“If a leader knows everything that is going on in his church, then there isn’t much going on in his church” Perry Noble
Bud Wilkinson, legendary former head coach at OU was once asked, “what contribution does professional football make to the fitness of America?”
He answered: “A professional football game is a happening when 50,000 people desperately in need of exercise sit in the stands watching 22 people desperately needing rest”
I wonder how similar our ministries are to Bud’s description of a football game: Staff running around frantically trying to share our faith, put on weekly meetings, lead 2 Bible studies while students applaud from the sideline.
Something we’re really wrestling with on our campus is how to become a permission-giving ministry truly led by students. Where students don’t need to ask before they lead. Instead they are starting prayer groups, Bible studies, outreach initiatives, throwing missional parties that we have no knowledge of.
A staff-centric ministry is:
- Students passively awaiting instruction from staff
- Staff communicate to students, often more by actions than words: “We staff would love to reach this campus on our own but since we don’t have the manpower to do it, we’re gonna need some of you students to help us out.”
In a bubble up ministry:
- Staff’s primary role is to equip students to “do the work of the ministry” Eph 4:12
- Ministry can and does bubble up from anywhere (instead of being carried out by, or commanded down from staff).
- Staff spend their time hustling to keep up with and encourage the ministry that is bubbling up everywhere
A good indicator of how we’re doing:
- Are we consistently hearing about students’ ministry initiatives that we had no clue were taking place? (“If a staff knows everything that is going on in his target area, then there isn’t much going on in his target area”)
And for MTL’s, a challenging thought from Mark Brown- Cru Director at Miami, Ohio (as I weekly try to cram everything we need to talk about into our 3 hour staff meeting):
“If you’re movement is truly led by students, there’s not much you need to cover in a staff meeting”
SO LET’S FIGURE THIS OUT TOGETHER, WHAT ARE SOME THINGS YOUR TEAM IS TRYING THAT ARE RESULTING IN BUBBLE UP MINISTRY?
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