Jordan Ames (00:00)
In this video, I'm going to break down a pathway on how you can lead your congregation to 500 baptisms in five years.
Jordan Ames (00:11)
If that sounds crazy, ridiculous, or intimidating to you as a pastor or as a leader in your church, keep watching.
Jordan Ames (00:21)
Now now you may be thinking, why five hundred? Where does that number even come from? To you it may seem even impossible. It may even seem like, well, you're talking about baptisms. That's that's not our job. That's a spiritual relationship between a person and Jesus. That's really not for us to we need to focus on an actual natural realm of
Jordan Ames (00:51)
Vision that we can accomplish with our resources. I'd argue I think God is calling us to partner with Him and casting visions in the natural realm. Let me tell you a little story. So I was working with a church back in the springtime, and they took the diagnostic tool that I that I built just to understand how their actions were affecting Kingdom Impact. And one of the questions is
Jordan Ames (01:18)
Is how many baptisms has your church conducted in three years? Now, baptism is just one metric we can look at as far as kingdom impact. There's many others we can do, but for the sake of this video, we're going to look at 500 baptisms in five years and how we can actually plan that and start conducting actions right now towards that vision. So this church.
Jordan Ames (01:47)
They calculated about seventeen baptisms over the previous three years. So I said, Okay, so what does it look like for five years? And one gentleman said, fifty, just throwing a number out there, fifty.
Jordan Ames (02:03)
But that 50 came from looking at the past and saying, hey, if we've done twenty in three years, we can probably do fifty in five years. So that vision wasn't filled with faith. It was filled with past certainty. It was if we keep doing what we've always done, we should expect 50 baptisms in five years. I said, what if we?
Jordan Ames (02:30)
Just got crazy and sought an impossible objective. What if we added a zero to that fifty and made it 500 in five years? Of course, all the questions from then started saying, Well, how could we even do that? It's kind of throwing up your air, that seems ridiculous. Like, why are we even talking about this? But I think those kind of big visions where we have no idea on how we're going to get there.
Jordan Ames (02:59)
But we've sought God and He's taking us, He's revealing to us the kind of impact he wants us to have. And we decide to move in that direction, not based on past successes, not based on actions or metrics in the past, but truly based on what God is laying on our hearts. I think that's the kind of vision casting that he wants from his church.
Jordan Ames (03:25)
I think he wants us to cast that kind of vision because he calls us, and scripture has this in many examples. He calls us to work with him. He wants to use us to work with him to carry out his kingdom purposes. Oftentimes, and I'm certainly guilty of this, oftentimes we are looking to work for him. We're serving in our church.
Jordan Ames (03:54)
There needs a filler for some sort of ministry. Nobody else is doing it, so we just feel like we need to cover down on that. And a lot of times it gets us in a busy routine. And people get burnt out. And ministries are just happening. There's a lot of movement, there's a lot of action, but there's no forward advancement in the realm of kingdom impact.
Jordan Ames (04:21)
See, as the church with the purpose of going and making disciples, that is something that happens in the spiritual realm. So I think it's important that we cast vision in the spiritual realm because I've heard it said the spiritual realm is reality. And the natural realm is only in a the manifestation of that reality. That opened my mind, my eyes, up to.
Jordan Ames (04:50)
a a revelation of where God was laying on my heart, where He was showing me my lack of faith. And it showed me where churches, specifically within the American church and many congregations, they look at vision based on what they can see, not what God is showing them. And I think that's where faith truly needs to lead us.
Jordan Ames (05:18)
A lot of us will say we have faith that God's going to do this or going to do that or we're trusting Him, but do our actions actually show it? There's many stories throughout Scripture where God is seeking for someone to act on the faith they say they have. And if they're refusing to, God or certainly Jesus, when he was walking the earth, saw that as a lack of faith.
