A Cedar of Lebanon, His Cedar.

Yesterday we finished up with tea and coffee with our wonderful hosts and exchanged some gifts. I was given some royal threads and made an honorary chief of a Bedouin tribe. The team pointed out to me that I didn’t have any people in my tribe but I told them I’m starting out with a cute blond with glasses. Today Matthieu told me that he has never seen them do that for anybody so he said we made a huge impact on them and they really appreciated our efforts. I asked why me and Matthieu just said they know who. . . ?

After that we took off up the mountain to see the cedars of Lebanon! The cedars we saw this day were much different that the ones that I missed seeing last week with the team. The team said these were far greater to see. Thanks Lord, for giving me this amazing opportunity.
The air was thick with mist swirling through the trees. It was an amazing sight. It was like someone started a huge mist machine for us on that mountain side and it created a sense of mystery and beauty.

Some of these great cedars are over 3000 years old. The tops on mature cedars break off and fall to the ground or just snap to the side and keep growing. Psalms 29:5 says that the voice of the Lord breaks the cedars of Lebanon. It’s like the only way to get to a certain level of maturity, it takes something big to happen. A breaking, a moment of stress, but then after this moment the branches start to spread out in all directions and create a huge amount of shade for the forest. Psalms 80:10 talks about the shade that comes from mighty cedars. Hosea 14 talks about the shade that a person gives to many others when a repentant heart is healed, cared for and loved by God. I think the best verse is from Psalms 104:16 where the Psalmist states that god himself planted the cedar seed and watered it and cared for it through all times. Good and bad.

He breaks it in its time and it matures and never stops growing.

I hope I’m one of those to God. A cedar of Lebanon, His cedar. Worthy of being a part of His temple, producing a fragrance that glorifies Him and draws others to some shade.

jp

The "Stuff" of Life

I had breakfast this morning with a friend. Our discussion reminded me of something I learned before I started in this role, thanks to one of my sisters. She pointed me towards the parable of the bags of gold from Matthew 25 (and Luke 19) where the master gave out 5, 2 and 1 bags of gold to three of his servants. Ever since I read this as a kid I viewed it as this lump sum of “stuff” we get as a human being to do life with, and when it’s all said and done and we have to give an accounting of our life, then God comes and determines your future state in heaven.

She pointed out to me that, no, it really means that what God has entrusted to me today, he expects me to use it well, and if I do, He comes along side of me and says “Well done, let’s go again!” There is also an implied partnership that should not be lost in these verses, but that’s a thought for another day.

So after she said this, my whole life flashed before my eyes where I saw myself in all of the various roles and jobs that I had experienced. I thought about my personal growth and the things I had learned through the good times and the not so good times, the increase in responsibilities that I had been entrusted with from job to job and also from role to role within the church setting. This was so cool because I saw all the points (I see charts and graphs in my head often!) where God had come alone side of me and said “Well done, let’s go again!”

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. While I had been trustworthy with what God had given me, I was in no way intentional about how I invested my “stuff”. My progress was completely done out of an intuitive mind set to seek out that which is greater than the last. It was the first time in my life where I sat down and had a good look at my “stuff” that God had given to me and ask the question, could I get a greater return that what I was currently getting? (This also implies an increase in risk! Right, another topic for another day).

Since this time I’ve come to land on three things that must happen in order to be highly intentional in my investments of the “stuff” God has entrusted to me.

1. I must know that which He has given to me. For me it’s leadership, administration and discernment. If you don’t know your “stuff” then get on with the search.

2. I must have a usage plan for each one of the gifts I’ve been given. We all have a number of roles we live and breathe within. A mom, a dad, husband, wife, volunteer roles, work related roles. If you think about it, you have huge opportunities all around you to exercise your gifts and be intentional about using them. When you get intentional, you’ll find yourself having out of body experiences where you are watching yourself doing things that blow you away. Often we are looking for that perfect “role” to make us happy and feel fulfilled, but in reality, using your gifts in the “now” will be instant satisfaction.

3. I must have a growth plan. Part of growth comes when God comes along side of you and say’s let’s go again and He throws you into something that is big and scary. You’ll always grow this way. But a large part of the growth comes from being in the moment, using your gifts and seeing the things you could do well and the things you could do better. It comes from reading and studying about your giftedness. It comes from observing others with similar gifts. It comes from trial and error. It comes from evaluating failure and success. I’ve discovered that the greatest growth spurts come from walking through a tough time. Every tough time presents itself with two opportunities for growth. One happened in the middle of the tough time where if you are aware, you get to test-drive your gift in new ways. Second opportunity comes after the tough time is over and you can take some reflective time thinking about what just happened and what you learned about yourself.

Be intentional with what God had entrusted to you here today. Enjoy it! If you are, then it will open up the path for God to give you even bigger things down the road. Don’t concern yourself with what’s next. It’ll be bigger than you can possibly imagine.

jp

1 for 10

Who Supports Me?

