How Get Right People?

Whoops! It’s been brought to my attention that last week I did a little short series on how I’d rather have no launch team to start a church than the wrong launch team, and how I’m trying to make sure we get the right people, and I promised I would share what I did at our “Vision Night” to help make sure we get the right people … then I never finished it.

So how do you find the right people? I don’t think I know, other than prayer.

What I think I do pretty well is eliminate the wrong people. If you do that, it will leave you with only the right people, or with no people.

So how do you eliminate the wrong people? You make your vision totally clear. You say it loud and proud, then say it loud and proud again. So last week we had 13 people who had expressed interest in joining our Launch Team over to our house. After dinner, I shared our vision: We want to join Jesus’ mission of seeking and saving the lost. I gave a few metaphors that help explain my understanding of church. I explained that if they joined we would not exist to serve them or meet their needs. That if they want to get fed, we’re the wrong church for them. That if they want great programs, don’t join us. That all I could offer them was our vision – that we would join Jesus in seeking and saving the lost.

After the meeting my wife said, “I know what you’re doing, but you could have at least made them feel welcome. It sounded like you didn’t want any of them to stay with us.” Maybe she’s right, but I didn’t want to give anyone false hope that this would be the right church for them. It won’t. Unless they want to seek and save the lost. And if they do, they’ll join us whether they feel welcomed or not.

Now just to be clear, this was a group of Christians. In Virginia Beach we started our church with a big group of people who weren’t walking with Jesus, and that was something else altogether.