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Saturday, November 23, 2013

About My Mentor, Avery Willis

My contacts with Avery Willis as I recall them can be divided into three stages.

Stage 1:

 About 1974 I was living in Singapore to develop the house church movement there. At that time Avery was president of the Baptist seminary in Semerang Indonesia. He invited me to come over and spend a couple of weeks with him. He had a few missionaries he assembled to train to write programmed learning materials. He had done great research and had compiled A little booklet that I think I still have but cannot locate after much searching. This was a  booklet that walked through all the stages of how a person learns, including the cognitive, affective,  and psychomotor domains. He also taught me the basic facts so I could write programmed learning material.  It has remained one of the most profound learning experiences of my lifetime and has influenced all my writing of training materials through the years.  I remember the many hours we sat on the veranda overlooking the river below and sharing our common vision of the changes that had to take place in the body of Christ. He was a godly, wise mentor and became a close friend.

Stage 2:

Avery and I reconnected through Dr. Roy Edgemon  when we were both writing and working with the church training department at the Baptist Sunday school board.  It was at this time I wrote the survival kit for new Christians, following his coaching and collaborating with A man who recommended who did the program learning segments of the book. He wisely counseled me about the problems I was making for myself by being overly outspoken about denominational politics. At this time I was writing A sequel to the Survival Kit and he gave me A suggestion that I took for the name, Life Basic Training.  I carefully followed his suggestions about how to create each division of that training manual.

At that same time, Avery was commissioned to prepare a discipleship series, MasterLife, for the Sunday School board and he retained me to write portions of it.  It was a great joy to help him as he pieced together what I gave him along with other writers as he put it altogether. It became the most valuable discipling tool the denomination has ever had.

Stage 3:

I learned that Avery had contracted cancer and had come to Houston to work with the hospital here. I quickly phoned him and began to visit him on a regular basis in his apartment near the hospital. These hours with him were very precious because at this stage he had discovered a cell group style of church that he felt was a final answer to the problems in Baptist circles. Once again, as in previous contacts, I had my notebook in my hand to jot down his many thoughts that shaped my further thinking.

So when I think of Avery, I remember him as a missionary on the field seeking to mentor those around him and shaping vital parts of my own future by what he deposited in my mind and heart. Then I recall the doors open for me, both in my mind and in the contacts he opened at the Sunday school board  related to becoming one of his writers.  Then I lovingly remember his courage as he slipped downhill in the recurring visits to Houston for treatment. His passion never waned in its intensity all the way to his home going.

I consider him among the five most important influences that have touched my life.


Saturday, November 2, 2013

The “Make or Break” in Ministry


1.  Internal motivation. If you “own the vision” it will not carry you when things get tough. The vision MUST OWN YOU!
2.  Believe that God is bigger than man.  No matter your circumstances or situation, have a clear picture of God as bigger than your struggles.  God-focused, and not man-focused.
3.  Be up-to-date with the stage of life you are in and the testings that are coming.  Be able to make adjustments with the new pressures and responsibilities.
4.  Pull your family into the vision.  Everyone needs the vision!
5.  Be open to change until the day you die.  This is a vital part of your lifestyle – be teachable, open to correction and rebuke.
6.  How you handle rejection determines how you will make it over the long haul.
7.  Comparison has to go!  Be a learner from everyone.
8.  Be willing to give up individuality and/or creative pride.
9.  Sharpen the saw – always be learning and staying ahead of the issues.
10.  Never get out of the local church, even through the various ups and downs.
11.  Never lose your first love.  Boredom is an indication of having lost your first love.  Stay hungry.
12.  Have an appreciation for even the mundane of life.  Find God in the mundane.  “Practice the presence of  God.” 
13.  Learn to overcome depression.  When you are unable to find God in the midst of the pressure, burnout happens.  Realize:
           a.  It will come!!
           b.  You are not a victim of the devil/flesh
           c.  You are not immobilized
           d.  Self-awareness is important.  Knowing what “pushed
                buttons” got you there
           e.  You are not pressured by God – people cause pressure.  
                You are not on a performance track.
14.  You have to find and know how you connect with God.  Realize that everyone is different and “connects” in different ways.  Some ways are:  hearing or reading something inspirational, being alone, reading apologetics or something that stirs intellectually, planning and working things out before the Lord, etc.
15.  Never, never, never, never quit!!!!!!!!  The right value system gives you the right perseverance.
16.  The five percent bad issues in you won’t resolve on their own, but will ruin/spoil the other 95 percent that is good.  The question is not, “What’s been done to me?”  but, “What’s God doing in me?”
17.  What you judge you will serve or end up doing the same thing yourself.
18.  Your response to trials determines how you make it over the long haul.  Learn to be an overcomer.  (See number 6 above)
19.  Nobody owes you anything!  Don’t blame others for your problems and situations.  Don’t expect apologies…B e sure that everyone is “debt-free” in your eyes…especially those you are helping…Don’t expect your team to give back to you…Explaining and having the others understand is OK, but it is not ok to demand that they understand and/or agree.
20.  Be concerned with internal wholeness and not external perfection.
21.  Get feedback on what you feel God is saying.  Don’t walk independently.
22.  Learn to handle failure and learn from it.

23.  Ability to encourage yourself in the Lord.  Team, family and enemy pressures come, but you must develop the ability to seek God and encourage yourself in Him.
-- From a message by Jimmy Seibert