Get a Pulse

Mark Batterson post:  Catalyst Reflections

This is my 11th straight Catalyst and yesterday ranks as one of the best days I can remember.  So many takeaways!  I’ll highlight one thought from one session.  I love the way Jim Collins, author of Good to Great, juxtaposed two words: empirical creativity.  It’s the best of the right-brain and best of the left-brain.  He said, “The great challenge is marrying creativity and discipline so the creativity is amplified.”  So true.  I have a mantra: I’d rather have one God idea than a thousand good ideas.  And that God idea is the essence of creativity.  It is God conceiving something in your mind, in your spirit. But you still have to do your homework.  You still have to count the costs.

Over the years, one of the ways we’ve gathered “empirical data” is with a survey.  It helps us “get a pulse” on the congregation when we’re considering options.  The key to spirit-led leadership is keeping one ear tuned to the Holy Spirit and the other ear tuned to the people you are leading.

One of the metaphors that Collins used was firing bullets instead of firing canons.  Too often we use all of our gun powder firing canons when we could have fired a few bullets to figure our where to aim.  Then fire the canon.  We’re going to be firing some bullets at NCC in 2012.