Tory Farina

And your local FORECAST is...

Forecast...

Every night I hear a three not tune that tells me to pay attention and listen because i am about to find out what to expect outside tomorrow. It is great my favorite weather person gives me all the things i need to know about in a few minute time span. I then am able to tune out and get back to what I was doing before.

I sat at lunch today with a new team member Chad. He is a highly skilled sound technician and was a strong support to a youth ministry for a number of years in town. He is a youth major in college and has aspirations to be vitally involved in the work of the church. He said something to me today that made e think...

"I would love to know what is coming up next so that I can be prepared and think ahead. I am always thinking of great ideas about what you are talking about and cool things we could do as a church to reinforce the message while your talking."

So I says to myself... "Self, if Chad is asking this questions who else in the church is wanting to know whats coming up in order to partner with the future vision." I then heard three notes in my head that sounded very similar to the weather persons three notes.

Forecast! DUH! I have told you things are coming but I can forcast better what is on the horizan and give you more details...

check back more often and I will let you know what is coming up next!

Future AG Fallow up...

I told you a while back that I started a blog for the Future of the fellowship we are associated with. It was a smashing success. We hit it hard. Wrote what we had been feeling and found a whole group of like and not so like minded people who were ready to talk openly and honestly about some deep issues.

I discovered the power of a God Idea. He takes the small things and blows them up.

We have now been invited down to the AG national Headquarters to talk with the Superintendent. He wants to continue the conversation and we want to help make a difference. I was afraid and didn't think I could make a difference. Now I know that when I feel like that... I need to do it.

Future AG Blog Down

Blogger shut down www.FutureAG.blogspot.com because its security machine thought that we may have been involved in spam. We had over 30 links on one post and that is what flagged us. This is a temporary issue and as soon s they realize that we are not spam we should be back i business to find a new GS. Keep coming back and spread the word we do not want this to stop the momentum.

Maybe it is time...

I love the way Erwin McManus says it in his book Unstoppable Force: “The center of God’s will is not a safe place but the most dangerous place in the world.” Then he makes a great distinction: “To live outside of God’s will puts us in danger; to live in his will makes us dangerous.”

Maybe it is time… to do something that scares you to death but if you don't do no one else will.

I am tossing around starting a web page that would be a dialog of the future of the AG. Who will lead and who will step up to vote and make a difference? If we as a young generation showed and voted we could have fresh leadership overnight. What Power we have as young leaders. But will we show? (I say that and feel guilty because i am about to have a baby then and my wife is needing me to stay home and take care of her.) But others will be there and could if they wanted to make a difference. So pray with me about this.

If nothing else at least it would be a place to rally who knows what could come out of it? The ideas exchanged the people reached and encouraged because we collaborated. I am working on the details so any help you can give let me know.

Either memory overtakes imagination or Imagination over takes memory

Either memory overtakes imagination or Imagination over takes memory!

Think about that for a moment... It is why churches after 30 years of one leader are dying. It is why businesses lose market share. It is the essence of age. I think that if you're imagination is overtaking your memory then you are young no matter how old you are. I think if your imagination is overtaking memory you will be a success and you will live by faith and take risks and live LARGE.

God may I be captivated by your imagination and never live in the memorials of my past.

Lets imagine a better future where we are holding on for dear life wondering what is at the end of the rapids we are on. I love that quote!

Running for a change

I am going for a run soon with my connection group. What an amazing idea that I thought no one would joinn in on. We had 13 last week and I expect another great group this morning. We are all of different running levels and that makes it fun. I get challenged a lot.

I have been thinking a lot about Galations 5:22-23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Self control is something I think we need to think on and focus on more. We should challenge our bodies not to eat, drink or indulge in so many easily had pleasures. Opting instead to place ourselves in a disciplined life for the better of ourselves and to show our God that we are able to handle what he gives us.

I truly believe he is waiting for us to take responsibility for ourselves, to control ourselves. Before he gives us his next challenge and blessing.

Whatever you say I can't do I really can do!

Do great leaders know they are great leaders when they are young?

Just a thought I had yesterday as I was on a walk with daisy. I wonder if they just feel like an ok leader or a bumbling brook of mistakes until someone tells them to write a book on leadership. Someday I want to write a book not about the things I did right. But all the things that I didn’t do right. I think there may be more value in that than in the things I have done right.

I read in Marcus Buckingham’s book, “The One Thing you Need to Know…” he says that great leaders know that success is not the opposite of failure. What a statement! Why are we then so afraid of failure? You have to fail in order to have great successes. It is a natural byproduct of doing something worth doing.

I have think that great leaders are born out of great failures. Here is why… first it weeds out the week. If you fail doing something and get back up to do it again that takes a lot of chutzpa (I have always wanted to use that word in a sentence). How many people never get back up? Or they just leave whatever they were working on and go work for someone else were it is “safe”. So it weeds out the weak.

Second if you get up and go forward you are stronger. You know that you can take more than you were just dealt. If you are stronger and less concern about the gravity of the mistake you just made or the failure you just bumbled in then how can you not take greater risk and with greater risk comes greater reward.