Jordan Ames (05:43)
Why is that? Well, we can turn to James two twenty six where he says faith without deeds is dead. So if we have faith that God's going to move in this way or that way, how are our current actions showing that faith? And not only a faith based on what we know, but a faith based on complete uncertainty.
Jordan Ames (06:09)
Based on a vision God has just laid on our heart. We're casting that vision and we're starting to take steps towards it. I've done that with a counter trafficking mission I lead in East Africa, and over the past several months it's been truly rewarding. I'm not going to share the whole story, but God convicted me of my lack of faith in leading that mission last year. He really worked on me and grew me through the fall and into the winter. And by the end of spring,
Jordan Ames (06:37)
I knew I needed to do something to get it out of maintenance mode. God started laying on me the vision to shut down the specific international border that we're working, and I'll keep that vague because this is of course on YouTube and other open source platforms. But to to truly shut down the border. A big, seemingly impossible vision. But as I started to think about how that would happen.
Jordan Ames (07:05)
Things started to fall into place. I started to be connected with people that want to share in that vision, that that believe it can happen. People that have worked in on international borders and cross border operations. I've started to connect with people that want to help with the fundraising to make it happen. And so things are moving and God's really showing me that once I started acting on that faith.
Jordan Ames (07:35)
And moving towards that vision that he started to show up. And it's grown my faith tremendously.
Jordan Ames (07:43)
So I think where where many churches lack in their vision is a lot of times, and it's probably just based on the way churches have casted vision in the past and what they know, what pastors and leadership knows is when they think of their church's vision, they think internally to their church.
Jordan Ames (08:02)
But I want you to start thinking about kingdom impact.
Jordan Ames (08:06)
And this video is going to show you a pathway towards if you just focus on the kingdom impact, how you can start leading your church and what it might do in the growth of you as a leader and in the members of your congregation and their walks with God.
Jordan Ames (08:24)
So, to help churches, church leaders cast vision and build a strategy to then implement, I've developed a framework. It's very simple, but arguably an unconventional strategic planning process. And I'll just cover the steps of the framework with you so you have an understanding of kind of where my mind is. But the first one is really where you establish that strategic vision. I call it know your destination.
Jordan Ames (08:52)
Because has to be an actual destination that you can arrive at, that you know. For instance, shutting down this international border to human trafficking, we can start measuring what that looks like. So it's something that we can see in the natural. It's a destination that we can see in the natural.
Jordan Ames (09:11)
A vision that is not a destination might be something like we have a vision to be the salt and light of Jesus for the world. Okay, that's great. I call that an enduring vision. That might have worked when you establish your church. It might be a guideline, a north star to where you're going, but it doesn't set a specific destination in what it looks like to be the salt and light of Jesus to the world.
Jordan Ames (09:39)
So first we you have you have to start with that destination. And that's where a faith-fueled strategic vision comes in. You start there. You don't, it's not based on your current positioning. It's not based on past successes. You seek God, He lays a vision on your heart, and you set that as that strategic destination. The next is knowing your location. So that's really understanding, okay, what time, talents, and resources do we have? How do we use it?
Jordan Ames (10:09)
Who are the people in our congregation? What are their strengths and weaknesses? How are they positioned and aligned? How are we as a church structured, positioned, ready to start moving towards that destination? Because of course, to start on that journey towards a destination, you have to know where you are, right? In any sort of navigation scenario, if you have a destination you aim to go, well, you got to figure out where you are so you can start planning that route.
Jordan Ames (10:38)
Figuring out the time it takes to get there. Then number three is know your environment. You have to do some analysis of the environment that God has planted your church in. Certainly the geographical location in that environment, but maybe, maybe the narrative environment, maybe the digital environment.
Jordan Ames (10:56)
And then the fourth step of this framework is know your opposition. And this is so important. Maybe in the business sector, that might seem like competitors, like understanding your competitors and analyzing. For this, for churches and for any really faith based leader, we have to understand that when we set a destination in the spiritual realm, a direction God wants to move us to have an impact on his kingdom.
