Core Ministry Values

At the core of my min­istry lies a set of con­vic­tions sum­ma­riz­ing my under­stand­ing
of the Bib­li­cal teach­ings on min­istry and life.

I Must Nur­ture Inti­ma­cy With God: if I do not act out of a vibrant
spir­i­tu­al­i­ty, then I labor in vain. I must reg­u­lar­ly:

1. Pray:
   both with my spir­it and with under­stand­ing
2. Read
   His Word: for per­son­al growth in addi­tion to min­istry tasks
3. Attend
   Cor­po­rate Wor­ship: par­tic­i­pat­ing regard­less of my emo­tion­al state
4. Meet
   With a Small Group of Fel­low-Believ­ers: for account­abil­i­ty and encour­age­ment.

I Must Cul­ti­vate My Char­ac­ter: who I am is more impor­tant that
what I do. Char­ac­ter is a broad top­ic, but I con­sid­er these qual­i­ties
to be cen­tral:

1. Hon­esty: nei­ther telling lies nor slant­i­ng truth
2. Con­sis­ten­cy:
   act­ing on what I pro­fess to believe in pub­lic and pri­vate
3. Courage:
   dis­re­gard­ing per­son­al con­se­quences when fac­ing moral choic­es
4. Hard
   Work: doing the best I can do because God is always my boss
5. Fis­cal
   Respon­si­bil­i­ty: liv­ing with­in my means, being gen­er­ous, sav­ing for the
   future

I Must Build My Mar­riage: God gave me a wife for a reason—she
is to be a friend and a part­ner in min­istry. Plus, I will be mar­ried after
I retire. I ignore that fact at my per­il.

I Must Hone My Skills: God deserves the very best I have to offer.
There­fore I read wide­ly and wise­ly, and I earnest­ly desire book, con­fer­ence,
and oth­er resource rec­om­men­da­tions from those I esteem. My goal is to
mas­ter the essen­tials of my pro­fes­sion. At present, I under­stand those
essen­tials to be:

1. Spir­i­tu­al
   Dis­ci­pline: learn­ing to live a God­ward life
2. Hermeneu­tics:
   learn­ing to inter­pret the Bible respon­si­bly
3. Lead­er­ship:
   learn­ing to help oth­ers act effec­tive­ly
4. Com­mu­ni­ca­tion:
   learn­ing to artic­u­late ideas per­sua­sive­ly
5. Mar­ket­ing:
   learn­ing to intrigue oth­ers with Christ and His Church

I Must Main­tain Healthy Rela­tion­ships: fun­da­men­tal­ly, min­istry
is about rela­tion­ships. As a spir­i­tu­al leader, I accept respon­si­bil­i­ty
for the health of the rela­tion­ships I am involved with and will work to
deep­en them.

I Must Rig­or­ous­ly Ana­lyze My Beliefs: beliefs dri­ve behav­ior.
I have a tremen­dous capac­i­ty for intel­lec­tu­al lazi­ness and self-decep­tion.
I must read the most chal­leng­ing works and talk with the most chal­leng­ing
peo­ple to test my ideas for truth.