I’m ready for 2016. I don’t know about you, but I am.

This just last week I sat down with our team and we reviewed this last year, which is always fun to see where God moved and was faithful, and I sat down and introduced the “word” we will be focusing on this year as a team.

Yes, a word.

I’m sure you have heard of this before, but this year our team has one word that we will be focusing on and will be asking the question: Does what we are doing right now go along with this word to move forward?

Before I tell you what ours is, let me tell you why. I think one of the best things leaders of a ministry can do is to keep things simple. This doesn’t mean water down anything, but to cast vision to get people moving forward in a simple but concise way so we know without a doubt we are hitting the goals we have set for this up and coming year. Sure we can make a list. Sure we can write it all down and check it during the year. Don’t get me wrong, each person on the team has goals we have written down, but for the ministry as a whole, I want to look back and ask, “Were we/did we do this?” One word allows us to say yes or no and then we know that as a team we were successful.

Last year, we didn’t do this as a team but I did it for myself. It was my first year in this postion and I just wanted to move forward. The word I picked this last year was the word:

BUILD

We rebuilt the program. We rebuilt our volunteer team. We rebuilt our camp culture. We rebuilt everything I feel. I shared this with the team and they would agree. We needed to build a firm foundation to build the future off of and I believe when you do this, you will see the fruits of sometimes what felt like fruitless workings in the moment.

This year, I introduced the one word concept to the team and came up with the word:

BOLD

I was reading through the book of Joshua and this word kkept coming up to me. The big point: before every great move of God, there was a step out in boldness of Joshua.

This is what I want. I want God to move in ways I have not seen yet, but it will take us to step out in boldness. From this point on as we carry on this year, all events, all sermon series, all small group launches and outreaches we will ask ourselves, “Is this being bold?” Because we BUILT last year, this year we can be BOLD because we now have something to stand firm on. Our program can take on growth. We now have small groups to place students in after they come to our midweek program.

We will be a bold team this year. We will be bold in our student and college ministries this year. All stemming from this one word that will help us keep focused on what we feel God has called us to do in our valley.

Again, leaders clarify and simply in a way that everyone knows where we are going and helps push their people to get there. One-word resolutions help us do just that.

 

How do you keep focus? What do you do to gain clarity in your ministry?

 

@justinknowles3