Jordan Ames (11:26)
We will face certain opposition. The enemy will not like that. We're stepping out of our comfort zone. We are seeking God, honoring him, following his direction. The enemy is going to attack. We live in a fallen world. It's a guarantee. So we don't just not do it because we understand we'll face opposition. We have to know that opposition. We have to recognize that opposition. The fifth step is know your direction. And that's really what we're going to talk about today. Just
Jordan Ames (11:56)
An actual plan. So steps two to four were kind of the analysis. You cast a vision, step one, two to four was that analysis that that we need to do. It's important because it's going to help us be wise and be good stewards and discern and be decision makers and assess risk during that step five, knowing your direction. And then six is just the execution. So once we do the plan, we need to execute it. And that's
Jordan Ames (12:26)
course the longest the longest step because that whatever if it's five hundred baptisms in five years well you might be able to develop a plan for that in hours in days but the implementation is going to be five years right
Jordan Ames (12:42)
So again, we're going to skip those steps. Our destination is 500 baptisms in five years. And for this video, I want to focus on that know your direction. I want to start looking at what does it look like in a plan to achieve 500 baptisms in five years? So we're going to take a vision we have really in the spiritual realm. We want to see 500 new souls in the kingdom, in the natural realm.
Jordan Ames (13:12)
How we measure that is through a baptism. But we have to start looking at what that where like where do we start with that with that plan, with that vision.
Jordan Ames (13:22)
So I have some questions to throw out, just again, as we kind of think about what's the journey of of a non believer becoming baptized.
Jordan Ames (13:32)
How can someone who doesn't know God see God? Right? If they don't know God, they got to see Him before they want a relationship with Him. How does someone recognize that they are a sinner? How is someone introduced to the family of God? Certainly, if you're a non-believer, you're you don't feel a part of the family of God. But if they can be introduced to the family of God and they start feeling loved and served, and they're like, wow, this is an incredible group of people.
Jordan Ames (14:01)
Certainly, that might be a reason why they want to be a real part of that family, a true member of that family. How does somebody feel loved by that family? So what actual action, that question alone will be, okay, I speak love, I I do love, I I do that one way, others do it another way.
Jordan Ames (14:19)
And who in our congregation is interceding with God on behalf of the non-believer? So some people have gifts of intercession and some people don't, right? Certainly we all are called to pray, but some people have that gift of intercession. I think it's very important that we leverage those within our congregation to pray for a vision like this, to pray that God's going to work in us and through us.
Jordan Ames (14:48)
to advance his kingdom in this way.
Jordan Ames (14:50)
So those were some questions as we think about what that journey is for a non believer to arrive at the decision to be baptized. All right, here's some other questions that we can think about as we formulate a plan. Who who is our church best positioned to serve? You know, our church in I live in Pennsylvania, our church in Pennsylvania is gonna be best positioned to serve someone different than a church in California.
Jordan Ames (15:16)
A a rural church is going to be positioned to serve somebody different than an urban church.
Jordan Ames (15:20)
Okay, maybe it's a demographic or maybe you're best positioned to serve specifically the geographical area or community in which you live.
Jordan Ames (15:29)
How does your church engage with people who are not part of your congregation? How does your church develop the members of the congregation to be prepared to give an answer for their faith? Certainly, if we want to invite people to the family of God, how is that family of God introducing people to who they are, to their faith?
Jordan Ames (15:55)
How does your church develop the members of the congregation in terms of like the art of networking and making a connection and even communication with non believers? Are the members of your church comfortable doing that? If they're not, they can be. They just might need some training.
Jordan Ames (16:14)
And I love this one because I I believe Jesus specifically prayed for this when he prayed for unity in John 17. Are there other churches in your area who also urgently desire to advance the kingdom the same way you do? Are there other churches, maybe outside your denomination, maybe inside your denomination, but are there other churches who want to partner with you in this vision?
