Making Your Vision Stick: 3 Essential Elements
Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash
Over the last two weeks, I’ve talked about celebrating your wins. You read those posts here and here. One of the keys to sharing your wins is linking them to your vision. However, casting your vision that is compelling and memorable can be difficult. You want it to be short enough to evoke emotion, but long enough to encompass all you’re trying to do in your ministry.
It’s a delicate balance. We’ve all heard those vision statements that’s just one word that makes things as clear as mud. Likewise, we’ve seen those poster size vision statements that are so word smithed you couldn’t repeat it if you tried.
In a previous post, I talked about lining up your vision with the overall church. This is essential if you’re in youth or kidmin. You don’t want to create a siloed ministry. Your pastor brought you on to ultimately do one thing, carry out his vision in the ministry you oversee.
Now that might mean you’re stuck in the basement never to be seen or heard from or you’re out front and center all the time. Whatever it is, you’re under authority. To do anything outside of that vision is rebellious.
I’m not saying you can’t nor shouldn’t have a say in your vision. Quite the opposite. What I am saying is that when you start creating the vision for your ministry, you need to start with the church’s vision first.
For instance, at one of the churches I served in, the vision was
“We are a community of believers who connected to God, the community, and each other.”
That’s great for the whole church, but I wanted to tweak it a little to line up the goals for the children’s ministry. So, my vision statement was
“We are creating a community of believers in kids who connect to God, the Bible, the community, and each other.”
When you look at my statement versus the church, they are similar but not the same. Because they were so similar, I knew that we would accomplish both our vision and the church's.
Even with a great vision statement like the one above, it can still be lost on people. Even with a great vision statement you need three essentials to clarify and celebrate it. In other words, you want your vision to stick.
1. Words
I know words are a broad subject. But what I mean is the words you use to describe your vision are essential. Your words bring clarity to what exactly you’re looking for.
In my vision statement I used before, my words were built right in. We wanted kids who connected to God, the Bible, the community, and each other. All our ministry decisions on those four words because they led us to our vision.
Every time a new idea or event was proposed it had to help us connect to at least one of those vision words. Even better if it was more.
So, when you’re trying to make your vision stick, what words bring clarity to your vision? What describes the people who are living it out? Are they faithful? Devout? Prayerful? Committed? Generous?
As you talk about your vision, use these words when using the next two elements. Your words bring clarity, but these make your vision stick.
2. Bible Stories
We love stories. The quickest way to get a group of people to pay attention to you is to tell a story. A master storyteller can hold people’s attention for an hour or more. As you cast your vision, find some Bible stories that show what living out your vision looks like.
For instance. We wanted our kids to connect to their community. That meant we wanted them to serve the community in some way. Not just focus on the church. So, a Bible story we used to communicate that idea was the early church in Acts 2:44-47
“All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.”
When we’re celebrating our wins, we remind people of this Bible story. Then show how we’re doing the same in our community.
Which leads us to the final element.
3. Volunteer Stories
Every good story has a hero. Star Wars has Luke Skywalker, Lord of the Rings has Frodo, Harry Potter has… well, Harry Potter. Find stories of your volunteers or other people in your ministry that are living out your vision. What’s one thing someone did that you’d like to hold up as a shining example for everyone to aspire to?
Finding this story can be difficult especially if your vision is new. That’s why the Bible stories help. If you don’t have anyone in your ministry that’s living out the vision yet, then you can point out a hero there.
For example, in my vision, I said I wanted kids to connect to God. I can talk about how Joshua in Exodus 33:11. It says after Moses would leave the Tent of Meeting, Joshua would stay. He didn’t want to leave God’s presence. His faithfulness paid off. He eventually led the Israelites into the Promised Land.
If your vision is for kid to connect to God, you should be able to find a volunteer or kid who spends extra time with God. Whether that’s extra time at the altar, in prayer at home, or studying the Bible. You can talk about how their time with God has affected their life. And how we can do the same.
At another church our vision was to
Live Like Jesus
Love Like Jesus
Give Like Jesus
Serve Like Jesus
Pray Like Jesus
We had it up everywhere. We also had a particular story from Jesus’ life that exemplified each of these values. At our volunteer appreciation dinner, we celebrated with volunteers who lived out one of these values.
Clarifying and celebrating your vision is essential to its success. It gives people handles as they try to carry it out. Take some time to figure out the words you use to describe your vision. Find the right stories to celebrate success. Then repeat those words and stories over and over again. Before you know it, you’ll hear your people repeating you as they work to achieve the vision.
