Busy or Productive…
I started my working life as a chaplain to university students. It was a wonderful post. I was paid to have conversations with emerging leaders, and my job description (such as it was) included taking time to think deeply together with them about things that matter, and to give talks at the many events which were hosted at the five campuses I worked on. There was only one frustration. Many of the meetings I was asked to speak at never happened. I would spend hours agonising over the morality of euthanasia or I would work out a Christian response to Marxism, and come ready to deliver my...
Read MoreBy persevering…
What’s the greatest predictor of future success? While experts express a range of views, their answers usually include words like resilience, tenacity and perseverance. Those who persevere, reap the reward. Naturally there are limits to this. If you persist in doing the wrong thing, you will be persistently wrong. What we persevere at matters, and checking we are on the right journey is important. There is an interesting aside in Luke 8:15, as Jesus wraps up his parable of the sower. It’s probably a familiar story, but lest its not in your repertoire, Jesus speaks about a farmer...
Read MorePreachers or story tellers?
Though the title might make you think this post is aimed at church preachers, it isn’t. It was a comment made in a podcast exploring communication styles. The podcaster suggested that there is a preacher and a story teller in each of us, and that we need to soften the preacher and develop the story teller. It’s worth thinking about. I think he was saying there is a bossy “I’m going to tell you what to do” part in us, living alongside a more winsome, “let me share my life and experience” self. Put differently, in communication I can put myself in...
Read MoreBecause lost direction is worse than lost time…
Have you heard the one in sixty rule? Pilots are taught it. If you are one degree off course, after sixty miles you will be one mile off course. That might not sound like much, but it is a big deal if it turns out the wheat field you thought you were due to fly over is actually a mountain – and history records some tragic accidents that have happened as a result. A bit of lost time checking your settings is far better than lost direction. OK, I’m not a pilot and you probably aren’t either. So why is this relevant? Perhaps you remember the haunting lines of the theme song...
Read MoreBecause you can’t spend 5 days waiting for 2…
Is most of your week spent hanging out for the weekend, insufferably long hours in the office slowly ticking away while you wait for the magical 5pm Friday moment when you are free to go and enjoy life?For many people work is a drudge, a necessary evil that provides the money to keep food on the table. It’s the story of the man asked why he was digging a hole: “I’m digging the hole, to earn the money, to buy the food, to give me the strength, to dig the hole.” It’s a sad way to live a life – how awful to wish away 5 out of 7 days each week. There are those...
Read MoreMaking Success a Pattern, not a Moment: 8 Qualities to Cultivate
You’ve probably had those moments when you breath a sigh of both relief and satisfaction. It’s come off. Something you wanted has worked out, and you are really pleased. Perhaps your response is, “Well, that was lucky. Hope it happens again.” Now once in a while success is like winning the lottery, and things come through against all the odds, but it’s dangerous to build our lives on that model. For the majority of successful people, achievement is a pattern, not a moment. What do I mean by that? Simply that there are reliable predictors of long term success,...
Read MoreBecause every yes is also a no…
Some throw away lines stick. I was listening to an interview with Richard Foster of Celebration of Discipline fame and when asked why he declined most speaking invitations he said,”Because every yes is also a no,” and then elaborated that each engagement he said yes to was a no to his wife and family, a no to time alone with God, and a no to the contemplative, reflective person others wanted him to be. Every yes is also a no. My yes to comfort food is a no to my healthy body; my watching one more TV episode is a no to waking early enough for prayer; my yes to a spurious invite is...
Read MoreThe Voice
You have probably heard that on 14 October Australian voters will take part in the 2023 Australian Indigenous Voice referendum to approve an alteration to the Australian Constitution to create a body called the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice that “may make representations to the Parliament and the Executive Government … on matters relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples”. While I am conscious that half the readers of this blog are not from Australia, the question of justice for First Nations Peoples impacts us all, and requires...
Read MoreBeyond distance and difference
In his profoundly insightful book Not in God’s Name, Jonathan Sacks asks how it was that Joseph’s brothers planned to kill him. Fratricide is a pretty extreme response, desperately over the top even if Joseph was a tad irritating, so how had it got so badly out of hand? Reflecting on Genesis 37:18-20 Sacks notes that the brothers’ murderous conversation starts when they see Joseph at a distance, and their talk soon dismisses him as an arrogant dreamer, someone very different to them. Goodness, his colourful coat emphasised that. What a pretentious prat, wearing that cloak...
Read MoreThe arrogance of procrastination
It was a perspective I hadn’t thought of before, and it struck me as insightful. She said it with some emotion. “People always think that procrastination is about being lazy, or uncertain, or non-committal, but it isn’t. It’s about being arrogant. It’s about assuming you will always have tomorrow. It’s about thinking another time will come around.” For her it was tinged with sadness – a sudden death, with so many things left unsaid. “It’s never the right time, is it? So you just keep waiting until it is, and that perfect moment...
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