Monthly Summary for September

4 Steps to get Past Your Limitations
Getting past the limitations we put on ourselves...

My "Tweets" from Randy Hahn's GIC Sermon
"How awesome would it be for God to look at us and think that we look just like Him while we reflect His greatness!"

Running Past Your Limitations
"The best pace is a suicide pace, and today is a good day to die." (Prefontaine)

Twelve Marks of a Great Leader
My attempt at crowd-sourcing leadership...

When the Alarm Sounds in Your Life
A very funny story of an alarm in the middle of the night...

Prayer and The Circle Maker
My first highlights from Mark Batterson's "The Circle Maker"

Prayer and The Circle Maker

I just started The Circle Maker by Mark Batterson.

Wow!

It's so good, I can't wait until I finish to give you some nuggets. These are all within the first 20 pages:

•  "And even if the people could no longer hear God, he believed that God could still hear them."
• "His prayer was resolute yet humble, confident yet meek, expectant yet unassuming."
• "Bold prayers honor God, and God honors bold prayers."

When the Alarm Sounds in Your Life

What do you do when you wake up to the sound of a loud alarm sounding throughout your home? Allow me to share what we did because this happened in our home a few years ago.

First, you need a little of the backstory. I am somewhat deaf...OK, I'm a lot deaf. The technical term is "Legally Deaf." I'm not sure what that would mean in a court of law, but in laymen's terms, I have over 50% hearing loss. I compensate with the use of hearing aides, but they get a break at night.

The mere fact that I heard an alarm should tell you it was loud, but it also makes this story interesting.

12 Marks of a Great Leader or Manager

Photo Credit: http://www.emergingrnleader.com/

Have you ever heard of "Crowd-Sourcing?" Maybe you've heard the term "Collective Intelligence." There is a Japanese Proverb that reads: "None of us are as smart as all of us." The idea is that two heads really are better than one. In fact that's how good ideas are birthed...from multiple influences directed toward a single objective.

Here is a video (4:00) that illustrates where good ideas come from...
(click "Continue Reading")

Running Past Your Limitations

Have you ever been to the "Dark Side"?

Unfortunately for some, this is not a reference to the Star Wars movie series from the 80's and 90's. The "Dark Side" I'm referring to is that place where most people have never been. They've been close to it, maybe even started to go there, but quickly retreated to their self-prescribed haven of rest.

It is that place where we want to go in order to be successful in something but requires some degree of uncertainty and discomfort. The easiest example I can give you comes from the activity of running and yet it applies to many area of our lives.

My "Tweets" from Randy Hahn's GIC sermon

I showed great discipline tonight as I sat in the Global Missions Kick-Off service at First Baptist North Spartanburg. We were blessed to hear Randy Hahn, the pastor of Colonial Heights Baptist Church in Colonial Heights, VA. It took all I could muster to not Tweet these nuggets during the service...

• Is God as great to us as that which we go on and on about?

• Worship should lead to witnessing.

• Worship should lead to missions.

• If it stops in here (church), then it's empty out there.

4 Steps to Get Past Your Limitations

What is it that you would love to do, but keep excusing away? It's the subject of the silent conversation you have with yourself quite often. You say to yourself, "I would love to _____", but it never gets any traction.

The Inner Battle

In our family, fall isn't as much football season as it is cross country season. In case you're not familiar, that's running 3.1 miles (5K) over a variety of terrain. I am thrilled that my girls are committed to this sport. It's something they can do for the rest of their life. And the experiences they are having are molding them into very disciplined young ladies. The discipline to compete in this sport requires a lot of inner battles we like to call "You vs. You."

A friend of ours shared this poem recently and fits well here: