5 Decisions I’ve Made About Me – Part 1

LIfe has a way of getting busy, doesn’t it? I mean, the stuff of life can distract us pretty easily, pretty much everyday. However, with limited time & limited resources, I know that, as a leader, I’ve got to make the most of the Talents, Giftings, Hopes & Dreams I’ve been given. After all, it’s in those areas that I will make the greatest contribution to the world around me during my time here on earth.

This week I want to talk about 5 Decisions I’ve Made about my Talents, Giftings, Hopes & Dreams. I hope it’s encouraging to you.

Decision #1: I Will Give Priority Energy to Them Everyday!

Too many people wait until their To-Do List is cleared before they give significant time and energy to what they do best! Yes, there is a time and place for “getting things done” but I want to challenge everyone of us today that, “The place where we will add the most value to the world is in the area where we are most passionate and gifted!”

1. It offers the greatest Return on Investment. When we give priority energy to our strengths, we get a better return on our investment! How much would Peyton Manning get paid by the Indianapolis Colts to play Wide Receiver? I’m guessing, Not Much! But when he’s playing Quarterback, he’s worth millions!!! Our strengths offer our greatest ROI.

2. Our Strengths offer the greatest Reward! There is nothing more fulfilling for me as a leader than when I’m using my God given talents, passions and abilities to add value to someone else! There’s just no feeling like it! I love it! It energizes me and makes me feel like I’m on top of the world!

I have made a decision in my leadership that I am going to begin giving Priority Energy to what I do best! Then, and only then, can I make a significant contribution to the world around me!

just a bloggish thought,

Matt

Adrenaline Addiction – Part 2

#2: Progress can become a Mistress.

If we’re not careful, those of us who lead churches or other organizations can allow the Adrenaline that comes from progress to actually begin to steal our heart’s loyalty from those who deserve it most.

1. Our Spouse. If you’ve ever seen the movie Fever Pitch with Drew Berrymore and Jimmy Fallon than you may remember this great line in there where Berrymore’s character looks at Fallon’s character, Ben, who is in love with the Red Sox and says something to the effect of, “What have the Red Sox ever done for you? They can’t love you back, Ben!” As a Red Sox fan, that was hard for me to hear, but as a leader, that can be true as well! If we’re not careful we can get tricked into thinking that our organizations “love us back.”

Question: Who are you happier to see each day, your spouse or your parking space in front of your office?

2. Our kids. The mistress of progress can steal our attention away from our kids. For me it’s a question of “Best Energy.” Who gets my Best Energy today… my work, or my kids? It’s my responsibility as a leader and a dad to make sure that I leave some gas in the tank for my kids when I get home each night. Here’s the reality: If I don’t monitor this, no one else will. Our kids don’t know how to tell us, “Dad, you’re not leaving enough emotional energy for us.” We’ll only find out, after it’s too late.

3. Our life outside of work. The mistress of progress can rob us from a life outside of work. I went through a stretch for several months last year where I actually prayed everyday that God would give me a hobby. I needed something to give my attention to that didn’t look anything like my life at work. I saw myself getting “sucked into” the adrenaline addiction of whatever I was doing at work. Thankfully, God answered my prayer in January and gave me a great hobby that is inexpensive and I love to do with my kids!

We can’t let Progress at work become a mistress for us,

Just a bloggish thought,

Matt

Momentum – Part 1

This week I want to walk through a series of blogs about Momentum. As John Maxwell likes to say, “Momentum is a Leader’s best friend, or worst enemy.” Over the past decade and a half of ministry and leadership experience, I have certainly been on both sides of the momentum pendulum. I want to throw out a few thoughts on momentum this week. Here we go…

1. There are times and seasons for everything. The Bible definitely gets this one right! Unfortunately, too many of us leaders, don’t. We want to constantly be pushing and moving our organizations forward, but one of our primary jobs as leaders is to know what our people can endure. The leader who never rests their organization burns people out.

