TOP 12 MissionalChallenge.com Posts in 2012

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Here are the 12 Posts on MissionalChallenge.com that had the most page views in 2012:

#12 Pray for Roland Niednagels’ Recovery– My friend Roland had surgery in April to remove a brain tumor. He fought the battle to recover for the next eight months and went home to be with our Savior last week on December 25. I will miss him tremendously and am so grateful for his influence on my life. (Read this post from Roland’s training: Luke on Leadership)

#11 Disciplemaking Strategies: Training for Trainers (T4T) – A discipleship revolution emerged in a densely populated corner of Asia as believers faithfully followed Jesus as obedient disciples, passed on the gospel, and discipled others they led to faith. At last count, more than 1.7 million people had been baptized and more than 150,000 churches started. This movement is known as Training for Trainers (T4T) because every disciple is expected to train others.

#10 Immature Christians Need to Grow Up! – Immature Christians are an obstacle to accomplishing Jesus’ mission! One of the reasons that churches are filled with immature Christians is that churches today are tolerating disobedience. I’m not trying to say that Christians can attain some state of obeying Jesus perfectly. Yet in many churches there’s no expectation that followers of Jesus will actually do what He says in Matthew 28:19-20.

#9 When to Start Worship Services – I love to train and coach church planters. In our training events, we focus on developing plans to start churches by first making disciples. I emphasize the importance of actually engaging in the process of disciplemaking before you set your date for a Grand Opening. In fact, I recommend that you don’t actually start worshipping on Sundays until after you have baptized new believers.

#8 The Pastor’s Job is to Be the Lead Disciplemaker -Pastors need to be equipping disciplemakers. They need to be raising up disciplemakers. How do they do this? By taking the lead in making disciples who make disciples. This isn’t something to delegate to others. Pastors can’t say their job is to preach, or think that preaching alone makes disciples.

#7 Don’t Plant a Church! – I’ve decided to change my message to church planters. Starting today, my message is: Don’t Plant a Church! Don’t Start Worship Services! Start Making Disciples First!

#6 7 Habits of Great Coaches – I’m grateful that Steve Ogne coached me and helped me to see firsthand the habits of great coaches. He both taught and demonstrated these habits.

#5 The Multiplication Cycle™ – Traditional training for church planters often focuses on preparing to launch worship services to hopefully make disciples. But what if church planters and their teams focused on making disciples who make disciples first – even before starting worship services? Jesus didn’t train His disciples to start services to make disciples, but rather to make disciples to start churches.

#4 Measuring Success in Your Church – What if the amount of offerings and attendance are actually false proxies? What if working to see these numbers increase has resulted in spending time “improving the proxy instead of focusing on our original (more important) goal instead”?

#3 Find David Goeser – My Friend Mark Goeser’s son was last seen on July 22, 2012. An all-out search was carried on for several months until his body was found. Regrettably, David took his own life. (Read this follow-up post: Search for the Lost)

#2 Flossing Teeth and Making Disciples – Here’s the parallel: Being in church on Sunday pleases God. I’ve made this part of my weekly routine for years. My parents starting taking me to church with them from birth. Now it’s a habit. Yet what I’m discovering is that more important than going to church on Sunday, Jesus wants me to be making disciples.

#1 My 500th Missional Challenge Post – After posting for five years, here are 8 lessons for bloggers.

Blogging gives me joy! I’m still amazed that I posted daily for the past year. I hope to continue this habit in 2013!

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