Discontent

Tomorrow, or today, depending on when you read this, millions of people are going to the polls here in America.  According to most analysts, many of the people going are quite discontent with the state of things, and for the third time in as many National elections (2006, 2008, and now 2010) the makeup of our government is going to change largely out of a feeling of discontent (that's a pretty nice term seeing as some people are more fed up and angry than "discontent").


Now, this isn't some political hack piece.  I like politics as much as the next man, and maybe more, but I want to talk about discontent.  Discontent is one of those pieces of leadership that I think goes overlooked in many circles. 

We are told in the Bible to be content with what we have.  Not being content with what God is providing us can get us into sketchy spiritual territory.  I believe, however, that God has put into us a discontent with the state of the world that drives the Christian leader to act.

Why are you a Christian leader?  My bet is that some aspect of the world seemed wrong to you and you acted on it.  Discontent at work.  For centuries God's  people have seen the spiritual and physical poverty of foreign and domestic peoples and have entered the harvest.  Discontent at work.  This Ministry:  Next in Line, is the product of discontent with the way that young people are prepared for a life of Christian leadership.  Discontent at work.

God gives the Christian leader a holy discontentment with some aspect of the world and then calls that person into His work.  Think of Nehemiah, being told that the city of Jerusalem lay in ruins, a laughingstock to surrounding nations.  Nehemiah knew that this was less than optimal.  Soon, Nehemiah was supervising the rebuilding of the walls of the great city.

When we get down, or seem to lose our way, remember the discontentment that first brought you to where you are today.  Likewise, look for discontent among your students.  This is a first sign of leadership capability.  Listen to them, and offer them a path to "sooth" their discontent.  Tell them to listen to God and hear what He is calling them into.  Nourish holy discontent (not so people can complain, but so they can act.  Nothing points out a person who isn't a leader like a person who just wants to complain about the problem instead of going into the work to cure the problem).

Tomorrow, or today, watch what discontent does.  Pay close attention to what leaders are doing with that discontent.  Look and see what discontent is capable of.  Agree or not with the way that tomorrow's election goes, you have to see the beauty of what discontent can accomplish.  What more can it accomplish when a holy discontent is burning within the heart of a servant of God?

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

"Radical" Leadership

Lately, I've noticed a jumble of books hitting the shelves that have to do with "radical" Christian living.  Personally, I think that they have to do with real Christian living, but that's another topic for another time.  Personally, I'm enjoying these books.  I just finished Crazy Love (for the 4th time), and am in the middle of David Platt's Radical. 

I know people are reading these books because they turn up in the Christian book section of Wal-Mart.  Only very popular Christian books turn up there. 

More than reading these books, I pray that people are convicted by them and are repenting.  My first romp through Crazy Love dropped me to my knees, and I've been in two other groups who have studied it now.  I know what a book like that can do to a person who has betrayed Christian ideals for the safety and comfort of our American lives.

What I also pray is that we are teaching these books to our kids; discussing them and doing what they prescribe.  I say this because I'm convinced that tomorrow's Christian leaders will live in the ways that are described in these books.  Tomorrow's Christian leaders will throw off the compromise that we have lived with between the world and our faith.  They will live in radical obedience to God and lead a movement of radical obedience to God.

I'm a student of history, so I don't believe that the things discussed in these books have never been discussed before, but I truly believe that we are faced with a time in which our technology and state of information overload are allowing more and more Christians to come into contact with the ideas that people like Chan and Platt are writing about. 

We have an opportunity, given our "new" awareness of the Christian life, to explore and integrate this teaching into our programs.  We have the opportunity to model this kind of life to our students and practice this kind of life with our students. 

Thank you, Francis Chan and David Platt, and all of those like you, for being the modern day prophets that we need, and for calling us back to the truth.  Now, for the rest of us, lets take that truth, live it, and teach it.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

Field Day

Today, I'm doing something I've never done before.  I'm going to talk to the offices of two senators.  I'm taking two youth to our local senator's offices for IJM and we're going to have a little chatty-chat about human trafficking.

I'm doing this for a couple of reasons.  First, human trafficking is one of my hot-button issues and tends to be pretty important to the young people that I teach.  Second, this is a wonderful opportunity for the leadership team to actually do something that can make a difference in so many lives.  Our leadership students need this kind of experience. 

In this case, it was one of our leadership students that became aware of this opportunity because of her past dealings with IJM.  There's a bill that's going through the Senate concerning human trafficking, and of course, senators need prompting and briefing about these sort of things, so we volunteered.

Participating in these kinds of activities now can very well wet your student's appetites for their entire lives.  I doubt that the students will forget what happens today, one way or the other.  It will mean even more to them because the idea didn't originate with me, but with them.

