Breeze Blog

How do you ensure your church will be a thriving ministry ten or twenty years from now? Those of you in a primary seat of influence and leadership in your church, perhaps THE primary seat of influence and leadership, what can you do to invest in the future of your church after your time in leadership is over? One of the key answers to these questions is leadership development—growing the leadership and ministry skills of the people around you.   So, how do you do that? Leadership development...

If your church is like most, you’ve probably been trying to determine the health of your church right now. You compare your attendance to last week. You compare your attendance to last year. You talk about the percentage of your people in-person and online. But it doesn’t seem to really answer whether your church is healthy or not. One of the best ways I’ve found to answer the “how are we doing” question is to measure engagement from your congregation. The reason I like engagement is because...

I was a student pastor for about 15 years. During the last five years of that time, I remember a scary thought that would pop into my head: Youth pastors have a shelf life. At some point I will no longer be cool or relevant. If my bedtime is 8:30 PM, my youth pastor days are likely winding down. The question I struggled with was this: What’s next?   Maybe for you this is a terrifying question. Or, maybe it is an exhilarating question. Maybe you’re excited about what might be next for you,...

For those of us who are in church ministry, we’ve just finished pouring ourselves into launching our fall ministries. They’re now up and running, and if you’re like me, not as many people are coming as you had hoped. Add to this the ongoing COVID pandemic and restrictions, church staff and volunteers are feeling weary. Also, is it me or does it seem like a lot of people are struggling personally? Anxiety. Marriages. Depression. Life truly feels tough right now.   Let’s put it this way: Morale...

How engaged are the people you lead? Are they fully in? Are they bringing their best, or are they going through the motions? Do they own their role and their work, or are they passive?   Lack of engagement is a sign trouble is on the horizon…or perhaps is already here. If your people aren’t bringing their best creativity, problem solving, communication, and pastoral work, the ministry will slip in effectiveness.   However, a fully engaged staff and volunteer team can accomplish just about...

We’re excited to get the Breeze team together for our annual company retreat happening the week of October 25th-29th. As a 100% remote company, an in-person retreat is a memorable way to build relationships and strategize how we can support our churches even better in the coming year. Plus, we’ll get the opportunity to spend time with some of our new teammates from Tithely! To allow all Breeze employees to attend the retreat, we will not be able to provide email and phone support October 25-29,...

I wonder if this season of ministry feels like an uphill climb for you. I wonder if you were thinking things this fall might start to feel more like they did before COVID. Perhaps you were hoping all of the challenges, resistance, and opposition we’ve been experiencing this past year and a half would disappear. I know I was.   How are we supposed to do effective ministry when it feels like there is significant opposition around every corner?   I bumped into something this week from Paul’s...

We’re a couple of weeks into the fall season. For those of us who serve in churches, this is about as intense as it gets. Especially in this season where we are attempting to rebuild our churches from COVID—and, COVID and the accompanying restrictions don't seem to be going away tomorrow. The situation feels as confusing and complex as ever.   How are you doing? I mean for real. How are you doing?   Are you healthy? The last 18 months have been insane for church leaders. You’ve been through a...

It was 1992, and I was in 7th grade. It was a roller skate party. The music dropped from the driving beat of “Can’t Touch This” by MC Hammer and slid into the subtle beginnings of “I Will Always Love You” by Whitney Houston. That song only meant one thing… couples skate.   Maybe you’re young. Maybe you never experienced the sheer terror of skating up to a cute girl and stumbling through some version of, “Will you skate with me?”   What if she says no? What if she says yes?!? Keep in mind, I...

What’s the one area of your church that, if you could improve it, would dramatically impact the effectiveness of every ministry of your church? Giving? Preaching? Small Groups?   While you could make an argument for each of these, in my opinion, it's volunteerism. Imagine if your church was full of highly committed, skilled, veteran volunteers. The effectiveness of every ministry would skyrocket.   Because of the season we’re living through, this probably feels like wishful thinking. Maybe your...