2. You need mountains and plateaus. It’s just good for the rhythm of an organization if there are seasons of rest. Farmers know this, and rest their fields 1 out of every 7 years. It gives the soil a chance to replenish the nutrients that have been lost by growing crops for 6 years. (Wow, that was a total Indiana Illustration! I guess I’m going back to my roots! Sorry about the pun!)

3. The great task of leadership is to create momentum even in the Plateau seasons. The tendency of leadership is to think that momentum must be lost during a “plateau season.” I don’t believe that to be true. It simply requires us as leaders to refocus our energy and efforts of the organization into a different direction.

4. Think Momentum Shift. Good leaders think in terms of shifting momentum from advancement to fortification. Momentum can be created and sustained during seasons of rest for an organization, but it all depends on the leader’s perspective and approach.

Do you need to shift the momentum in your organization or department?

Just a bloggish thought,

Matt

Trustworthy – Part 4

I don’t want to go there, but I have to.  My only hope is that you’ll not tune me out, or click away too soon.  But being found trustworthy is about patience.  And doggone it if the King James word for patience is long-suffering.  Oh come on, King James, that just sucks.  Patience is:

1.  The ability to not have what you want and still have a life. Too many leaders have destination disease.  They think that just because they haven’t arrived means they’re not going anywhere.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  And honestly, the longer I’m in this thing as a leader, the more I’m realizing that the life is what happens while we’re waiting to arrive at a destination.

2.  Being okay with where you are. Alot of leaders are living with a constant gnawing in their stomach because they aren’t where they thought they would be by this time in their life.  Being trustworthy means learning the art of being okay with where you are.  Until we embrace where we are, we have given God no evidence that He can trust us with the next place we want to be.

3.  Learning what we need to learn here, so we can move on. If we don’t get what we’re supposed to get at each stop on the train, we’ll have to circle back later to learn it again.  Too many leaders are spending too much time circling back because they lacked the patience in the moment to pause and ask, “What is it I’m supposed to learn now?”

As hard as it is, if we want to be found trustworthy, we’ve got to be willing to grow the fruit of patience in our lives.

Just a bloggish thought,

Matt

Encouragement to Church Planters

So I found a new spot to connect with God. Honestly, I hesitate to share it with all of you b/c some of you who are Next Levelites are likely to go and find it and then be there and bother me and that will just make it not a hiding place anymore. (Just kiddin’) Suffice it to say, I can see the entire Midpoint Bridge from where I’m sitting right now. AND… (and this is a big AND) Apparently, there is free wireless internet so… (I’m not sure how that works, but I’ll take it!)

Here’s an illustration for all the church planters who read this blog…

From where I sit I can see the cars heading onto the bridge. A few minutes ago, a guy comes riding by above me on a bike. From his vantage point, all he can see is the huge hill ahead and how far he has to go. After all, he’s riding his bike to Cape Coral, so obviously, he’s focused on the enormity of the task ahead.

From my vantage point, all I can see is how fast he’s moving. As he rides by I’m thinking, “Wow, that guy is going fast for an ole guy.” (Or something like that) He’s making great time. The wind is at his back, he’s going with the flow of traffic. That guy is doing a great job on his journey.

As one who has the privilege of coaching several church planters and pastors across the country, I see the same thing happen all the time. They are so focused on their road and have their eyes so fixed on the challenges ahead and can’t stop thinking about the Big Vision that awaits on the other side, that they don’t realize they’re winning!

So, from one church planter to another, let me just tell you, I see you moving on your road! You’re doing a great job! You’re making the right time. God is with you, the wind is at your back. You’re being successful at seeing lives changed in your community. Keep pedaling. Don’t worry about the hills ahead. Oh yeah, and put your head up long enough to realize that there is an amazing view all around you! After all, you’re on the bridge of God’s Journey for your life! And the view from there is breath-taking.