Jordan Ames (16:42)
Partnership is such a huge and very biblical practice in all in for profit, nonprofit, and churches, individuals partnering with each other to accomplish a common vision, a common goal. It's it's some are hands, some are feet. That applies as individuals, but that also applies as organiz organizations. Some organizations are better equipped.
Jordan Ames (17:11)
To do X. Another organization is better equipped to do Y. When they partner together, they can have a lot more impact.
Jordan Ames (17:20)
And I believe this is true stewardship. Like we're not just thinking about our own resources and our own caufers and how we're going to use them, but we're willing to use our resources to partner with others. And ideally, those partners are willing to use their resources in partnership with us. Because it all belongs to God.
Jordan Ames (17:43)
And lastly, even though this is not an exhaustive list of possible questions to kind of help us critically think through this process, lastly, what pipeline, for lack of a better word, what pipeline does your church have once someone commits their life to Christ? Because someone may commit their life to Christ, but maybe not see the need for baptism. So if our our
Jordan Ames (18:09)
vision is 500 baptisms because we believe that's that's a a a a real cemented decision for Christ. What is the pipeline to develop somebody to say, hey, this is you've made that decision decision for Christ, but this is a way you can truly proclaim it publicly and people can witness it.
Jordan Ames (18:31)
So do you have some sort of discipleship class that they can be a part of? Do you have some sort of small group or life groups that they can get in, get plugged in and start being a member of the family of God in their newfound faith?
Jordan Ames (18:44)
So as we consider all or some of these questions, we can start to understand what I like to call lines of effort. All right, that's a a term I pulled out of my my experience in the military. We use lines of effort to kind of break down what type of avenues that we need to put, you know, align resources, time, efforts towards so that we can start moving towards whatever our objective is.
Jordan Ames (19:13)
So, considering our destination of 500 baptisms in five years, and some of the questions we just went over, I'm gonna provide four possible lines of efforts to get us there. Now, again, we skipped the whole analysis part of the planning process, right? We set the vision and we skipped all that, and now we're just making a plan. You don't want to skip that. I'm doing that for the sake of this video to show you.
Jordan Ames (19:43)
A pathway based on your analysis of wherever your church is, the environment God has put you on, your lines of effort towards the same vision may be completely different.
Jordan Ames (19:57)
All right, but here's here's four that I put down. All right, so number one is outreach, an outreach effort, right? Number two, life groups. I like calling them life groups rather than small groups, although they should be small. But I like life groups because it it allows for the fellowship, allows for people the opportunity to really just be in family, in in the family of God. Sometimes that family is closer.
Jordan Ames (20:27)
and more loving and understanding than their actual natural biological family. And so I personally think life groups are very, very important for people's growth. All people, mature Christians and brand new believers. And maybe even people that are kind of just exploring. Like bring a non-believer and invite them to your life group.
Jordan Ames (20:49)
The third line of effort, I think, is a big one, although it might not take as many people within your congregation, but intercede for the nonbelievers. So maybe the life groups are taking time to intercede for the non-believers as they share in their in their church leadership's vision. But I also think that having a dedicated intercessory team to specifically pray even by name.
Jordan Ames (21:19)
For some of these non believers, I think God's gonna honor that.
Jordan Ames (21:23)
And then number four, train the congregation. So we talked about like, are they are they prepared to share their faith? Right? Do they understand networking and connecting with people and communicating with people? If they don't, maybe they need some training in doing that. Maybe they need some training in sharing their faith, right?
Jordan Ames (21:41)
So those are the four lines of effort. Now I want to break those down further into so how you can see actually some strategy coming together, strategic plan that can be implemented. We're not going to go too deep because that would take a long time. But I want to go deep enough just so you can understand what this could look like. All right, so number one, the outreach line of effort. Our goal is focused.
Jordan Ames (22:09)
On the non-believer who does not attend our church or maybe any church, then what must we do? We must have an outreach strategy. Maybe we plan certain events to serve people or invite people to. Maybe we plan certain consistent efforts like a service day so we can go out and meet and serve people and love them in that way. Maybe your church already does both of them. All right, so this isn't.
