On My Heart:Presence

It’s all God. His world. His kingdom. His church.

Leaders must be renewed. Personally, deeply renewed in God. Not just strategically equipped, but spiritually present to him before any strategy is built.

It starts with seeking God himself. Not seeking a movement, not engineering an outcome, not manufacturing what only he can initiate. Just seeking him. Being with him. Silence. Solitude. In His presence, before productivity, being before doing.

And it comes through honesty before him. Confession of need. Confession of sin. Confession to one another. There is something about a community of leaders who will not pretend that opens the door to genuine movement.

It comes through the means of grace. Character transformation is the only path to lasting behavioral change, and character is formed slowly, quietly, through disciplines, through His presence. The Spirit works little by little, through the Word, prayer, and community, making us more like Christ. We pastor like Christ. We lead like Christ. We think like Christ. But only in proportion to how much we’ve been with him.

Leaders must embody it. Then train others to do it, individually and corporately: how to sit quietly with God, look upon him, listen for him. How to read Scripture not just academically but personally, taking it in as food. How to pray. And how to do all of it together, as a gathered people.

There is no shortcut. There is no other way. A movement of God cannot be manufactured.

Yet I’m not seeking a movement. I’m seeking God.