Verve Value 5: Intimacy TO Influence

I mentioned awhile back that at Verve we recently went through a long process of naming our values. We felt very certain about our values – what it is that impassion and guide our decisions and makes us distinctive from other churches – but we wanted to give them words. Clarifying a church’s values bring unity, provide momentum, and help future generations understand and stay true to the original vision of the church.

We named five values, and I thought I’d share them over the next weeks. If you’re from Verve, you’ll recognize these values because we live them out everyday. If you’re a pastor from another church, hopefully reading our values will help you to think about your church’s values.

Our fifth value is:
Intimacy TO Influence
  • We believe that abiding in Jesus is the point, and the path to abounding in ministry effectiveness.
  • Because of love we want to impact others (at Verve we say we want to turn the world upside down) but our relationship with Jesus comes first. Not only is it the priority in terms of importance, it is also prior in terms of sequence. Jesus said in John 15:5 that we must faithfully live in Him to fruitfully live in this world. We can’t just seek intimacy with Jesus, and we can’t just seek influence in the world. God calls us to both. But intimacy with Jesus must come first, and is the fuel for ministry.
Values are one side of the “Vision Frame” – a brilliant, clarifying tool from Auxano. If you want amazing coaching on discovering your values (as well as your mission, strategy and measures) get into an Auxano co-lab!