Jordan Ames (22:38)
The actual actions that need to be done probably aren't much different than what you're doing, but the focus might change a little bit. How it's structured might change a little bit whenever you cast a specific destination God is taking you.
Jordan Ames (22:56)
So as you think about that that outreach and what that looks like for your church, we need to select leaders and build teams really for any one of these lines of efforts. But as we craft what those efforts look like, we need to select leaders in our church and build some teams to start leading in those efforts. And of course, they're going to do their own planning process, which I'll share a little bit about.
Jordan Ames (23:25)
So, for instance, for outreach, what does that look like? Are we going to plan and execute one per quarter? And certainly we talked about a partner church. Let's say your church plans and executes some sort of event or service day or something of that nature to outreach and serve and love on people. Let's say they do that once a quarter. And then your partner church also is committed to doing that once a quarter. Well now.
Jordan Ames (23:54)
You're doing that twice a quarter. And you're you're partnered, you're sharing resources for the whole purpose, the whole vision of seeing five hundred baptisms in five years, five hundred souls in the kingdom.
Jordan Ames (24:12)
All right, now we could go down the rabbit hole of of what that outreach looks like, what the events could look like, what the service again, that's going to look different for each church. But the idea is that it is intentional towards the goal of baptisms. And we honor Jesus' prayer for unity as we work together with partner churches in this vision. All right, so the second line of effort, life groups.
Jordan Ames (24:39)
So these groups are small groups of members in the congregation, right? They share similar interests and passions. They do life together and they enjoy spending time with each other because they connect on common interests.
Jordan Ames (24:52)
So you may have the the church as a whole doing outreach events once a quarter, twice when you include a partner church, but maybe the life group, just each individual life group, are doing things on a much, much smaller scale, but maybe they're also committed to doing sort of outreach and service type events. Now you see how you're you're really multiplying in the military. We like using the word force multiplier.
Jordan Ames (25:21)
'Cause you're using a little bit of talent and resources and multiplying that for a much grander impact.
Jordan Ames (25:29)
All right, and maybe in some of those smaller events, maybe just those are more intimate ways to network and connect and communicate with people who are non-believers. And you're starting to build a relationship and they're starting to experience the true family of God.
Jordan Ames (25:45)
And just kind of throw some math in there. Let's say each life group in your church does one event per quarter, some sort of outreach event. Well, times that, times four, the amount that you're that the one would do in a year, times that by the amount of life groups in your church. And now you've just added that much more visibility, that much more service and love to the non-believers that your church was already doing. So again, you're multiplying the impact.
Jordan Ames (26:14)
and engagement really with your community.
Jordan Ames (26:16)
Now let's just pause for a minute. We talked about outreach and these life groups. Of course, we know not everyone that you're going to connect with, build a relationship with, invite to something is going to make a decision for Jesus. And certainly not everyone who will make a decision for Jesus is going to decide to get baptized. So I want to use a business sales metric that I've recently learned called the rule of 50.
Jordan Ames (26:45)
I'm gonna use that just again, just to put some some hard objective numbers to what we're talking about. And we're gonna do do it in reverse planning. So the whole idea of 50 is that you know say I meet whatever a hundred people and I'm a salesman for I don't know, TVs. I'm trying to sell TVs. Well out of that hundred people, maybe fifty of them actually want to have a conversation.
Jordan Ames (27:14)
So that's the rule of fifty, half of it. Now that fifty, twenty-five actually want to hear my offer of the TV. And another twenty-five, maybe twelve, right? Fifty percent ish. Wanna go a step further, but you know, it goes the whole way down to maybe there's three actual sales. Okay. So again, rule of fifty, put in for this metric to reach people and to see people baptized.
