Category Archive: Spiritual Growth

The Window and The Mirror

Posted by on April 28, 2009

I have always been an Alabama football fan since the days of Coach Bryant.  One of the things I always appreciated about him was when we lost a game he always took the responsibility in the press conference and never cast blame toward the players or officials.

According to Jim Collins in his best seller Good to Great all great leaders do the very same thing.  His team noticed this pattern in all of the very successful leaders and they called it the window and the mirror effect.

All great leaders would look out the window and give credit to other people and not themselves when things were going well.  At the same time, they would look in the mirror to assume responsibility for failure and never blame bad luck or someone else when things went poorly.

The comparison companies did just the opposite.  These leaders would look out the window to blame someone or something when they experienced negative results.  When they did get it right they would look admiringly in the mirror and take all the credit with great fanfare.

We all need to apply this lesson on a personal level.  It is always easy to justify our bad behavior when we can use what someone else said or did to hurt us as an excuse.  Assuming personal responsibility for our attitudes, words and actions is the first major step in becoming a leader who is driven by character and not by the fading recognition of the crowd.

 

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Personal Crisis

Posted by on April 20, 2009

When negative things are happening in your life and you feel like you are in a deep hole and cannot see how to get out there are three key personal leadership disciplines that will help you get your positive momentum back.

The first is perspective.  When things are not going well today it is very important to put the present in the context of the long look that includes both the past and the future.  All of life both the good and the bad tend to run in cycles.  You cannot choose many times the circumstances about what happens to you but it is your responsibility to choose how you respond to them. 

Adversity in life will either make you a better person or a bitter one and that choice is within your control.  The key thing about your past is you must learn from it but never live in it.  Failure never has to be final unless we let it.

The same is true about the future.  You can choose to watch the news 3 hours a day and live with fear, worry and doubt or you can be grateful for what you have and face the future with hope and a positive attitude. 

The second personal leadership discipline in dealing with change is priorities.  The one incredibly good thing about a down cycle is that it always forces us to separate what is important in life from what is not. 

We must start by not asking the question what have I lost but what do I still have?  I would encourage you to write down everything that is still in your life that is important and when you see it all you will be amazed by how blessed you really are.

Someone has well said the tragedy of life is not that it ends so soon but we wait so long to begin it.  Regardless of your age or stage of life this dramatic period of change we are all going through is the perfect time for you to decide how you want to spend the rest of your life.  If you need some help get a life coach to walk through this process with you.

The third discipline to deal with change is to be proactive.  When some people face dramatic change they choose to live in denial as if this is not really happening to me.  On the other extreme others know the change is real to the point of becoming emotionally depressed about their new state of life.

I must assume personal responsibility to change myself first and start leading myself by making good daily decisions before my life can begin to turn around in different direction.  The only way to do that is to do what you can with what you have right where you are and do it today with all your heart.

 

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Forgiveness

Posted by on April 13, 2009

One spiritual principle that cannot be violated is that you cannot pass on to others what you have not first received yourself.  This is very hard to do when someone else has hurt us deeply and we find it so difficult to really forgive them.

When we feel the other person is wrong and they are the ones who have caused us pain then why should we give them a release from the debt they so clearly owe?

If we do not forgive them then we will be permanently emotionally bound to them because the issue will never be resolved.  We wake up every day with the memory of this person and our pain as we literally relive the event in our minds over and over again.

The only way out of this bondage is to have the courage to ask ourselves what percentage of the problem is our responsibility.  After all by now we are also wrong because of what we said or the anger and bitterness we feel inside.

If our responsibility is only twenty percent of the problem we must realize that we now have to resolve our relationship with our Heavenly Father.  We can never justify our wrong behavior as a Christian regardless of what someone else has done or said.

Once we have been forgiven and receive the grace we need then for the first time we are in a position to pass that same grace on to the other person.  Now we have peace instead of the pain of the past and regardless of how the other person responds to God’s grace we are free.

 

 

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Passion

Posted by on April 8, 2009

One of my favorite definitions for passion is a strong or extravagant fondness, enthusiasm, or desire for anything.  For most of us we could think of several things we are passionate about, family, friends, health, recreation, career and our faith.

As we enter into this week and take a few moments to reflect on The Passion of Christ I hope we do not miss His incredible grace in our lives.  For many of us we will go to church this Sunday and celebrate Easter and the resurrection.

My sincere desire for my life is that my passion for Christ goes far beyond my passion for anyone or anything else in this life.  The only way I know that is true on a daily basis is to make sure that the things that I am doing are important to Him.

I must not settle for mere religion when I have been called to a meaningful relationship.  Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.

 

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Living In The Moment

Posted by on April 3, 2009

 

Many of us will lose some of the greatest blessings in life because we are not able to enjoy the life we already have today.  Someone has well said that,” the measure of our peace of mind is determined by how much we are able to live in the present moment.”

Two mortal enemies that tend to rob us of the potential for today are the failures and pain from our past or the worries and fears about what may happen in the future.  Mark Twain once said, “I have been through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened.”

We tend to live under the false illusion that one day I am going to get my priorities in order and then I will be able to do what I want and need to do.  Happiness is always in the future tense because we never take the time to decide what is really important and what is not.

Every day we must say no to something because we live in a highly stressful world that demands more of us than we can possibly accomplish.  The only way to consistently say no to the wrong things is to first know what you should be saying yes to on a daily basis.

One of the major yes things should be I want to live everyday with a grateful spirit and a peaceful mind so that I can really see what is good about my life. Then I can concentrate on getting the things done today that are important and before today is done I can make sure to enjoy the moment.

