Happy 2008!

This has been the best Christmas vacation! We've stayed in central Arkansas the whole time. It's the first time I haven't traveled for Christmas (or Christmas break in college) since 1989.

Tonight Emmaleigh planned and cooked dinner (with a little help). We'll watch a movie, watch the ball drop on TV, and eat our "Happy New Year" cake (Em's idea).

Happy 2008!

Still reading...

I'm still trying to get through this book. It's like 800 pages. I've enjoyed it as I've read it sporadically, but now it's getting really good. I'm just about to the point of Lincoln's nomination as the Republican candidate for president. Man that Lincoln worked hard! While one of the other contenders was touring Europe FOR EIGHT MONTHS (!!) and another was sitting at home writing a few letters, Lincoln was working for what he wanted and for what he thought was best.

What as inspiration toward hard work, rigorous thinking, and clarity of communication!

Lots of leadership lessons in Lincoln's life.

Good wedding today

Debbie, Emmaleigh and I attended a wedding today of friends at Mosaic. It was good for several reasons:
1) The whole ceremony inspired not only the couple but everyone present to live out what God intends marriage to be.
2) Emmaleigh got to see her small group leader from her 4th grade class at church commit his life to serving his new wife.
3) Great music and worship moments.
4) The groom's cake was awesome chocolate.
5) With marriages on such shaky ground all around us, it was great to see these two so clearly commit to each other. They even signed a covenant of marriage in the ceremony and said in their vows not just "til death do us part" but also "I will never divorce you".
5) The pastor lightened up the mood at times. The bride and groom were Joseph and Molly. The pastor accidentally called them Joseph and Mary once in the wedding.

Good times...

A Hellen Christmas Eve

Little Rock Christmas Parade

Today we went to the Little Rock Christmas Parade, lighting of the capitol building and fireworks.

So it's not the Eiffel Tower or the Empire State Building (inside joke), but it's all we got... the Metropolitan Bank Building.




Susie was pretty serious about getting candy.


A few good floats... this one was spewing lots of nice fake snow...




The inside of the state capitol building was decorated beautifully.




JOY is her middle name.


My camera battery ran out before the lighting of the capitol and fireworks.

Fun day!

The leadership of Jesus - Mark 5

I continue to look at the Biblical book of Mark for clues into how Jesus led his organization. Today I'm struck by how Jesus seems to be able to do anything. Well duh... he is God. One minute he is teaching his disciples, the next he is healing people, the next... who knows!!

But, the point I take today is this. He can do everything, but only because he is God. People so often set up organizations with all kinds of roles whose "job descriptions" are to do everything for the people under them. To some degree we are asking them to be little gods who can do everything. We ask them to hire, to train, to inspire, to organize, to develop, to manage, to care, to report, to administrate, to... to... to.

The model of Jesus' organization is that everyone is good at and gifted for only a thing or two. All together they work as a body, not as an endless leadership hierarchy.

I'm going to explore this here for the next few days. Join in the conversation!

Tomorrow: Short order cooks, French restaurants, and the leadership of Jesus

Later in the week: Urgent vs important, hierarchy vs body

Fall family photos

We took a drive a couple of weekends ago up to northwest Arkansas to see all the fall leaves.

Here are some family photos:



Elenita's is our favorite Mexican place up there!




Alex LOVES dogs... here's a dog we saw when we made a stop on the trip...

Memorizing 1 Peter 1:3-9

I'm leading our LifeGroups at Mosaic to memorize 1 Peter 1:3-9. If you want in on it, go here for details.

What is God up to?

I love how I've gotten to do some very different things.

Worship leading
Master's degree in Electrical Engineering
Implanting ions into silicon
Technical production team leadership
Hurricane relief
LifeGroup ministry leadership
Video production for a restaurant chain
and now adding some development and operational leadership in children's ministry (of all things!...I never thought I'd spend a morning reading preschool curriculum!)

God just keeps moving me around and adding new experiences. Some people would be driven crazy by that. Not me... I love digging into new areas and helping to develop them.

It does make me wonder what is in my future. Will I continue to move around to different areas to help develop them? That would be fine for me. Or... is all of this going to play together in some way? Either way, I'm having fun.

How did You do that?

The other day at sunset it was raining with overcast skies, but somehow You made a smooth, seamless, not jagged, gradient transition from overcast gray through pinks and ending in a fiery orange horizon. The sun, just descending out of view, cast a rainbow opposite the blazing horizon. How did you do it? It was amazing to see. Alex was amazed as well. Your creativity is beyond words. Your beauty is beyond description. You are God. You are living and moving and leading and speaking. Thank you for sharing your creativity and beauty with such lowly, sinful people as my son and me the other day.

DNA of an organization

This week someone said something to me that struck me as odd. This person said that she needed to inform people in her organization that a particular practice is part of the organization's DNA.

It seems to me that if you have to inform people of that, then it is really not in the DNA.

So how do you put something into the DNA of an existing organization? I think it takes a lot of hard work, strategic thinking, and also prayer.

We can't just tell people they should participate in a certain practice of the organization (in my case a church). I think we must draw them in and inspire them by doing things like:

-- Vision Casting
-- Teaching
-- Modeling
-- Storytelling
-- Logistical tweaks to give that practice a better chance of taking off
-- Changes in programming to lead people by the hand into the practice or value that you are trying to instill


How successful have you been at embedding new things (or strengthening the presence of old things) in the DNA of your organization? How have you done it? What are some tactics to add to my list above?

