@evdaddy – That’s exactly right. If it were up to me I’d change all the games, even ones that don’t need changing. I need people around my leadership table that can scout the risks not worth taking, step on the brakes as needed, and creatively suggest steps A-C to suppliment (and many times save) my plan that jumps straight to D:)

@Mary Beth – “can someone teach us how to get out of the rut?” Ask! Ask people to come in from the outside and evaluate the game you’re playing. Much like building a listening station to hear what’s being said about you, asking people to tell you directly what they think has proven to be invaluable to my game:)

As far as it being a “spiritual gift” I’m not sure but I do know it has a lot to do with “strengths” which if you’re not familiar with is explained here http://www.extraordinarynormal.com/2009/09/are-you-strong.html

If you’ve not done it I would recommend very HIGHLY that you find out what yours are and look for people that compliment your “strengths” to work with you…talk about game changing!

If any type of organization needs to change the game it’s churches. Most churches are declining because they continue to play by the “old rules,” which don’t work any more. Fortunately there are a lot of churches who are changing the game. Many of them started by asking themselves some of these questions…

- Do we have to use rituals/liturgies non-Christians don’t understand?
- Do we have use music that was written before any of us were born?
- Do we have to meet in a church?
- Do we have to be a part of a denomination?

And I’ll throw out some questions few churches dare to ask themselves?

- What if instead of expecting people to come to our church, we went out into the community to serve people?
- What if instead of judging people for their sins, we accepted them no matter where they are?
- What if we did a service where the sermon wasn’t the focal point?
- What if instead of spending 90%+ of our budget on ourselves (facilities, staff, ministries), we gave half our money to those in need?
- What if instead of getting together once a week for an hour, we actually looked like the early church described in Acts 2?

What other questions should we be asking as church leaders?

If we’re going to change the world, churches need to change their game.

@Jan Wow – huge point! Having a vision is great, but if you’re too afraid that you’ll fail, the vision won’t go very far.

@Mary Beth That’s something I want to know. I’ve been realizing lately that I’m lousy at coming up with my own ideas. I would love it if someone could teach me how to better think critically and develop new ideas and innovative solutions.

I love creative minds that take a different perspective or approach. That’s so hard for me and why I admire that trait in others. Can someone teach us how to get out of the rut? Think outside the box? Is that a spiritual gift? =)

For what it’s worth, I love twitter. It provides me with a platform to connect with kingdom builders across the globe. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Creative minds are continually improving the game or usefulness of twitter and facebook. I am just as excited about the changing ‘game’ of twitter, as the next great idea.

Changing the game is incredibly exciting. In fact, as I’m writing this comment my knee is bouncing up and down so hard that my laptop lid is swaying along to the rythm (mostly because I’m working on a “game changer” myself that I’m hopefully launching this week – I’ll keep you guys informed on how it works out).

Steven, you asked, “How can we get from being stuck in the status quo to trying something new?”

Step 1: We can’t be afraid of failure. We’ve got to start looking at failure as a potential breakthrough to something great.

If Twitter hadn’t worked out then who cares? Maybe 15-25 people might have known and made jokes about it. Maybe even a few hundred but life moves fast and mistakes become memories before we know it.

People like Jessica Jackley of http://www.kiva.org and Andrew Rugasira of http://www.goodafrican.com both understood this principal and are changing the game daily as it relates to alleviating poverty. My guess? There are thousands of people who are increibly thankful today that they weren’t afraid to fail.

Step 2: Repeat step 1.

What has happened with Twitter is the users have changed the rules. It’s no longer “What am I doing right now?” It has become a form of quick communications — not as efficient as Instant Message but more efficient than email because of the 140 character limit and the wide spread nature of it.

Just last week Twitter was used to help a special needs baby by tweaking the rules http://thewellmom.com/blog/2009/10/19/moms-plea-for-help-races-across-the-web/

So, even within existing systems, we change the rules to make it work.

BTW, Steven, I have never tried to get followers but they’ve come along through relationship activities. That’s food for a different post.