Make A Difference - James 1:22

But prove yourselves doers of the word and not merely hearers who delude themselves. James 1:22


The end of a relationship with Jesus Christ is that we are doers. There is a difference between someone who remodels his kitchen and someone who remodels kitchens for a living. There is a difference between someone who plays guitar and a musician; or someone who volunteers and a volunteer. The difference is commitment. James challenges us to be a doer. We're to be professional in our doing.

Think back to the best leaders you've known. I'd bet one thing they had in common is that they weren't afraid to do what they said. They were people who had integrity. Integrity is the most common response to the question, "What do you want in a leader." Integrity means less that your leaders are honest, but more that they are true, pure. Their message was consistent with their beliefs. When we say someone has integrity, we are saying that they are what they claim to be. Integrity is the opposite of hypocrisy. The original Greek word for hypocrite meant an actor or one who wore a mask. Anyone who appears different than they truly are is a hypocrite. They're acting. If the best leaders in your memory were actors, you haven't had a good leader. Great leaders are what they represent. They live the life they call others to. Followers of Jesus are to do what they claim to believe.

Another problem with integrity in leadership is that it spills over from the professional life to the personal life. If you tell the truth to your teammates, but you lie to the government about your income, are you still a liar? Do you really have integrity? If you're an honest politician but you cheat on and lie to your wife, are you not still a liar? How can you be called honest if you're not always honest? If you lead a team and preach commitment to your company, do you bad-mouth your superiors? Would you be surprised to know that I have? We all have fallen in some way or degree. You can't achieve perfection in your integrity, but as a fellow member of the human race, your friends and teammates ask that you pursue integrity and that you're closer than they are. It's hard to lead someone to integrity if you're not on the same road.

Finally, we can't just do anything. We must use judgment and discrimination because we're called to do "the word." Our profession as followers of Jesus is to be full time doers of the Bible! "Wait a minute!" you say. "We can't be accountable for everything in the Bible! That's impossible!" And, you'd be right. No one would ever do anything if they had to become an expert on the Bible before they started. In Romans 3:23, the Bible itself says, "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." We fall short, but that's no excuse. We can't wait until all the lights are green before we leave the house. Becoming a full-time doer of the word is a process. Just like any profession or vocation, we have to start. Doctors practice medicine and lawyers practice law. Just as integrity is a pursuit, knowledge of Jesus and the Bible is a pursuit. Once we believe that Jesus is who he claimed to be, we begin the pursuit of knowing Him and glorifying Him. Once you believe Jesus is the way, the truth and the life as John 14:6 says, then you can truly begin to study for the tests that life will bring your way.

Today, ask God to make you a doer of the word. Take a few minutes more than usual and learn the Bible. Take a few minutes more than usual to talk with Jesus and ask for direction. But be careful, if you get an idea that lines up with the teaching you know to be true, you probably need to take action. How else will you be able to call yourself a doer?

As you pray, ask God to show you where you can do something different today.


What thoughts came to your mind?



Do they line up with scripture and what you know to be right? *


If it did, what are you waiting for. Go and be a doer of the Word today. The word of God is your new job. Do it like you mean it. You get to work on your career and the rewards are eternal! Think about it. Then, get to work.


*If you're not sure, check with your pastor or send me a note. I don't have all the answers but I may be able to help. Or I definitely will help you find a friend who can walk with you as you work on your career in Christ.

Photo © Vyacheslav Osokin - Fotolia.com

The Seven Wonders of the World

My mother reminded me of the Seven Wonders of the World today.

7 Wonders of the world


Thanks Mom!

Social Media Madness Part 2

Twitter
Well, my Twitter account is back online and it remains http://twitter.com/mikehenrysr.  It apparently happened some time last night or early this morning.  Jessica's account @jdhenry09 is back as well.

We still have no communication why we were suspended or reinstated.  I wonder if we'll ever know.  Now I can begin to develop a strategy to better manage this if it ever happens again.

Blog
The blog is back up as well, but clearly "under construction." I tried to change the primary domain on my hosting account and messed up Wordpress.  While I think the site is pretty much back in tact, there are still a couple of problems and we're also implementing a theme customization, so some things will remain under construction for another day or two.

