Back in 2001, God placed a clear call on my life when he answered my prayer for life goals with three very specific items:
- To be a part of a church planting church.
- To help reach my generation for Jesus.
- To invest myself in the next generation of church leaders.
Those three over-arching goals set in motion a series of events and decisions that radically altered the course of my life. We planted LifePoint Christian Church in San Diego in response to the first of those life goals. Since then, we have joined up with Mountainview Church in Denver to help them live out the vision of adding new churches and campuses.
But it’s the third goal that I’ve been thinking about lately: to help develop the next generation of church leaders.
There was a time in my life when I was the next generation of church leaders (I’d like to think I still am, to some degree). Looking back over my early years as a pastor, I am grateful for the older men who served as mentors. Not all of them were pastors themselves. Some were, some were not. All of them took the time and interest to invest themselves in me.
I’ve become much more intentional over the past year or so to seek out up-and-coming leaders that I can spend time with. It’s interesting to see myself sitting across the table — 10 or 15 years younger, with the same youthful ideals and passions. I hear myself saying, “When I was your age …” more and more.
There is a great need within the Christian community for older men to invest themselves in younger leaders. It was the encouraging words of the man who baptized me who helped set my feet on the path they are on today. For him, it might have been a casual comment; for me, it was an affirmation that settled in my heart and never left.
I’ll be writing more on this later. Off to a meeting …