ryan russell

It’s weird and fun being on the other side of local church leadership… it is making for some helpful and new insights. Through my new experiences being an attender at local churches I have been able to identify a few basic items that make a for a healthy and successful church. Of these, probably one of the most basic and controllable aspects is friendliness.

It doesn’t matter what size the church. Big or Small, it is easy to be friendly. However, most churches fail this simple test. Leaders and regular attenders are too concerned about their needs, jobs, and preparations to stop and connect relationally with people… the very people they so desire to reach and have stay at their churches.

If you attend a church or lead a church, here is something VERY SIMPLE that you can do to help your church grow (spiritually, communally, numerically)…. Take the 15 minutes before the service starts and walk/talk through the worship center. Say ‘hi’ to people. Engage them in 3-5 min. conversations. Look for faces you don’t recognize or don’t know very well (don’t talk with your regular ‘friends’). If you could just get just 2% of your congregation to lead on this level I am confident you would experience a whole new attitude in your church within 2 months.

Moving to a new area and establishing new relationships has forced me to renew & re-think accountability. In Mesa I had steadily insulated myself with many levels of accountable relationships. I had professional accountable and challenging mentors. I had spiritually accountable relationships. I had friends who would hold me accountable to leading better within my family. Last year I had finally establish accountable workout partners. I don’t think there wasn’t aspect of my life where more than one person was holding me accountable consistently. Being in a new arena it has become very apparent that I have to work to establish accountability all over again. Just saying this I am sure causes some to think “what is wrong”. Nothing is ‘wrong’. BUT if you really want to grow, you shouldn’t wait for something to go wrong to then get accountable. However, that is what most people do. They get called to account AFTER they have made some fatal errors in the life and in their judgement. I HIGHLY recommend you get accountable BEFORE something goes wrong so that you can avoid the painful experiences of major life failure. Tomorrow begins a new circle of accountability — Every Thursday morning @ 5:30 a.m. I am meeting with 6 other leaders from across the nation. In addition to that I am developing face to face relationships here in Seattle. What are you doing in your life to be accountable?

Vegas (www.stripchurch.com) is going GREAT! I am very excited about the addition of Jessica who is heading up our local clubs & brothels initiatives. She is also working with our gal interns. Our prayers our that her leadership continues to flourish this summer and she will stay on a permanent staff. Check out the site — we are making lots of new headway into new territories. Going places where most Christians dare not going. Stephen who is charge of our guy interns and our strip outreaches is also doing a great job. All of the new efforts and the prayers are really starting gain some practical traction.

Also, for the next 2 weekends I will be filling in preaching for our man Dean up at Pathways. Our family attended there last weekend and the church is mostly made up of young couples with young kids — fits Dean well! I will write more about the ministry there as I fill in preaching and volunteer some with him.

Look for NEW CHURCH updates starting in Sept.-ish.

I am in Las Vegas this week launching some new efforts for StripChurch. We have 2 new interns on board PLUS a brand new coordinator for the local ministry efforts. Here is a quick link related to our work in the strip clubs. Here is a quick link related to our first Las Vegas strip outreach. What is very fascinating to me is how easy it has been to go into new areas with the Gospel. People who are hurting the most and who are in the darkest areas are actually the most receptive. Interesting isn’t it… people don’t want Jesus until people really need Jesus. Pray for our team of gals… they are out at a brothel today & tomorrow.

— unapologetically passing along a great post on Communication form Seth Godin —

The two elements of a great presenter

1. Respect (from the audience) 
2. Love (to the audience)

There are no doubt important evolutionary reasons why this is true, but in my experience, every great presenter earns the respect of the audience (through her appearance, reputation, posture, voice, slides, introduction, etc.) and captures the attention of the audience by sending them love.

Love takes many forms. I love you enough to teach you this. I love you enough to help you. I love you enough to look you in the eye. Or, in the case of rock and roll presentations, I love you enough to want to engage in various acts with you, right now, backstage.

Margaret Thatcher was a great presenter, even though she had none of the glib charisma people expect from someone with that title. That’s because people (even those that disagreed with her) respected her before she started, and they understood at every moment that her motivation was to motivate and improve the lives of those she was presenting to.

In the famous interrogation scene in Basic Instinct (link not included so no one yells at me), Sharon Stone does a brilliant presentation. She instantly earns (a sort of) respect from the cops and their undivided attention at the same time. She replaces love with sex, and it works.

Tony Robbins is considered an astounding presenter for a similar reason. His stage presence and reputation and energy and sheer size earn him respect, and his generosity and complete connection with the audience is received by them as love. The result is a connection far bigger than the content alone would account for.

If you have love but no respect, you’re a lounge singer. Fail.

If you have respect, but no love, you’re like one of the rare self-promotional talks at TED. Fail.

Consider this clip from Patton. In 28 seconds, George C. Scott delivers both.

When you create a presentation, think about what your status will be as you begin the presentation. What can you do to prewire, to earn more respect from the start? How can you be introduced? Lit? Miked? What can you wear? If your reputation doesn’t precede you, how do you earn it?

Don’t apologize at the beginning of the talk. For anything. Don’t hide in the dark. Don’t hide behind a wall of bullet points.

And then, as the talk (pitch/presentation/interview) begins, don’t focus your energy or concern on yourself. It’s not about you. It’s about them. The presenter who loves his audience the most, wins.