Several folks offered info and sympathy.  Thank you very much.  Also, thank you to everyone for your patience.

Mike Henry
mikehenrysr@gmail.com

Posted via email from Mike's posterous

Social Media Madness

My Twitter account was suspended today.  It used to be @mikehenrysr.  I don't know what it will be when I finally get to the bottom of the mess with Twitter.

My website is also down.  I learned that you shouldn't change your primary hosting domain.  Wordpress didn't like what I did and now I can't post to my blog nor can I send anyone a tweet telling them my site is down.  I'm having fun.

I'll post another message when everything's back up.

Mike Henry
mikehenrysr@gmail.com

Posted via email from Mike's posterous

Opportunity Disguised As A Lion

Book Review: In A Pit With A Lion On A Snowy Day: How To Survive And Thrive When Opportunity Roars By Mark Batterson

I've got to say that I really enjoy Mark Batterson's books. I read Wild Goose Chase first but haven't yet written a review. That will be coming (hopefully) soon. In A Pit presents a principle about opportunity: opportunity seldom looks like opportunity at first. I just read the following quote from Harvey Mackay's weekly newspaper column about James Barksdale, the former CEO of Netscape. Barksdale had a maxim about opportunity known as the three-snake rule:

• The first rule: If you see a snake, kill it. Don't set up a snake committee. Don't set up a snake user group, Don't write snake memos. Kill it.
• The second rule: Don't play with dead snakes. (Don't revisit decisions.)
• The paradoxical third: All opportunities start out looking like snakes.

Batterson makes the argument from the life of a biblical character, Benaiah, and an encounter he had with a lion, in a pit, on a snowy day. Benaiah chose to fight the lion, and went on to become the leader of King David's army. Benaiah's life and career hinged on this event, and he ended up in charge of the army of the greatest king in the history of Israel.

Batterson calls us to become a lion chaser; someone who would chase down the lion rather than someone who would run from it. The book is energizing, empowering, encouraging and challenging. Each chapter is engaging as the author discusses facets of embracing opportunity even when it's disguised as a lion, or a snake. I admit I took my time and savored the book. One chapter called Unlearning Your Fears he asked: "Are you living your life in a way that is worth telling stories about?" Well are you?

Another chapter and one that I studied the most was titled Guaranteed Uncertainty. It begins:

I know one thing for sure: Benaiah didn't wake up on the morning of his lion encounter and plan out every detail. It wasn't scheduled in Outlook. It wasn't on his to do list. I'm not even sure it was on his wish list. The lion encounter was as unplanned as a toothache.

God makes opportunities out of the uncertainties of our lives. If you think about the great moments in your life, they were seldom planned. Batterson uses examples like the Pentecost, and other major events of scripture. They weren't planned. Those people (and us at times too) didn't get up on the morning of the day in question knowing it was going to be a day with a life-changing pivotal opportunity. Embracing God requires us to embrace the uncertainty of our lives and use perspective and trust in God to allow Him to make the most of each opportunity (or lion or snake).

In the same chapter, the author explains something that made a big impact on me: Explanatory Style. What is your normal interpretation process for the events that happen your life? When someone stands you up for lunch, do you think "Something must have happened to them," causing you to worry, or do you think "That turkey stood me up!" causing you to be angry. The author calls that our explanatory style. He goes on to explain that our default explanatory style can cause us to see problems as opportunities God has placed before us or it can cause us to blame God or someone else for the problems and drop into victim mode. Great leaders seldom rise from victim explanatory styles.

The book was thoroughly encouraging and challenging. As a Christ-follower, I am encouraged to continue to work on my Explanatory Style. I commit to refuse to blame God or others for my circumstances. My prayer is that I can honor that commitment and that I will be found faithful to embrace the opportunities God presents in my life, whether they look like snakes, lions, unemployment, loss of income or any other type of setback.

Please let me know if I can help you in that area as well. I recommend the book wholeheartedly.

Why I'm Not Following You on Twitter

I've become a bit fascinated by Twitter. In just over 5 months on the service, I've made friends with people from all over the world, some business leaders, an author or two, and several other folks. I've even had a few phone conversations with some and one or two have been a great help to me in my new business. I enjoy meeting new tweeple. If you haven't, you can follow me here. I will (at least initially) follow you back.