I’m praying for you church planters today! I love you guys!

Matt Keller

A Lesson in Margin from my 2 Boys!

This morning on the way to school, I had the opportunity to teach my 7 year old and 4 year old about Margin. I was attempting to help them understand why we want our mornings to be Peaceful and not Stressful. Here’s a synopsis.

• We live crazy lives. Which is okay, in fact we prefer it this way, most of the time. Once we get to school, or work, our life is full of details, homework, friends, teachers, lessons, responsibilities, etc.
• We want our mornings to be peaceful. The more relaxed our mornings can be, the better we’ll be for the rest of the day.
• The way to have peace is through Margin. Put another way, Peace lives in the Margins of our lives. Show me someone with no peace, & I’ll show you someone with no margin. No peace in your finances? I bet you don’t have margin. No peace in your calendar? I bet you don’t have margin. No peace in your personal life? I bet you don’t have margin.
• Margin is the distance between where you live and your limits. Foolish is the person who resides on the side of a cliff. We wouldn’t think to build a home within 6 inches of a cliff, but we do it all the time in other areas of our lives.
• Margin is everywhere. I pointed out to the boys that roads are built with margin. Books have margin. Papers have margin. 7-Eleven signs have margin. It’s everywhere.  And it was God’s idea. My 4 year old asked me if trees have margin.  I said, “yep, it’s called bark.  Without, the wood is exposed to the elements and the tree won’t survive.”
• Blessing live in the margins. We got to school 10 minutes early and rather than drop them off in the car line, I walked them in. I told them, “because we have margin in our time today, daddy got to walk you in.” Then my 7 year old asked me, “Can we stop at the drinking fountain before class?” I answered yes. Then he said to me, “Because we have Margin, right?”

I just smiled.

Want to live a blessed life?

Want to have peace?

Examine your margins. That’s where they live.

Just a bloggish thought,

Matt Keller

Easter Sunday @ NLC

Hey everyone,

On Sunday afternoon, I couldn’t help but reflect on how far God has brought our church in the last 6 years. We went to my parent’s house in Cape Coral for Easter Lunch. That’s the house that Sarah and I lived in for 5 1/2 years before mom and dad retired last fall. As we sat around the table, I couldn’t help but think that just 6 years ago, there were 6 adults and 2 kids (taking naps) during “Easter Sunday Service!” in the living room of that house!

Easter services at NLC yesterday were absolutely mind-blowing. We had over 1000 people in church and saw hundreds of people respond to the first of our 3 part series we started called, “CAGED.”

A Few High Points for me for the Day were:

• Seeing one of our worship leaders, Elizabeth, (I call her Bethy), who is 17, absolutely set the stage for the presence of God to move in our church in an unprecedented way! I believe our people responded to God’s presence like they never have before b/c of the words Bethy shared!!! I’m so proud of her! She’s an amazing worship leader… and only 17, that’s just crazy!
• Seeing our staff giving ministry away! I loved watching our staff at their best yesterday! They were impowering others to “do the work of the ministry” and were rising above it all day long! The staff of NLC truly has the DNA of this thing and are doing the work of reproducing that DNA into hundreds of Team Members!
• Seeing Mike and Scott lead, cast vision, and truly pastor our people like they were created to do! Those two guys are an absolute riot! I can’t believe I get to do this with them!
• Seeing South Fort Myers High School transformed into a house of worship every Sunday is just a cool thing! What a gift from God that we don’t have to build a $40 million facility to have church in! The state of Florida did that for us! Wow!
• Seeing it all come together. I heard John Siebling, an ARC pastor from Memphis, TN, say, “Our goal is to try and put 3 good Sundays in a row!” anyone in the church world knows just how hard that is to do. Yesterday was truly a good Sunday! I feel like we keep stringing “Good Sundays” together, I think we may even be able to get to “3″ by the end of the year!!!

