Tag Archive - Faith

Dreams of Leaders

January 18, 2010 in Faith, Featured, Leadership with 0 Comments

I hadn’t really planned on writing something related to Martin Luther King Jr. day today. I don’t feel overly qualified to talk about race relations or about truly suffering for a cause. But, after watching the video posted by Michael Hyatt today and subsequent discussion of leadership lessons learned from Dr. King, I just had to write down some of the thoughts going through my head.

I honestly cannot fathom what African-Americans went through, especially during the civil rights movement of the 1960s. When I sat down and considered what the equivalent would be in my daily life to be African-American up through the 1960s, I’m quickly humbled. Being a white male, I’ve never truly experienced that other than one time, and that one experience was incredibly uncomfortable.

After listening to Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, it put some great perspective to the historic event of Barack Obama being elected president. Regardless of any political affiliation, it’s amazing where we’ve come since 1964. On the other hand, I have a feeling that Dr. King would be disappointed that the media seems to make every issue related to the president somehow about race, like the recent events in Haiti.

I think Michael had it right when he discussed Dr. King’s leadership. Above all else, he was a leader. There very well may have been no civil rights movement without Dr. King’s vision, tenacity, and heart.

So, Dr. King, thank you for showing me what it takes to follow my dreams, be a visionary, and most of all, lead with a relentless passion that encompasses God and those that are struggling. It gives me renewed strength to pursue my own dreams.

Looking Ahead

December 29, 2009 in Causes, Faith, Featured with 6 Comments

As we come upon the end of another year, and in this case, the end of a decade, I’ve decided to skip the usual year in review and instead look ahead to next year. I’m excited for the potential of the next year for the first time in a long time, and it gave me extra incentive to write about it.

When I sat down to write my list of “goals” for the upcoming year, I think I came up with a fairly decent list of what I want to accomplish next year:

  • Lose weight and get in shape.
  • Improve my golf game.
  • Continue my involvement in student ministries at my church and grow the relationships that I’m developing with students.
  • Get back to playing baseball. I miss it a ton.
  • Increase my time spent with God and His Word.
  • Make sure I am where God wants me to be career-wise.

I’ve looked over this list a couple of times, and even thought I had refined it a couple of times, it still didn’t convey what I was really feeling. After spending some time reading through others’ blogs and in the Bible, I’ve come up with what my “goal” for the next year really boils down to.

I want to be authentic.transparent

I don’t mean this in some sort of ethereal sense, but I want to be truly authentic in everything I do. In my relationships online and offline, on Twitter, Facebook, at work, with my Creator, the causes I support, in every area of my life. Especially online, it’s very easy for us to phrase something a certain way or use certain words to make us sound a specific way, and I want to make sure that the person you see is the same whether I get the opportunity to meet you online, at work, at church, or in a bar on a Friday night.

I don’t feel like I’m starting from zero with this goal, but I know there’s definitely room for improvement, and I want to make this the major focus of my life in 2010. That’s the reason I’m putting it out here for all of you to see. I want to make sure you hold me accountable. Just because I’ve never met you in person doesn’t mean I don’t have respect for you and I would definitely listen to what you had to say regarding authenticity, especially when I’m sucking at it. For those of you that know me on multiple levels, I’m hoping you’ll step it up to make sure I’m being as transparent as possible. So for better or worse, you’ll hopefully be seeing the real me at all times in 2010.

Do you have a big “goal” for 2010? Is there anything we can hold you accountable for in the next year?

They Know

December 21, 2009 in Featured, Leadership with 0 Comments

I’ve been volunteering in student ministries for not quite a year now, and it’s been one of the greatest things I’ve done. I absolutely love working with these students. They’re like my little brothers and sisters, and I want nothing but the best for them.

So I would like to throw out a few words of advice or those interested in working with students:

They know when you’re not being serious, when you’re not taking them seriously, when you blow them off, and when you don’t care.

I think we as adults sometimes forget, or we think that students won’t catch on because they’re students. But we all know we hate when someone blows us off, or we can tell we’re not being taken seriously. And if you’re anything like me, you just get upset. In my life, I would rather the person not be there than just patronize me, or throw out some catchy phrase like “Just pray about it.” That’s just avoiding the situation and not wanting to deal with it. In most cases, I’m already praying.

Students aren’t any different. They can pick up on these things clear as day, and it instantly lowers your credibility with all of them, because they’re no different that anyone else. They’ll tell their friends about it. Granted, we all do this from time to time, and none of us are perfect, so we all make mistakes. I’m just reminded as I sit here and write this post that I need to make sure I stay on guard and try to prevent that from happening as much as possible.

How do you remind yourself not to blow people off?

blood:water mission

December 3, 2009 in Causes, Videos with 0 Comments

blood:water mission

December 3, 2009 in Causes, Videos with 0 Comments

blood:water mission

December 3, 2009 in Causes, Videos with 0 Comments

A Million Miles in a Thousand Years

December 3, 2009 in Books with 2 Comments

[A report]
book coverSo, as part of the sweet program I am a part of with Thomas Nelson Publishers, I get the great opportunity to read books and write reviews on them. In return, I get the books for free. This book review is particularly special, in that I received Donald Miller’s new book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years before it was released to the public. Not only that, but they also included a second copy for me to give away to someone else, and so it was given to my fellow student ministries staff and the student ministries director at my church.

Honestly, I thought this book was amazing. It hit very much at home for me since I have been working on defining my life a lot over the past year, and working on making good changes. I haven’t read any of Donald Miller’s other books, but this one makes me want to go back and read them all.

The premise of A Million Miles is that your life is a story, and is your story actually interesting? Don give a ton of examples from his life regarding how he had been living his life and just letting it pass him by, until a movie producer and writer contact him and want to turn one of his previous books into a movie. Through this process, he learns that life is a story, and your story can either be boring or it can be exciting, full of great chapters and awesome adventures. I’m not going to spoil it by telling you how Don changes his life based on this, but you definitely need to read it and find out, and it may give you a ton of insight into changes you need to make in your life to make your story more interesting.

One of the parts that struck me the most is when Don comes home and looks around his house, and it’s like no one lives there. He says his house looked like a stage on which fake props had been set. There are no pictures of anything anywhere in the house. Nothing that shows a story that he was living, with chapters from amazing events in his life. It’s basically like he wasn’t living a story at all, or it was so boring that there was nothing to display from it. This hit home for me as I sat reading this in my living room, and I looked around, and realized that I didn’t have a whole lot of pictures or mementos as well. I wasn’t living a story.

Don’s writing is very conversational in this book, and it is a great way to tell his story. At times he’s depreciating of himself, all of it making for a great vehicle for this book. I’ve taken what’s been said in this book to heart. It’s not meant to be a self-help book in any manner, and I don’t think it’s written in that way, but it does greatly make you think about how you’re living your life and if it’s worthwhile, or boring and pointless. I highly recommend you go out and pick up this book and read it. It will at least make you think…

What’s Your Story?

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