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The healthy church sees its role as transformational: helping God to transform the lives of God’s beloved. And then helping them to transform their families, neighborhoods and workplaces, and daring to dream of transforming entire communities. The unhealthy church, by contrast, places ultimate value on sameness, consistency, not challenging people, and not making waves in the community.

That is why measurements matter. Not to fill boxes on a spreadsheet or official church report, but to avoid hurting people, to know when a program needs refreshing, to see growth as it is happening so that you can support it, or to see early signs of decline so that you can take action. Without metrics, leaders are flying blind.

Project Peace on Earth’s first worldwide concert from Bethlehem Palestine on Christmas Day 2011 featured the Oneness video written by Peter Joseph and Steve Robertson. Produced by Peter Joseph. The 2013 (PPOE) World Forgiveness Concert for Bethlehem Christmas Day features this video. It is a message dedicated to empowering reality of all are one connected through the only true religion, that of being loving. The PPOE concert was broadcast worldwide to some 80 million homes through the graciousness of MelliTV. The concert features spiritually inspirational performances from Grammy Winners and Nominated Musicians: Contemporary/New Age, Legendary rock stars, Opera, Country, World Music Fusion and HipHop and insights about the importance of forgiveness from world-renown thought leaders.

Similarly, if we allow the menacing influence of certain TV and/or movie content to go unchecked and corporations from whom we buy products to sponsors such debasement without pushback, then the boil of apathy and moral confusion will likely lead us to experience and repeat the history of the fallen Roman Empire. According to Lewis Munford (1895-1990), American renowned historian, sociologist, philosopher of technology and influential literary critic: “Rome fell not because of political or economic ineptitude, not even because of barbarian invasions; Rome collapsed through a leaching away of meaning and a loss of faith. Rome fell because of a barbarization from within.”

Practice being a person of increase and thanksgiving. Our gratitude will lead us naturally to giving, we’re grateful so we give, and then we receive, and then we are grateful some more! What we will do for a life of meaning, peace, compassion and love will always be far more powerful than what we will do for money.

sadly in a world dominated by might, money, and power, some people look upon compassion, mercy, gentleness of spirit, inclusiveness and unconditional love as weakness. In a world blighted by terrorism, war and indescribable brutality demonstrated day by day, for example in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan; in a world where many have become indifferent, self righteous and just downright selfish; in a world where Bible passages are taken out of context to uphold racism, sexism, homophobia and unhealthy nationalism: these are the places in which compassion, mercy, gentleness of spirit, inclusiveness and unconditional love should work and speak.

When I first developed my best practices guide to Church Wellness, I called this section “Young Adult Ministry.” Now I title it “Younger Adult Ministry.”

It is unrealistic to think that a congregation whose average age is over 60 will be able to appeal effectively to people in their 20s and 30s. Not only are the generations too far apart, but the church expectations of the 60+ set are shaped by congregation, facility, ordained leadership, denomination and Sunday worship, whereas so-called Millennials pursue a hunger for God that takes different forms.

As Christian people we all too often pay lip service to the fact that the political and religious context in which Jesus lived, thought and died, was one of economic, political and military domination by the Roman Empire. We also often fail to realise that this was also both the context in which the Christian scriptures were written and the life and death of Jesus was interpreted. Failure to understand these Jewish contexts leads Christians and the Church to misinterpret the underlying message and meaning of the life and death of Jesus the Jew of Nazareth. Whether we like it or not, I am convinced that Jesus had a political agenda as well as an agenda of compassion.

“With media complicity, Trump has unleashed the beast that has long resided not far from the American hearth, from those who started a Civil War to preserve the right to enslave a fellow human to the Know-Nothing mobs who burned Irish-Catholic churches out of fear of immigrants.” This observation is from Timothy Egan’s excellent article “The Beast Is Us” in The New York Times. The presumptive Republican presidential nominee stands for “hatred of immigrants, racial superiority, a sneering disregard of the basic civility that binds a society” and his supporters love him for “telling it like it is.”

As we prepare for Easter, this Season of Lent offers us an opportunity to reflect again upon how we experience Yahweh God and how we live our lives of servant hood – not as doormats to be trampled under foot but as true servants of Yahweh God who proclaim by our lives that Jesus is our Way, our Truth and our Life.

Lent offers us the opportunity NOT to give up but to give more of ourselves in the service of others and in the causes of justice and peace. May this Season of Lent have real meaning for each one of us.

Surely, the time has come for local churches and national denominations to take a much more liberal and compassionate view and celebrate all healthy sexual relationships that have been developed between married or unmarried adult couples who are committed to living within loving monogamous relationships? Churches now need to go beyond the pretence of the turning of a blind eye to any long term supportive, loving unmarried co-habiting relationships and openly acknowledge that these are healthy relationships to be celebrated rather than to be condemned.

The healthy church has a fundamental orientation: outward.

Leaders don’t ask, “What do our members want?” Instead, they ask, “What does the world around us need?”

Leaders understand that a missional mindset is the heart of all church development. New constituents, for example, are rarely attracted by better and better worship. They want to know what a congregation stands for and what it is doing in the world for others.

It is an awesome task to be “the leader of the free world” or the leader of any nation. That’s why your vote and my vote count so much. We don’t want the presidency to be scarier than it already is.

In the larger scheme of life, I believe that the great challenge of western culture is to connect with our souls, our inner being, the “still small voice” that urges us to be this or do that. In the busyness and challenges of life it is easy to push aside that inner light and get on with the demands of work, family, and all the responsibilities life brings. The temptation is to live on the surface of life and neglect its depths.

  [We continue a look at the basics of church wellness. This week: Stewardship Development.] Stewardship Development is perhaps the most complicated and overlooked ministry of the church. Two reasons for this: it’s easier and safer to …

The logic of complaining is like the logic of worrying. Worrying doesn’t change the future; and it makes the present less pleasant. The same is true about complaining. What do you gain by complaining? Is that gain more precious to you than living in a world with fewer complaints?

“You don’t know when you will die, celebrate tonight, you don’t know when light will dawn, celebrate the storm…”