To all who are apart of making NLC happen on a weekly basis, this is BIG WIN for you too! Do something today to celebrate! Take your spouse to dinner, play with your kids, give your pet a treat, get the mail, yell out the window in traffic, drink an energy drink, go off your diet, take a day off!

Personally, I’m opting for the last one,

Matt

The Thing about Being a Pastor

One of the craziest things about being a Pastor is that you have to live what you’re preaching! So we’re in this series called Pete’s Blog… a journal of trust. For 4 weeks, we’re talking about Trusting God. In the Storm, in the face of Unconventional Thinking, etc.

Well, trust me when I say I’ve had to live this whole trust deal! Wow. Let me just go on record and say that Pastors don’t live in a bubble. We face the same challenges and real-life issues as everyone else.

I’m excited about the new places in God that “Trust Tests” are taking me.

If you haven’t heard the messages, I highly recommend downloading them asap. Especially if you’re going through a “Testing Time.” 4 ways to do that:

1. Order a CD at the Resource Table on Sundays at NLC.

2. Go to www.NextLevelChurch.com and click resources, then listen to messages. You can listen through live streaming or.

3. Right click and then save target as to download the mp3 to your desktop. At that point you can make your own cd’s if you want!!!

4. Go to iTunes, click on podcasts, then search Next Level Church. Click on us, and all of our messages are available to automatically sinc with your iPod.

5. You can also subscribe through iTunes as well. Simply click subscribe and you’ll start getting each and every week’s message automatically in your iTunes library and on your iPod. (I highly recommend this option by the way!) What a great way to make sure you are feeding your spirit every week.

I’m so excited about Part 3 of Pete’s Blog.

See you Sunday at 9 am and 10:45 am.

Matt

Wow, what a Week!!!

Hey everyone, I’m so excited to be back in SW FL.  Sarah and I just finished an amazing / whirlwind week of ministry consulting, downtime, edification, and networking!  The last 8 days have been incredible!  It’s amazing to see how God is using all that we are learning through Next Level Church to impact so many!  AND… we just keep learning more!  Here’s the last week in a nutshell:

