, sent the ark back and said, hey, if God wants to bring me back, he'll bring me back, but I'm going to let him do that. I'm not going to bring the ark with me. Conspiring for authority, looking at the example of Absalom in chapter 15, dealing with Shimei in chapter 16 and 19. There's some interesting things there to consider. And again, 2 Samuel 15, I thought about surrendering to God's plans and

Similar to letting God defend you. If God wants to bring me back, he'll bring me back. If God doesn't want me to, then I'm fine not being king is what David was expressing there. And so I prayed over those things and I continued to read through the passages, continued to read through the chapters and began to narrow down to

What I taught this morning, 2 Samuel 16 verses 1 through 4 and chapter 19 verses 24 through 30. And what began to resonate is the thought, the idea that God loves unity and Satan loves division. And that thought was the main thought. That thought was the emphasis that the Lord gave me. God loves unity and Satan loves division. And I thought, well, I'm going to do that.

And so I began to reflect on that, how easy it is to divide us. And I jotted down some different passages that related to that. And I came up with my first draft for the message there at the bottom. And so the original title was How to Maintain Relationships.

That's, you know, the way I put it down. That's the way I wrote it. Do not immediately believe what others say about them. That was the first point. Do not make decisions before hearing the other side and give opportunity to reconcile. And so that was my first draft. And usually I send that out to a couple people, the worship leader. And so they kind of know and they're kind of, you know, they're being able to pray over their set and stuff as they're preparing for worship.

But it's the first draft, and so then I go through many revisions. So you can see here on the left, How to Maintain Relationships was the original title, Fight for Reconciliation, Fight for Unity. I liked that idea of fighting, you know, that contrast, fighting for unity. But then as I continued to work through it and pray through it, then the Lord brought me to the idea, and it was based on, you know, the picture of holding on to unity. And so that's what I shared. And then each point, you know, I was playing with different wordings. Now, this isn't just...

you know, for style. It's not just for fun, you know, that I'm playing. Because what I'm doing is I'm narrowing down

The emphasis, the point, and seeking to hear from the Lord. It's not just about, you know, is it catchy? Is it, you know, clever? You know, is it all that kind of stuff? It's, does it narrow down? Does it sharpen the point so that I'm sharing the emphasis? I'm convincing, rebuking, and exhorting for the situations that God wants to address in this message.

And so that's the reason for, you know, changing up the wording and changing up these things. It's not to be fancy. It's to hone the message. It clears up my heart so that I know this is what the Lord wants to speak. And so I focus on that and I work hard on that. Again, not just to be clever and not to have, you know, some fancy thing, but to have that clear, specific, this is what the Lord wants to speak to his people regarding unity, right?

Well, one of the things I also do for Sunday mornings, it might be just a silly thing, but I also, you know, pull up a different visual to kind of go behind the points just to kind of reinforce the point that is being made and that I'm making. And so these were different, you know, I went through a bunch of different things, but I

but looking at these kinds of pictures, I was talking about, I was looking up things like division and separation and that kind of thing. And, and then that's where it brought me to, um, the, the title of hold on to unity. And so then it, you know, brought me to, uh, the whole picture of red Rover and, uh, yeah, red Rover, not red Robin. Um,

But so, you know, I'm playing around with different visuals and stuff because I just want to be able to bring, you know, kind of as on many levels as possible that clear direction, that clear specific word from the Lord. And so, again, it ended up being like this. And so the girl breaking through the line or trying to break through the line and Red Rover holding on to unity is the title. Don't believe in accusation because I tied it into reality.

Paul's exhortation to not receive an accusation against an elder. Don't make decision before hearing both sides. That one stayed the same the whole time. All the revisions stayed the same. And then make reconciling a priority. And I actually had a fourth point, if you notice, on the previous...

I had a fourth point, when to divide, and talking about maybe dividing when necessary and the time where it is okay to divide. And I thought about getting into that. I prayed over it, and ultimately the Lord took it out. So I didn't get into that. And so the whole idea, though, is sharing words from God. That it's my goal, it's my endeavor to make sure that I bring forth a message from the Lord. That's not just information. That's not just, you know,

Stuff you can put in your head and have interesting facts about, but that there's a specific message from the Lord, a specific word from the Lord to convince, to exhort, to rebuke, according to, you know, whatever the Lord wants to speak to those that he has gathered together today. And so these are what I see as spiritual disciplines for leaders.

Same basic elements of your walk with the Lord in reading, in praying, in fellowship, and in sharing. But as leaders, we need to take it to another level. And it's your responsibility to feed yourself spiritually. And just to have, you know, a chapter a day probably isn't sufficient for you to be spiritually fed.

And for you to just attend, you know, once or twice a week probably isn't sufficient for you to be spiritually fed. In order to continue to lead and to give out, you're going to need to be receiving from the Lord to a greater degree.

But then you also have an accountability for your people. And so you need to be praying for your people. You need to be lifting them up before the Lord by name, regularly, consistently. And again, I see that as connecting to the teaching them. In order for you to teach them and disciple them and train them in the way that God wants you to,

You need to be praying for them. And it doesn't mean you're gonna be perfect in it, but you're never gonna be as successful or as effective in teaching if you are not praying for the people that God has entrusted to you. And then keep yourself in fellowship.

Grab people and bring them close. Don't wait for people to, you know, scoop you up, but you do that. You grab Peter, James, and John and take them with you and say, come pray. Come, let's get together. Tell Timothy, hey, come quickly. I need to have you here. I need to spend some time with you. Reach out and don't just wait for others to reach out to you. Keep yourself in fellowship.

And then work to share words from God. Spend time in prayer. Spend time in the word. And share the word of God. Convince, rebuke, and exhort those that God has entrusted to you. Amen. And so, Lord, I pray that you would help us to grow and to exercise these disciplines, Lord, that we would develop, that we would mature, that we would draw near to you and become more like you, Lord, that we would be useful in your kingdom for the work that you've set before us. In Jesus' name I pray.

Amen.