Jordan Ames (27:42)
So 500 baptisms in five years, that's a hundred a year. So that's twenty-five baptisms per quarter. Okay, and of course, you gotta understand this is gonna build over time. So you might not get any baptisms that first quarter, you start doing these. But over time, you might have a whole lot more than fifty in a quarter because people you're building relationships, people are being introduced to Jesus and wanting to get baptized. So, but we're gonna use the metric of 25 and a quarter so that we understand.
Jordan Ames (28:12)
Where we need to start. Okay, so twenty-five baptisms times that by two because of the rule of fifty. Now we're if twenty-five are baptized, fifty have made a decision to follow Jesus. So again, rule fifty, if if fifty made a decision to follow Jesus, we're just saying, based on this metric, that twenty-five are going to want to be baptized.
Jordan Ames (28:36)
I think it would be a lot more, especially if you're asking them, hey, I know you've you've recently decided to follow Jesus. Would you like to be baptized? And here's what it is, and here's why it's so important. well let's just say for the sake of this rule of fifty, we'll go twenty five baptized, fifty made a decision times fifty by two, a hundred heard the gospel through a personal testimony.
Jordan Ames (29:03)
From someone they connected with on a personal level. See those hear those qualifiers? So it's not just about let me go knock on a door and tell about Jesus and they'd never even know who I am. That might make me feel good and check the box on outreach. And who knows, maybe you land on somebody whose heart has already been prepared, the seeds have been planted and watered, and they're ready to make a decision. I would argue that probably doesn't happen that often.
Jordan Ames (29:31)
However,
Jordan Ames (29:32)
Out of a hundred people who you've who've heard the gospel through a personal testimony, and that person they heard it from has already been serving them and building a relationship with them and connecting with them on a personal level. So in business, they say you you do business with people you know, like and trust. So you build that know, like, and trust factor.
Jordan Ames (29:59)
Before ever really just sharing your testimony with them. Okay, so how do we get to that? We're gonna keep going. So a hundred have heard the gospel from someone arguably they know like and trust. And out of that 50 made decision, out of that 25 baptisms. So a hundred. So that means 200 people were served and loved, arguably more than once, and connected with people from your church or your partner church at another event.
Jordan Ames (30:28)
So 200 people have been served, loved more than once, multiple times, by a person at your church. All right, again, and we're saying 100 of those heard the gospel from someone they've had a personal relationship with.
Jordan Ames (30:47)
Now, if 200 have been served in love multiple times from people of the church, maybe that's over multiple quarters, right? But if 200 have been served in love, 400 need to attend an event. Either need to attend an outreach event that you have that you're inviting them to, or they need to be served and loved in some way for the first time. So 400 attend an event for the first time, or there's someone that
Jordan Ames (31:16)
An outreach team or some sort of ministry you have goes out and serves somewhere, someone and loves on them for the first time. That's 400. Okay, again, here we are, times that by two. Now we're at 800. 800 people were invited to an event or prospected to be served at some sort of outreach. So let's say you're going down to let's just say like feed the homeless. Okay, and you're prospecting.
Jordan Ames (31:45)
That there's going to be ten there. Okay, so that's what I mean by that that prospection is part of this eight hundred. And then maybe there's another event where you actually invited a hundred people to. Okay. So so we're we're we're talking about making contact with eight hundred people per quarter.
Jordan Ames (32:06)
Okay, when you start looking at being a force multiplier, life groups being a part of this, partnering with other churches. Let's say you partner with one other church and you start talking about how you're gonna do outreach events, how you're gonna share resources, where you're gonna conduct them.
Jordan Ames (32:25)
the the eight hundred kind of starts not being as big of a number.
Jordan Ames (32:29)
And so I hope this is helping. I hope you're starting to grasp that as we think of arguably an impossible objective, when we really start picking it apart and really truly seeking how we can actually accomplish this, God is faithful and he will reveal ways that we can do it.
Jordan Ames (32:50)
All right, now let's go to the third line of effort.
Jordan Ames (32:53)
So intercession, intercede for non believers.