Interesting post I read today...

I'm not sure what to do with this, but I found this a very interesting post.

What do you think of the unschedule?

Building community at our church

Each month on the third Sunday at our church we have a "community meal" after morning worship. This month we arranged the tables in a new way to cause people to more likely sit with those they don't know instead of just with their usual circles of friends. We also had cards at the tables with some questions aimed at spurring conversation.

I thought the changes helped a lot. I saw people mingled in diversity even more than usual.

My favorite thing from the day was seeing my tiny, smiling 4-year-old daughter and a really big older African-American gentleman sitting right next to each other as our family sat adjacent to theirs. Wish I had a photo...

I'm so glad that my kids are in an environment that fosters comfort with people different from them.

Thanks Mom, Dad, and Rob for helping us with the rearrangement of the table and chairs.

Sticky Teaching - Mark 4

Painting a word picture conveys an idea so much better, stronger, stickier than an explanation.

I continue to look in the Bible book of Mark to study what Jesus did in leading and building his organization. The parable of the sower is a great example of "sticky" teaching. The book "Made to Stick" talks about six characteristics of a sticky concept.

Simple
Concrete
Credible
Unexpected
Emotional
Story

The parable of the sower, at least in some ways, meets all six of these.

Paint! Don't explain.
Paint! Don't explain.
Paint! Don't explain.

Significance tank

I find that I can endure anything when my significance tank is full. I can work on Saturday in the garage, do laundry, clean the kitchen, all kinds of mundane things if I've already had a good week of making an impact at work and home. If I haven't made enough impact yet in the week though, watch out! I won't give time to anything else until that significance tank is full.

I'm not sure if everyone tends to be like this, if it is men that tend to be like this, or if it is just me.

I like making a significant difference; I just need to watch out that I'm not addicted to significance.

More on the Organization of Jesus

I'm looking in the Bible specifically for how Jesus built his "organization".

I continue today in Mark 3

A leader assesses the situation for potential problems and directs that wise provision be made. (Mark 3:9)

Mark 3:13-19 Forming the core team
Observations:
1) Jesus knew who he wanted and called them to himself
2) He appointed 12 that they might be with him (he was confident that these 12 spending time with him would be good for them)
3) He appointed 12 that he might send them out to preach and to have authority to cast out demons

Punishment that fits the crine

I was talking with a friend recently who said that it must've been a lot easier to get kids to do chores back in the old days on a farm when not doing chores had serious consequences. If you didn't take care of the chickens or cows, you wouldn't have food to eat.

That got me thinking. We'd have to force it a little, but maybe we could create stronger connections between chores and the consequences for undone chores. (I'm sure this has been done by millions of parents... but it's a new thought to me!)

Here are a few I thought of for my kids...
- If you don't hang your towel back on the hook in the bathroom, you don't get a towel the next evening for your bath. You have to put PJ's on your wet body.
- If you don't put your dinner dishes in the sink, those dirty dishes will be the ones you have at your place at the table for the first five minutes of the next meal.
- If you don't make your bed, you sleep on the floor the next night.

What are some more?

My friend said that if you whine about cleaning the bathroom you should have to go outside for the next day. That might be a little much!

I love meetings

Many people talk about hating meetings. Not me! I love meetings. Sure there are some unproductive, boring meetings. But I love meetings where progress is made, where issues are worked out, where relationships are built, where ideas are bounced around, where strategies are solidified, where vision is formed and seen, where value is brought to all meeting participants.

I guess this goes with one thing Colin Powell said at the Willow Creek Leadership Summit this year. Not strategies on paper... not rules set in stone... "only people make things happen."

I guess this is also why I'm becoming more and more about "coaching".

Cool photo

On Saturday, the family seemed to all want to stay in even though it was a beautiful day. So, I went hiking! I snapped this photo standing behind a waterfall and looking straight up.

The Organization of Jesus

Confession: Sometimes I spend too much time listening to the leadership ideas of people today instead of looking to Jesus for leadership wisdom. God, in the human flesh of Jesus, led an organization on earth... and it's documented!

Today I started looking at the gospel of Mark with a focused eye on how Jesus created and led his organization. These notes aren't polished; they are just what is hitting me as I read.

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Recruiting: Jesus saw people who were busy at work, said “follow me”, and left it in their hands to decide whether to get up or stay put. (Mk 1:14-20)

Modeling: He showed his followers the importance of building his relationship with his Father (Mk 1:33-37)

Lead from purpose instead of following the clamor (Mk 1:37-39)

Jesus did not want certain people to tell about his healing them. Then they told anyway and made things hard for Jesus. (Mk 1:40-45)

Relate closely with followers: Call to Levi to “follow me” then Jesus ate at Levi’s house (Mk 2:14-15)

Use pictures to bring clarity (Mk 2:18-22) Cloth/wineskin: Some things don't work together. New people in an organization can feel like old or new wine in the opposite wineskin. What is it that makes new wine and old wineskins able to work together? Time.

Boldly take action in front of detractors to transform culture. (Healing on the sabbath right in front of people; Mk 3:5-6)