“God has not bowed to our nervous haste, nor embraced our machine age.  The man who would know God – must give Him Time!”   A.W. Tozer

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build’em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Rudyard Kipling

I’ve been to a million coffee shops in my life.  Some I’ve loved and some not at all.  The difference for me is never the coffee.  it’s always the environment.

When a place goes out of its way to give me an experience while I’m there that goes way beyond the taste of my latte, they’ve won me.

In leadership these days, there seems to me a lot of healthy discussion happening about environmental approaches to leadership.  Where the goal is not to see how we can most effectively use the technology of compliance that is management, the goal is to create an environment where people are inspired to bring their best.  An environment that inspires people to achieve new dimensions of performance.

In the church circles that I’m in these days, we are continually thinking, not about how we can funnel people through a 4 step program or around a base path to full devotion, but about what kind of environments inspire people to really engage the faith part of their lives.

I need to confess that my theology of discipleship is leaning farther and farther in the direction of environment over efficiency and inspiration over structure.

I’m not anti-structure or efficiency.  I love my latte hot and with just the right amount of vanilla.  But I can get that anywhere.  Create for me an environment that inspires me to stay and you’ve won.

Every once in a while you come across a story of a brand or group that gets the power of environment to inspire and to change the whole experience.

Those creative story tellers are the ones that win hearts and define what’s really possible.

Where have you experience the power of environment to transform your experience?

I’ve heard this statement made many times before but I have to admit, I’m still not completely clear on what culture is or how to recognize it.

One definition I read says that:

organizational culture is the personality of the organization.

That helps because there are copious amounts of material out there to help you understand, measure and identify personality.

It doesn’t help because I’ve yet to find anyone offering the same kind of tools to help you really get your organization’s personality.

More than that, I’ve always understood one’s personality to be a relatively static thing.  I’m an ENFP.  I realize there are limits to this type of assessment.  Still, I was an ENFP in College and I’ll probably be an ENFP when I’m retired.

But according to Shawn Parr, culture is something that can and should be developed.

“Long-term success is dependent on a culture that is nurtured and alive”. 

Read the article here: Culture Eats Strategy For Lunch | Fast Company and then post me some juicy stories of when you dated an organization that looked hot on the outside but whose personality left a lot to be desired.

You see I believe there is nothing like living in your sweet spot.  Doing that thing that you were created to do.  The thing that you love to do.  The thing that makes you feel like God is smiling on you.

But I’ve also jumped eyes wide open into “experiences of discovery” when you realize that just because you thought you could, doesn’t mean you actually should.

I was 6 when I first really understood what it meant when my mom warned me:

“…make sure your eyes aren’t bigger than your stomach!”

Even at 6 it seemed hard to imagine that eyes, even in pairs, could be bigger than a stomach but I confess I’ve returned many times to my mom’s fateful warnings.

I’m a dreamer, a creative. I’m always looking for a new way to do something – not because the old way doesn’t work, but because doing it a new way is more fun and just may yield a new dimension of performance.

This creative urge and optimistic bent has repeatedly landed me in over my head.

This has led to one of only 2 outcomes.

The first is I discover that new possibilities are out there and that I’m able to rise higher than I first imagined.

The second is the painful reminder that living outside of my level is living outside of God’s will – at least for that season of my life.

I’m not saying that people aren’t capable of growing beyond their present capacity.  They are – and one of my biggest beefs are the limiters around us whose self appointed role is to tell people what they can’t do.  I will never be one of those people.

But I do want to serve today as one with big eyes, warning you all to take care out there.

Living outside your level for too long can be dangerous. 

N. T. Wright ~ Scripture and the Authority of God

              Steven Gary Blank

From that simple vision test we searched for the opportunities of tomorrow and then spent the rest of our time talking about summoning courage to face whatever obstacles we might face as we pursue that image of our preferred future.

What I didn’t expect was the almost immediate response from those who felt the discomfort of feeling like the life they are living now is not at all like the life they dream of or, at least, not enough like the life of their dreams.

If that’s you then I want to offer 2 tools to help you identify and then at least take some new steps towards the life you dream of.

The first is Scott McKnight’s book One.Life

One.Life

Publishers weekly said this about One Life

McKnight, a professor of religious studies at North Park University in Chicago and the author of the acclaimed Jesus Creed, argues against the Christianity he was taught in his youth, an interpretation he finds overly fixated on the personal piety of believers rather than their influence in society. He contends instead that Jesus called believers to action and to the establishment of a world of justice, compassion, and peace.

The second is a tool from Michael Hyatt on how to create a Life Plan

Life Plan

Michael Hyatt is the chairman of Thomas Nelson Publishing, a popular speaker on leadership and a professional blogger.

Michael Hyatt give three reasons why you need a life plan.

1. It will give you clarity about where your life is headed.
2. It will keep you in balance when things get crazy.
3. It will give you peace of mind, knowing you are addressing those aspects of your life that matter most.

It’s not a bad thing to look at your life and discover that you’re not where you hoped you would be – as long as you take whatever steps you need to take to start getting there.

Where in your life do you need to draw a line in the sand and declare that is as far as you’re going in that direction?

Where have you seen the greatest movement in the right direction in the past year?

Have a safe and happy holidays everyone…

I’ve been wrestling with this temptation a lot lately.  I’m not proud of that.  I think this idea – that I need to be held blameless or acquitted of what I feel are “unfair” charges is a window into the state of my heart sometimes.

Oswald Chambers captures it well when he says:

Another thing that distracts us is our passion for vindication. St. Augustine prayed, “O Lord, deliver me from this lust of always vindicating myself.” Such a need for constant vindication destroys our soul’s faith in God. Don’t say, “I must explain myself,” or, “I must get people to understand.” Our Lord never explained anything— He left the misunderstandings or misconceptions of others to correct themselves.

Richard J. Foster in Celebration of Discipline captures the problem perfectly.

“One reason we can hardly bear to remain silent is that it makes us feel so helpless”.

What if people believe the wrong thing?  What if they think poorly of me?  What if…

But Foster is right.  The tongue really is a thermometer.  It really does give an accurate reading of our spiritual temperature.  And i want mine to say things like

calm, controlled, and quietly trusting.

Because it’s often in silence that God can do a work of inner transformation.