Jordan Ames (32:56)
So when we're talking about a vision that we believe God has laid on our hearts that we are sharing, we certainly need to be interceding and constantly seeking Him for direction and constantly seeking Him to prepare those hearts. Right? Because I think a lot of churches, a lot of pastors, they don't want to set some sort of vision like baptisms or people saved, because, well, that's that's between them and God.
Jordan Ames (33:24)
We're here when they want to do that, but that's between them and God. But we're talking about is being more intentional to partner with God because throughout scripture, that's what he's always wanted to do. And that's where we come in deeper relationship with him. So just think about having an intercessory. Let's just say it's five specific intercessors. Maybe they meet once a week. Maybe they're their own life group.
Jordan Ames (33:54)
Maybe not. Maybe they're part of different life groups, but they each are on this intercessory team. And as these outreach events start happening and connections are being made, relationships are being built, maybe those names of nonbelievers are sent to the intercessory team and they are by name specifically praying, maybe even fasting for these non-believers.
Jordan Ames (34:19)
I think that is a tremendous way to collectively again, I said earlier, we all are called to pray, right? We all should be praying and seeking God. But when we dedicate that type of effort, I think God honors that. It's not just about all of us doing our own thing when it comes to prayer, just doing our own thing, but having a c consistent effort. The goal is a collective goal. That vision is collective vision.
Jordan Ames (34:47)
At least with your church, hopefully you partnered with other churches and now you're all sharing in the same vision. And now you have dedicated maybe that intercessory team is one team with members from the different partner churches. And they're all f I think God is going to honor that so much. Why? Because well, Jesus prayed for that kind of unity. All right. The last line of effort is training the congregation.
Jordan Ames (35:17)
So to do all these things I've mentioned, the congregation needs to be equipped to do it. Now I'm not belittling any pastors, but I don't think a sermon every Sunday morning is equipping enough. I don't think even just having some discussions in Sunday school class is equipping enough. I think it's become more of a routine within the American church. I love
Jordan Ames (35:44)
Hearing a sermon, I love being in Sunday school. But I think there's some who show up and it's just part of their routine and they don't necessarily do anything with it. Maybe as I say that, you're thinking about individuals in your church right now.
Jordan Ames (35:58)
So I think that sometimes those church routines has have become a check the box type of thing and it's kept us comfortable, it's kept us in a status quo of ministry, a maintenance mode, if you will, that I think we need to start stepping out of.
Jordan Ames (36:14)
And there's people, I guarantee you, there's people in your church, or at least again, if you're partnered with churches, that are capable of training the congregation and members in things like networking, in communications, in systems to follow up with those new connections. And even the love languages. All right, if you don't there's a book called The Five Love Languages, I encourage you to get it. It's
Jordan Ames (36:43)
A lot of people probably have been introduced to them when it comes to marriage, but they certainly apply to any sort of interaction and how we share love. Training in behavior and communication styles. Okay, people need to learn these types of I guess skills and abilities if they're going to have relationships with people, if they're going to be able to communicate clearly.
Jordan Ames (37:10)
and share their testimony and the story of the gospel with others. I think it's a a necessary strategic effort is to train your congregation in some of those things.
Jordan Ames (37:22)
So once we identify all those lines of effort, so I I've given you one hypothetical pathway to start looking at how you can
Jordan Ames (37:33)
grow towards a vision of seeing five hundred people baptized in five years. So once we identify those lines of efforts, then let's start selecting leaders, building teams with those leaders that can start working in those different efforts.
Jordan Ames (37:49)
Okay, like I said in my framework, the whole know your opposition, there will be opposition, there will be conflict. There's a good chance that not everyone in your congregation will buy into this vision. Could somebody say, this kind of seems ridiculous? I want to go to a different church. It could happen. But whatever vision God is laying on your heart.
Jordan Ames (38:12)
You need to move towards.
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And it shouldn't be based off of the opposition you're gonna face. Certainly it shouldn't be based off of maybe losing members of your congregation.
