Nate asked me an important question this weekend. He asked, “When and how did you become disciplined in spiritual growth?” That’s a great question. I wish I could say I was most excellently disciplined, but I’m not…just disciplined. I wonder though if some of you may be equal curious as to the answers to this question.
I write mostly about leadership, family, and having a personal walk with God. I continue to be honored that people would choose to read what I write. This week alone I received over a dozen emails from church leaders looking for help with a leadership situation they are facing and/or from believers who need guidance for life.
I once wrote that growth covers over a multitude of problems. (Read that post HERE.) I know many organizations and people that mistakenly believe for a time (before it catches up with them) that busyness means things are moving in the right direction. That may or may not be true, but success always depends more on the type of activity than on the quantity of activity.
Here’s a quick message to my boys. My boys are 21 and 18 years old. I wish someone had given me this advice when I was their age. (Perhaps you need to hear it as well.)
Perhaps that’s your story today. The journey has gotten much harder than you expected and the days ahead seem unbearable. Some days you would just rather quit trying.
If you follow my blog regularly, then you know that I’m trying to spur people to dream bigger dreams. Not only do I believe dreaming is a healthy practice, but I believe we need your dreams. Obviously we cannot life in dream world all the time, and I spend far more energy writing about accomplishing dreams than dreaming dreams, but I believe the world needs some more dreamers. I believe God encourages this process. If you don’t believe me, read my first post on this issue HERE.
The older I get (and that’s happening faster it seems that it once did) the more I’m beginning to assess my life and what the experiences of life have taught me. On my laptop I keep I file where I simply type principles/ideas/nuggets of wisdom as they occur to me. Sometimes these originate as a Twitter post, sometimes they are a line from a Sunday message, but often they just go in this file.
Recently Josh had a career decision to make. He wanted to wrestle through it with me. He actually took my advice. He honored me greatly, not by taking my advice, but with a text he sent me later, which said, “You are my new mentor!” He probably was joking, but he doesn’t know how much that comment resonates with me.
Moses was used of God to do incredible things for God’s glory, yet Moses, more than many leaders I know, questioned his own abilities. He lacked confidence and would have probably never volunteered for the job. His reasons might have been:
The better goal it seems to me is to learn to balance our lives between difficulties, good and bad times, triumph and tragedy, and the feast or famine the world in which we live tends to experience. In fact, I wonder if learning how to balance our emotions between the extremes isn’t the normality we are seeking, rather than periods where everything is calm. When we learn to live in the joy of every moment, normal may seem more attainable.
