The Importance of Vision

I haven’t blogged much lately because quite frankly I’ve been too busy. If something has to slide, it’s definitely not going to be my time with my family, so the blog has suffered. But now I’m finally getting back on track. Cornerstone is going through a period of great growth and change as we have moved into a new facility. It’s a great feeling to see new people come and join us and recognize that God is at work. But it hasn’t been easy.

I started not to write this post, but I want to be very transparent and honest. It has been a very discouraging time over the past two months. We have been spending long hours in our leadership meetings trying to work through structures and processes to connect and disciple people within our church. As a church, we started without a clear plan, without leadership in place, and without an overall vision for the church. Now we are in the process of nailing down all of those things as we moving forward, and it’s not an easy task. Getting everyone on the same page has been a long and trying process. I have used the analogy before that it’s like building an airplane while it is flying. If you let go of the controls too long and focus just on building, you will crash. But if you don’t spend some time building and fixing the plane as it’s flying, you’ll disintegrate in mid-air.

Through this process, I have seen the importance of a strong vision. There are many different ways you can Biblically “do” church. There are many different ways you can “Biblically” structure a church. We have freedom in our forms and structure to accomplish God’s plan for the church. But until a church has a crystal clear view of what God has called them to be, and how God has called them to function, they will function in frustration and discouragement.

A clear vision is more than just having a mission or vision statement. It’s more than just being able to articulate what the vision is. It is believing, supporting, and acting in complete unity with a singular focus and purpose. Most churches never get to this point. Ministries compete for time and resources, people compete to push their plan and agenda for church, and in the process the church remains unfocused and ineffective.

My leadership has been stretched, but I continue to see God at work. My hope and prayer for Cornerstone is that we can continue to become a ‘focused’ church. A church with a crystal-clear vision of what God has called us to be. To find out more about the vision of Cornerstone and what we are focued on, check out this page.

Mike

I am a former design engineer who now pastors Cornerstone Community Church in Galax, Virginia. I'm passionate about following Jesus and I love technology. I've been married to Jennifer for 28 years, and we have three adult children.

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