Jordan Ames (38:21)
They need to be part of that vision. And so you need to communicate to them, even if some of them are going to kick back. All right, there's a saying, SWSW, SW SW.
Jordan Ames (38:33)
When it comes to communicating your vision, when it comes to starting to move in a direction, some will, some won't. So what?
Jordan Ames (38:41)
Someone is waiting. And I'd argue that last SW, someone is waiting. That's the non-believer. They're waiting for you to start growing the kingdom and taking an intentional effort to do so rather than waiting for that non-believer to just show up at your church steps.
Jordan Ames (38:59)
All right, to wrap this up, let's just say at the end of the five years you had a hundred baptisms that you recorded and four hundred new decisions to follow Jesus. Did you fail? You didn't get five hundred baptisms, you only got a hundred.
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Maybe that vision wasn't from God because we didn't succeed. Let me tell you this. I think that's a complete lie from Satan. Because the vision is a tool. The vision is a tool.
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To command and generate and be intentional about current actions. Right? When you cast that vision and at the end of the five years, you have a hundred baptisms and four hundred new decisions to follow Jesus. That is five hundred new souls in heaven.
Jordan Ames (39:45)
And because of your leadership, there wouldn't have been those five hundred new souls in
Jordan Ames (39:50)
And if you're at that point after the five years and you're seeking God for what's next, maybe he doesn't want you focusing on baptisms or seeking for new souls, non-believers to come to Jesus. Maybe he wants you now, taking a few years, to nurture and grow those new believers. And probably not all of them are going to be coming to your church. But
Jordan Ames (40:20)
Chances are some of them will. So we don't cast a vision to grow church attendance. We're casting a vision to grow the kingdom. And the byproduct of that is likely they want to be a part of our church. They want to be in our family. They've already spent time with us. They love us. It's probably just something, a place they want to be. And so as leaders in the church, on the board, administration, executive leaders, you have to be prepared for that.
Jordan Ames (40:50)
But the focus first needs to be on a kingdom impact.
Jordan Ames (40:53)
And we talk about reaching the 100 baptisms and 400 new decisions for Jesus. You never know as you start to develop them, those 400, what if they end up being baptized in the next year?
Jordan Ames (41:10)
What if
Jordan Ames (41:10)
You do an event and hundreds of wanna get baptized that day.
Jordan Ames (41:16)
That that type of stuff happens, but it won't happen in your church if you never cast the vision to begin with. You can probably tell that I am very passionate about this. It's a it's on my heart. I think a lot of churches are fearful and doubt casting visions like that because they don't want to fail. They don't want to look weird.
Jordan Ames (41:42)
But really, would you not agree that that's what God wants? Like he wants to grow his family, and he's put us here and he's put us in leadership positions to do that through us. He wants us to partner with him. And I guarantee you, you will grow as a leader of your church. You will grow in your relationship with God. Your congregation, as they buy into this vision, as they start implementing.
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the strategy they will grow in their relationship with
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I hope this blessed you, gave you a new perspective on leading your congregation and community for real impact. Please leave a comment with your thoughts and give me criticism. I have thick skin, but I also love to hear how how it blessed you and and what you're gonna do with it. And also if you're at a point in your church where you're seeking God for a vision, for that next strategic vision, that next chapter in the life of your congregation.
Jordan Ames (42:44)
I invite you to download a vision casting prayer journal that I created. It's a seven-day, seven consecutive days to fast one meal a day and to pray and has scripture with it and has some questions to start critically thinking through what that vision, what God's laying on your heart. And I encourage you to do it with the other leaders, maybe on your board or staff, other ministry leaders in your church, so you can collectively
Jordan Ames (43:14)
What is God placing on our heart as far as a vision for which to move towards? He is faithful and I believe he will give you that direction. We just got to intentionally seek him for it. It's that prayer journal. The link will be in the comments of this video.
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Thanks and have a great week.
