keys for success

Over the years I have noticed that there are 4 main ingredients to success in just about everything, but especially when it comes to Church services. (If any of these 4 things are left out, results will be mediocre at best.)
Here is my list in the order that they need to be in.

#1 Prayer -- Before any endeavor we need to pray. Prayer sets everything else into motion. It is important to note that my prayer should NOT be,"Lord bless what I am about to do". Instead it should be more like, "Lord help me to tap into your heart and do what you are blessing."

It seems like prayer would be a no-brainer, but too often in church service planning, we start with a cool idea, and then tack on a prayer at the end like, "oh yeah,by the way, God bless this."

The times we get this part right, God moves in extraordinary ways!

#2 Planning-- Once we figure out God's direction through prayer, we should start planning. The farther out you plan, the better the execution will be.

I have to laugh at the number of people who have actually convinced themselves that somehow planning doesn't leave room for the Holy Spirit to move. The Holy Spirit should be moving at every one of these 4 steps. And considering that God is a God of order, it makes sense that planning should be a part of every service. (Planning creates order!)

One more thought about planning; My plans must always be flexible enough, that if God wants to change things up at any point in this process, it is OK

#3--Preparation--Once the plans are made there needs to be some action. That's where preparation comes in.
In this phase assignments are handed out (with timelines), materials are ordered and people are working toward the final execution of the process.
You can have the greatest planning in the world---but if no one prepares, all you had was an IDEA!

#4 Presentation--The last step in the process is the presentation. The presentation is the culmination of all of the above steps. It's where the rubber meets the road.
The likelihood of the presentation being excellent is totally proportionate to the amount of prayer, planning and preparation that have been done.

The only thing else I would add to the process--a #5, if you will, would be the assessment or review (I wish I could think of a word that started with a "P"!)
At the end of every service we evaluate. We ask questions like, "What was really good?", "what could have made it better?" (Kind of like a football team watching the film of the game, even though they may have won by 40 points. There is always something that could be tweaked)

Bottom line: Every Sunday may be someone's last chance for hearing and experiencing the Good News of Jesus Christ. The stakes are high, we need to give our best efforts!!