I like to follow people who tweet about interesting ideas, leadership, teamwork, making the world a better place, people who are generally encouraging or add something to the twitterverse, and fellow followers of Jesus.

However, today, I just unfollowed several people on Twitter. I do it once a week or so. While Twitter is non-reciprocating in it's organization structure, I believe my twitter account is. I made that decision a couple of months ago in an effort to develop a standard follower policy. So here are the reasons I might un-follow you.

1. You chose not to follow me back. It's just as simple as that. Unless you're a news feed or a product I'm extremely interested in, you won't last. You may make it for a few weeks but after a while, I'll unfollow. One other exception to this, at least for now, is friends who just don't seem to pay much attention to Twitter. I have about 20 people I know personally that have accounts but haven't seen fit to tweet or follow anyone. No wonder you don't understand it!
   
2. You're a celebrity. I don't follow many celebs and only local politicians. As a note, it's unfortunate that the local politicians don't interact more on Twitter. Many of mine fall in category #1 above because they don't understand the value of the service.
3. You tweet a ton. I use a Firefox add-on called Greasemonkey and a script called FollowCost that ranks your tweet volume. If your count is over 1000 milliscobles (a value derived by the authors), you risk being dropped at any time. Also any accounts that post multiple versions of the same tweet (more than two or three a day, which I sometimes do) then you can expect to get unfollowed.
4. You have some association with porn, foul language, hate, etc.
5. You send a bunch of direct messages (DM) to me. By a bunch, I mean one or two unsolicited ones. I understand people who choose to send DM's as Thank You messages. That's a personal preference and I don't have any hard feelings about those. But if you send me a "Hi" DM and you haven't sent any standard tweets, you're a goner.

That's about it. Maybe we just haven't found each other. I may from time to time follow you because of someone you follow or something you tweeted, but if you don't follow back or if you hit one of the other categories above, you can just give me a few days and I'll disappear. For me, Twitter is about the friends I can make, the relationships I can build, and the people I can help. Thanks for reading this and being part of my Web 2.0 world.

Paths and Principles

Book Review: The Principle Of The Path: How to get from where you are to where you want to be by Andy Stanley, published by Thomas Nelson.

I just spent a few conflicted hours with Andy Stanley's latest book. As usual, he delivers a powerful message, with biblical accuracy and pointed simplicity. The point of the book, and the principle stated plainly is: Direction - not intention - determines our destination. Later in the book he adds that our attention determines direction or what we focus on determines our path and our path determines our destination. It seems so obvious to me and yet I am also very tempted to lobby for an exception.

The book is well written. The author has used great examples from personal life and important passages from scripture to make the point that the choices we make determine our destination. The points are well explained and even argued as he understands well the questions one might ask. In fact we all ask many of the questions of this book and we all make many of the mistakes in the book as well. Who hasn't wished they could eat whatever they wanted or skip exercising without gaining weight (or worse)? Who hasn't wished there was some shortcut to happiness.

I understand and agree with the ideas in the book. I take responsibility for my choices of what I eat and how I spend my time; of the thoughts I choose to dwell on and the habits I've allowed. I take responsibility for those things and therefore I accept responsibility for where my life is after 51 years.

But there is little to encourage those of us who are a number of years or miles away from where we'd like to be. The book offers little more than a suggestion that we seek out a mentor or that we submit to God. Maybe there is little more than that for someone like me with several years of bad decisions behind them. This is a great book but I'm left more disappointed with my life for having read it. I don't know why. Maybe I'm arguing with submitting to God. Maybe I want to reserve the right to try to take shortcuts. But I felt after completing the book that the answer to the question "How do I get from where I am to where I want to be?" is that I can't get there from here. I have to go back in time or accept some compromise for a destination. The book seems to offer little regardless of my desire to change.

Therefore, I don't know how to recommend the book. I will probably offer it to some high-school graduates at my church, but I don't see recommending it to many of my friends at my age. I'm a big fan of the author's and I've appreciated his works like Next Generation Leader and Visioneering, which I both enthusiastically recommend. But I'm left with an empty recollection of The Principle Of The Path, wondering, contemplating where my life will end up now that I'm this far from my dream path.