This brings me to my third thought… Risk! Name one great bible hero who didn’t risk? Balls out through it all on the table and take the giant leap into the unknown. It is “easier” with God on our side which is the essence of faith. So why isn’t faith a synonym with risk? Maybe easier isn’t the right word… but at least your not alone which is way more fun than being alone.

So I raise my coffee cups to all of us leaders who the jury is still out on whether we will be great…

One more thought… it is ok if you are not a leader. I don’t think we really feel that freedom to not be a leader but if your not your not. It has to do with gifts and calling not job description. I just happen to resonate with leaders and feel called to be one.

Lets God “fail forward” until someone says we can’t do it and then let’s go show them we can!

Church Planters Fellowship

I was just in a meeting of about 33 church planters from MN. It was a great meeting. I love to hang with these people. They are the innovators and the people on the front line of what God is doing in the church world. I get stoked about the raw potential that makes up a church planter.

they are the fuel that drives church growth in the Kingdom of God. The reason that is is because they have to face all sorts of obstacles with very little resource. You want to know how to do something ask a church planter they have to come up with ideas with little time and little money. I love church planters. Part of that is because I is one!

We have a passion for church planting! we want to plant another church or campus withing the next 3-4 years. God probably has already placed that planter in our community. God loves to plant churches because they reach more people for Him than traditional or older churches. That is a fact.

leadership

So I posted yesterday about how my dog training is helping me discover how to encourage others and lead more effectively.

Let me be real honest and then maybe you can help me work this out. I feel as a 26 year old church planter and lead pastor that i am a bad leader. "Bad may be to harsh" but inexperienced leader. I think that all leaders make mistakes like crazy there first time at the helm. Youth pastors make them and there youth groups of 30-100 are effected little compared to a main church. I was never a youth pastor. In some ways i feel like I skipped steps. On the other hand i know that God called me and that my path was intentional and not the normal way. We wanted to plant later in life but it was like a cosmic magnet drawing us to this place and time... God is amazing like that. So here is my dilemma.

I am a 26 year old newbie who has seen amazing growth in the two years we have been working on this. From 2-150 (last week). But i am frustrated with myself when i make mistakes or hurt others or frustrate my team or don't know what to do. My wife told me today as I was in my pitty party cave... Doesn't that sound like God? You are out of your natural ability and doesn't that seem to lend to Him giving you what you lack? and Isn't that what growth is all about? then she laid out something she does periodical that really bakes my beans... in a good way.

"Who are your peers?" she asks and before i can respond she says Craig Groschel is not you Peer, Rob Ketterling is not your peer, who is your peer?

I don't know... I guess I don't really have any peers in this game of Church planting. Who plants a church with relatively no experience and who is 26 years old? as you can tell there can be room for some insecurity but God has taken me thus far. Right?

Here is my problem... i have an amazing desire to be in control. I want to control things that are amazingly out of my control and it drives me crazy. So... When i give it up to God i am so much more at Peace. when I let my team do there thing and not feel the need to micromanage or control every step then i am at peace and they are more satisfied.

So what have I learned, you ask. I have learned that I am not perfect yet. and that it is OK to make mistakes and that I am going to be an awesome leader in 5-10 years. But that what God has done is truly to his credit because I am not the one to Praise. Finally I learned that my wife is amazing and I need to buy her flowers or something.

So back to the school of Life Leadership 101.

dog training, Parenting and Leadership

So I got a Dog...

She is great except she doesn't come pretrained. She is raw and with a number of bad habits and quirks.

She is teaching me so much about how to deal with people. No one comes pretrained. I thought they did for some reason. I thought you just tell people what you want and they will come back to you with it done better than you could do it. I know a little Naive. But you have to understand. E and I started this church with are bare hands everything we did we had to learn the hard way... We had to grow up fast or we failed. So wouldn't you expect others to think the same way? (I am not bashing my team here... they are amazing... What i am saying is that Good leadership is all about realizing that you have to be clear with what you want.) My dog knows a couple words... Outside... that one we are still working on... Potty... I think? Sit... kinda (we have only had her four days)

She has learned them because we constantly say them and when she performs well then we give her a treat or affirmation. How is that not like people? Everyone needs to hear things again and again and then get praised. Affirmation begets correct behavior!

The old school kind of discipline for dogs is... roll a newspaper up and beat the tar out of the dog until it is so afraid it doesn't repeat the behavior. As I was Reading in my Training beagles book they said that negative attention is the same in the dogs head as positive attention... So the magazine i used on my first dog 20 years ago really feed the dog fear and mistrust of me. How amazing is that like the new leader. They need to be encouraged on good behavior and spend more time on the good and less time addressing the bad.

Bad behavior has to be addressed but it cant be addressed with the same or more potency as positive behavior.

Now i wonder if this is the same with a kid? I grew up with the spare the rode spoil the child concept... My but still burns some days from my upbringing... But what if we tried this model of behavioral training on kids? but i am not going to use treats because i don't want my kid to get fat and associate food with good behavior. TO many of us already associate the two. So what can i use to encourage the kid? Praise? Toys? Adventure?

I have 20 more weeks to figure that out and until then... Daisy! Good Girl!