• Friday, Feb. 8th – Flew to Orange County, CA.  Made it to Dallas.  Then flight cancelled.  Rerouted to Las Vegas.  Ran to catch the plane.  Realized we were on Pacific time, not Mountain time.  Actually had an extra hour.  Felt like Idiots.  Caught our breath.  Arrived in OC, CA @ 7 pm PST (10 pm EST).  Had dinner with Church Planters.  Told our story.  Went to bed at 2 am EST.
• Saturday, Feb. 9th – Had breakfast at the hotel.  Ate too much.  Slept for 2 hours.  Met up with Scott & Mary Turner, incredible church planters in Irvine, CA.  Shopped.  Ate at PF Changs.  Heard their story.  Went back to their house.  Talked til 10 pm PST (1 am EST).  Slept at hotel. 
• Sunday, Feb. 10th – Arrived at theSummit Church which at 8:30 PST (Do I need to keep doing the EST reference?) Watched set up.  Took notes.  Preached at 11 am PST.  Grabbed a sandwich.  Debriefed at their house for 3 hours.  At 6 pm, a dozen of their leaders arrived.  Taught Church planting leadership & philosophy til 9:30 pm.  Drove to our new hotel on Laguna Beach, CA at 10:30 pm (1:30 am EST).  Slept.
• Monday, Feb. 11th – Had 9 am PST Video Conference Call with Pastor Scott and Quigs about the upcoming week at NLC.  (I love iChat by the way…) Drove to Saddleback Church, founded by Rick Warren.  Toured Saddleback.  Was blown away.  Had lunch.  Did some Geocaching. (Ask me later).  Back to hotel.  Slept.  Went to a movie.  Had Pizza at BJ’s Italian Restaurant on Laguna Beach at 10:30 PST (1:30 am EST).  
• Tuesday, Feb. 12th –  Had breakfast overlooking the Pacific Ocean.  Walked on the beach.  Slept. Listen to a couple of LifeChurch.tv podcasts.  Read by the pool.  Ate Mexican.  Saw another movie.  Slept.
• Wednesday, Feb. 13th – Woke up at 8 am PST.  Drove to Scott & Mary Turner’s house to return their car.  (Thanks by the way…)  Drove to Airport.  Talked with Scott for another hour.  Flew to Dallas.  Flew to Ft. Myers, FL.  Arrived home at 9:30 pm EST (6:30 pm PST).  Did some laundry. (Okay, Sarah did.)  Watch American Idol.  Still on West Coast time.  Bed by midnight.
• Thursday, Feb. 14th – Valentine’s Day.  Woke up 6:30 am.  Checked e-mail, (1st time all week.)  Repacked.  9 am drove to Fort Lauderdale.  Arrived 11:30 am.  Got Starbucks.  Checked into hotel.  Attended lunch at the Book of Hope Missions Roundtable Event.  (Talk about a great ministry… oh my goodness, they’re incredible.  More on that later too.)  Last afternoon session at 4:30 pm.  Took a cat nap.  Dinner at 6 pm.   Watched the sunset over Fort Lauderdale skyline with my wife. (Come on Somebody!!!)  Attended night session.  9:30 pm had dessert at Cheesecake Factory with Peter and Carolyn Haas (Substance Church in Minneapolis, MN).  Incredible couple that we totally hit it off with.  Back to hotel at  12:30 am.  Asleep by 1 am.
• Friday, Feb. 15th – Woke up at 8:30 am.  Went to the Red Door Spa at The Galleria in Fort Lauderdale.  (yeah, I did.  So what???  It was awesome!)  10:30 am – watched SportsCenter in the Men’s Dressing Room. (Hey I wasn’t about to go out there with a bunch of women and pretend I was actually comfortable!!!  I do have boundaries, you know.)  11 am – 80 minute hot rock massage.  1 pm – Lunch with my wife.  2 – 5 pm – shopping at the Galleria with Peter and Carolyn Haas.  Back to hotel.  Cat nap.  6 pm – Dinner with RoundTable Pastors.  9:30 pm – Last Session ends.  10 pm – Dessert at the Cheesecake Factory with Chris and Jan Beard, Pastors in DownTown Cincinnati.  Incredible story. 1:30 am – back to hotel.  2 am – sleep.
• Saturday – Feb. 16th – 8 am – Wake up.  Check out of hotel.  Get boys a present.  Get Starbucks.  Get Krispy Kremes. (yeah, I did!)  Drive across Alligator Alley.  Home at 12:15 pm.  2 pm Birthday Party at Gator Lanes for Will’s friend.  5:30 pm ate something. (I can’t remember)  8 pm – Boys in bed.  8:10 pm – practice message for tomorrow.  8:57 pm – finish writing this blog.  9:05 pm – Probably will pass out.

Man, what an amazing & refreshing time we had.  It was just great to relax and do nothing, you know???Seriously, we love that!  It’s God’s calling for us, and there’s nothing we’d rather do together! Can’t wait for God to move tomorrow at NLC! Pastor Matt 

Vision Night Message now available

Hey everyone,

If you weren’t able to be apart of Vision Night, you’ve got to make sure you hear the message from that night. The vision we cast that night will become the foundation for the next year of ministry at NLC and beyond. God has positioned us and given us a strategy to impact Southwest Florida & the United States in a big way!

Here’s how you get it:

1. Go to the Resource Table and pick up a CD on Sunday.

2. Go to the NextLevelChurch.com website and download the MP3 from the Resources page.

3. Go to the NextLevelChurch page on iTunes and download the Podcast.

The feedback we are getting from across the NLC world is exciting! NLCers are starting to see a clearer picture of what God wants to use us to do for Him than ever before.

I can’t wait to hear your feedback as well,

Thanks,

Matt