We are currently in the midst of our Leadership and Compassion sessions. These are days that we set aside to help serve other churches as well as remind ourselves who we are and why we do what we do. These are culture reinforcing days.

The truth is these sessions are my favourite things to do. I love training and educating people who are hungry to learn and move towards city transformation.

*Honesty moment*

This year I was less excited by the sessions. Partly because I knew sign ups would lower than usual, which hurts my pride, and partly because I know our team were tired after a new term start – many of them didn’t see the value in taking more days from their normal work. All of this made me go into them a little unsure.

I needed have worried. Once again they proved themselves to be one of the most valuable things we do. Numbers were lower but so what? Once again it reminded us of our story, of how God intervened, and has led us into everything that we now are experiencing. We remembered what we got right, what we got wrong, and where we need to double down again. It reinforced our culture all over again.

Taking the time to work on culture is hard to do. Culture never loudly demands our attention but it slowly moves in the background. Ignoring it is the worst things we can do as leaders. If we aren’t setting the culture someone else will and before we know it the urgency will be there for all to see but no one will twig how it arrived at that point.

Leaders, lets take an honest look at our culture and see if it matches where we want it to be. Is it leading us into the good future God has set before us? If not, lets roll up our sleeves and get to work!