Don't teach doctrine.

Ever hear someone say that doctrine is boring or impractical? Dead wrong. That's like saying that God is boring and impractical. The key to change is the mind and doctrine is the key that opens the door to Biblical thoughts.

Just do ministry.

I recently asked a ministry leader why their church has a Sunday night service. He just kind of stared at me blankly, amazed that I would even ask such a question. There's nothing wrong with Sunday night service, but our ministries are hurting too much to keep on doing things just to do them. What are we trying to accomplish? Does everything we do fit into a comprehensive plan?

Here's a great quote I read about this over on MoreThanDodgeball.com: "Some aspects of ministry I could do with little thought, but valuable ministry comes from doing things on purpose with God honoring vision, leaders, and programs."

Don't read.

There are some incredibly wise people in the world who have some incredibly effective ministries. Many of them have written books containing important principles that are not only helpful, but essential to our own ministries. In ministry, you can almost measure your humility in pages read. Not only that, reading also gives you great new ideas to engage culture and be more effective. Wondering what to read? Start here. [via RayDeck3]

Do it all yourself.

Feeling overwhelmed and overworked? Start delegating more. Don't have a team to help you? Work hard to recruit one (check out all 4 parts of that excellent series). You know you were doing it yourself when you leave a ministry and things fall apart. [via Nathan Shoultz]