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Attitude of Gratitude

Posted by on April 1, 2009

 

I was reading again Don’t Sweat The Small Stuff by Richard Carlson and he talked about his tendency to start thinking negative thoughts with all the bad news that is out there today.  I fight this as well especially when you are going through a hard time personally or when there is this slight issue of a global recession.

It is important to build into your life the daily discipline of thinking about all the good things that you have in your life.  We all should be grateful just to be alive and the basics of life including food, clean water and shelter.  There are multiplied millions of people who struggle  just to make it through one more day.

Beyond that we have families and friends and hopefully we are fulfilled by doing something with our life that we know will make a difference.  Through our faith we can have forgiveness for our failures and hope for the future.

The power of gratitude though is released when we go beyond thinking about it and personally telling someone else how thankful we are for what they mean to us.  This sets off a chain reaction of them passing on their gratitude to someone else in their life and the cycle continues.

So as we all are waiting today for the new evil conflicker virus to start spreading through our computers lets start spreading something positive in our lives by telling just one person thanks.

 

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Principle vs. Precept

Posted by on March 26, 2009

Any good dictionary will help you know the difference between these two important words.  A precept is a commandment or direction given as a rule of action or conduct.  On the other hand, a principle is a primary truth from which other truths are derived.

In Christian speak, a precept is black ink on white paper where someone quotes you chapter and verse with the understanding that there is one and only one meaning of this truth.  Salvation is by grace through faith in Jesus Christ period, end of conversation.

To be sure we as churches have beaten unbelievers over the head with our precepts to the point they are totally turned off to the gospel.  I am not talking about watering down the truth but when people do still walk into our buildings they just want to know is there any good news for my life today?

On the other side of this issue, many Christians can spiritually rationalize their behavior because they cannot find a clear precept that prohibits certain behavior on their part.  Obviously the New Testament was written in the first century so the writers did not cover the part about staying away from internet pornography. 

Eating meat offered to idols was a big deal in the first century so the principle of deference was taught to make sure a Christian did not offend a weaker brother or an unbeliever with their behavior.  Today there are many contemporary issues that will never be addressed by precepts but the principles that are taught in scripture still apply.

If you have any doubts just use I Corinthians 10:31 as your guide, “therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”  Just always remember, everything that is for His glory is also for your good.

 

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One Day At Time

Posted by on March 25, 2009

The Christian life at times can be extremely complicated.  We all suffer from the consequences of our bad decisions but sometimes we suffer not because we have done something wrong but as a testimony to the world that God’s grace is indeed sufficient.

I have learned the hard way over the years that the only way to work your way out of one of these black holes of the soul is to discipline yourself to live one day at a time.  When you do not know why things have happened and how it is all going to work out it comes down to what can I do right now.

The first practical step in this process is to experience forgiveness for the past.  We must first receive it for what we have done wrong and then give it to others who have hurt us and caused pain.  We should learn from the past but we cannot live in it.

The second step is to have faith for the future.  God is able and He is good so you can rest in the fact that He will meet our needs.  All worry and fear will do is to rob us of the spiritual energy we need to live today.

The last and probably most important truth is to embrace His promise of grace for today.   Every new day comes with the necessary spiritual power to deal with whatever happens within that twenty-four hour period of time.

If we do not waste that power on unforgiveness for the past or fear of the future then we will be able to live today with eternal perspective.   That perspective is that no matter what happens to me in this life that may hurt deeply at the time we win in the end.

 

 

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Multi-Generational Churches

Posted by on March 22, 2009

There is always the debate about what is the most effective strategy for reaching new people, change an existing church or simply start a new one with its own unique culture.  In my opinion both have their strengths and weaknesses, so the decision should depend upon the context.

There are several things I have noticed when churches are started with one particular age group in mind as the target.  All of your programming, especially your worship can be one style depending upon the age group in the room.  The staff and the facilities can be designed with the needs of this age group in mind as well.

Although this may work for a short period of time there eventually will be serious challenges that must be addressed.  One day all of these single adults will get married and then they are going to want programming for their children.  Eventually, this same group will become empty nesters and that will bring on another whole set of needs.

My point is simply this, every church given enough time will become multi-generational unless you are going to tell people at some point you need to leave.  Since that is a reality then why not start with a multi-generational model from day one that will avoid all of these potential crisis points that can kill momentum and destroy unity.

An even more significant reason is that it is biblical.  Every person is important to God from the youngest newborn to the oldest senior adult.  The gospel will always be more receptive with younger people but the ministry of the church must include the widow who is all alone.

 

 

 

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Glocal

Posted by on March 21, 2009

During the last century there were very clear distinctions between the concept of evangelism and missions.  In the simplest of terms evangelism was reaching people for the local church and missions was reaching people for the kingdom.

Within the context of missions there was a local, national and an international segmentation.  This implied the potential for several different strategies to be effective in all of these areas.  It was understood that to reach people in an international context that significant cultural barriers had to be addressed for the gospel to be effective.

Today the cultural distance between the people who are in the church in America and the people who are not is significant enough to require a cross cultural missiological approach to reach them.  They hold an entirely different world view and they are simply not going to come to our buildings regardless of how cutting edge our marketing may be.

For churches to be effective today in reaching the unchurched in America we are going to have to become missionaries in our own local context.  We will have to find ways to take the gospel to where the people live, work and play and do it in a culturally relevant way.

That is why we need to stop thinking in terms of the old models of segmentation.  The world has literally moved to America and through the use of technology and the new global economy everything has changed.

The church must become glocal in its thinking, which means one missiological mindset that produces multiple strategies depending upon who we are trying to reach in our area.

 

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