So I finished the book and wanted to bring forward for you one of the last chapters because it’s made me think a lot in the last three days. In chapter 24 Maxwell asked us to think about those that support us. I think you could do some translations from work to family to life in general, but I’ll talk here mostly from the context of my role and the staff that I lead at the church.

What kinds of support people do I have working for me? When I went through all of these questions I was able to plug a lot of my staff into them. So I’ll give you the questions and then talk a little at the end.

Who supports me at work?

Time Relievers – These are the people that save me time.

Gift Complementors – These are the people who do things I am not gifted to do and make up for those areas I am lacking. I need a lot of these kind of people!

Team Players – These are the people who add value to me and my team. They continue contribute and see themselves as part of something greater than just their own role.

Creative Thinkers – These are the people who solve problems and give me options. I can never get enough of these people and so I am always facilitating brainstorming sessions. I have my special people that I really love having at the table.

Door closers – These are the people who complete assignments with excellence. When I delegate something or create a project that get’s handed over, they bat it out of the park every time.

People developers – These are the people who develop and raise up other leaders and producers. Check out my other post here on Trading Up where I talk a bit about addition vs. multiplication.

Servant Leaders – These are people who lead with the right attitude. I’ve got a whole host of these kinds of people here.

Mind Stretchers – These are the people who expand my thinking and my spirit. Sometimes they create tension for me, but it’s always creative tension and never negative tension. I have come to really love these people in my life.

Relational Networkers – These are the people who bring other people into my life who add value to me. I’m really lacking people in my life that do this for me. This is the one area that I need to so some further thinking about to determine how I can acquire these kinds of people in my life.

Spiritual Mentors – These are the people who encourage me in my faith walk. I think I also need more of these kinds of people. They are hard to find in person. I have a few authors that give me substance, but not so much that one on one mentor.

Unconditional Lovers – These are the people who know my weaknesses, yet love me unconditionally. I need people in my life that I know are "for" me. I have a few of these. I’m thankful.

I am so grateful for my staff and from reading this chapter I realized even more all the wonderful people I get to work with. I’m not so good at letting them know how much I appreciate them, and with this list I’m actually able to put some verbiage around how they bless me.

I’ve gone through each of these types and wrote down the names of some of the people on my staff in those areas where they bless me. Over the next month I’m going to make sure they know what I think about them and how I appreciate them. Call me on it a month down the road and see how I did.

On to another book ...

jp

Trading Up

Finished chapter 22 in Leadership Gold. Maxwell talks about 10 different things that you need to consider trading for so that as a leader you can get to the next level. Really good stuff. Two of these trades jumped out at me.

1. Trade Addition for Multiplication

If I’m all about leading others, well that’s really great. Because I am adding to myself as I lead people forward in whatever seems to be the trek of the day. The follower list might be growing but it’s still only through addition and not multiplication. It’s a far more significant thing, and more difficult to achieve, to develop leaders who in turn lead others. If I can lead and grow others in such a way as to result in those I lead developing still more leaders under them, well, then we are talking exponential impact. I’m not so sure I do this well, but I’m becoming much more intentional about how I lead and develop others into leaders. I feel like I’ve stepped into some kind of vortex in the past 3-4 months that has heightened all my sensory receptors when it comes to this thing called leadership.

2. Trade Your Work for God for a Walk with God

I’ve been doing ministry for years. I think since I lead my youth group in high school. A small portion of those years have been in a paid role, but none the less, I’ve been a busy guy doing ministry in various areas of the church. I think I’ve spent most of this time doing things for God and not necessarily spending time with God. Since last summer I have become convinced that God is far more interested in my walk with Him than he is in “using me” for the work he doing in our world. I’m not saying that’s not important, but what I am saying that without a deep relationship with God, nothing else much matters. It’s the relationship that lives for an eternity. Susan Scott in her book called Fierce Conversation makes a statement about people and their relationships that I think goes for my relationship with God as well. She said that we can think all we want about our relationships with each other, but none of it has any substance to form “relationship”. Relationship is formed only during the act of conversation. The conversation is the relationship. In that very moment, the act of speaking and listening, centered on another human being comes the essence of the relationship. It’s either a positive or negative encounter based on the conversation (words, body language, unspoken words, all that conversational stuff). If I’m not fully there with my presence, chances are high that its does the relationship harm. If I’m all there, centered, listening, sharing, interacting, consumed with the very presence of another precious being, God or otherwise, the relationship grows and becomes greater than before. Today I crave a deeper walk with my creator than ever before. So I’m becoming much more intentional and careful when I come into His presence.

jp

ps. If you attend CrossRoads Church and would like a copy of Maxwell’s book, let me know. I’ve bought a few extra, just for you!