Now, some of you might not want to involve your students in politics like this, but I assure you there are lots of ways different activities that your students can do that will increase their leadership skills without visiting the offices of the local politicians.  Here's a couple of things I've found about these sort of trips that really help cement them into the minds of students:

1.  Make it important.  If your students feel that what they are doing isn't important, the activity isn't likely to have much impact.  Even if your students can't see the importance of what you are doing, it is our responsiblity to show them how important what we're doing is.  Students want to do important things.  They want to be involved.  Give them that opportunity.

2.  Give them ownership.  This opportunity didn't come from one of my sources, it came from a student's source.  It means more to them that way.  As much as I'd like to talk a lot today, I'm not going to.  My students are taking the lead.  They are coming up with the agenda and the talking points.  They will lead the meeting.

3.  Debrief.  Luckily, we have time between our two visits to talk about how the first one went and what we can do to improve the second meeting.  Make sure you are thoroughly debriefing your activities.  I've found that the real learning takes place after the activity as we all sit down and digest what we did.

4.  Make it Fun.  After we're done, we're going to go have coffee at one of our favorite coffee shops and just chill out for a while.  These kind of activities can be wonderful times to strengthen your relationships with your students.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

Explosions of Worship

This morning at Desperation Church, our worship pastor talked about the Spirit of God filling us to such an extent that we just exploded in worship to our God and King.  I had never heard this analogy before, and like so many other things, this got me to thinking about leadership.
My worship pastor talked about glorifying God in explosions of worship.  He prayed that there would be explosions of worship all over the world.  It was simple and beautiful, yet so poignant that I have been thinking about it all day.

So I began to think to myself:  "What is it that we want to see out of the next generation of leadership?" 
The answer?  I want to see explosions of worship in leadership positions all over society.

It's true that if we explode in worship people will see and be drawn to God.  It's also true that if we have godly leaders living lives of worship in positions of leadership throughout society, people will see and be drawn to God.

This is what God wants.  This is what I want.  It's why Next in Line Ministries exists.  It's why we do what we do.  It's why I write this blog, and why the board of  Next in Line works their tails off to help raise new leaders.  We believe that Christian leadership througout society witnesses of Christ, honors God with just and true decisions, and changes society at it's core by leading like Christ.

Just as our worship pastor prayed today, I also pray tonight:  Father, raise up a generation of leaders that live for you.  Fill them with Your spirit that they may burst in explosions of worship to You.  May their every action, their every word, and their every interaction be fueled and guided by love for You and others.  May they be a light in the darkness, a constant witness for You, and a guide to those who need it.  In Christ's Name, amen.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

Sometimes You Just Need to Keep Your Mouth Shut

It's not easy for me, but the art of keeping your mouth shut is just as important as knowing how and when to speak.  A lot of leadership literature today hinges on communication, and I don't mean to denigrate communication, but sometimes it's better just to keep your mouth shut.

A lot of leaders feel they need to add something to every conversation.  Please kick this impulse in the teeth.  There are many times that people just want you to listen.  There are many times that you need to just listen. 

Learn before you speak. 

Though you may have something to add to the conversation, always having something to add to the conversation will get you a reputation that you don't want.

Equally important to a leader as speaking is listening.  Communication without understanding doesn't happen.  That's miscommunication; and if we feel the need to talk more than we listen, miscommunication is exactly what we're going to have.

As leaders, we are expected to be charismatic, witty, charming folks that liven up all conversation with our intellect, wisdom, and anecdotes.  We can do those things to.  There is a time and a place for that.  More than that, though, is the need to understand before being understood.  If we truly serve the people we lead, our job is to listen to them more than we talk at them. 

In all honesty the more we listen and understand other people, the more poignant and guided can our words be.  Hastily speaking we miss important aspects of a situation, or have a less than full understanding of a person.  A leader can't afford misunderstanding; sometimes there's only one opportunity to lead correctly and wisely.  

I'm not suggesting a prohibition on talking, but I am suggesting that we not only learn to listen better, but find ways to teach our leadership students to listen more carefully and thoroughly.  Doing so will be a long haul, because listening to others without interjecting our own opinion and beliefs is not an art that is being taught by today's culture. 

Your overtures into this disicipline are going to need to be planned, intentional, and plentiful. We are constantly encouraged to give our view on something, no matter how little of it we know, and so as teachers we will have to be contantly vigilant to expunge that tendency in our students as much as we can. 

Remember, a servant listens, and then acts.  It is a tyrant that dominates a conversation or a debate without understanding the situation or the person.

Learn to listen.  Listen.  Model listening.  Raise listeners.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

The Hardest Lessons

It's been a while since I blogged, and I feel I owe you some explanation.  The last few months have been one of transition for me, and have been extremely difficult.  There have been a lot of changes in my life, and a lot of difficult decisions that I've had to make.  Through it all though, I've learned some incredible leadership lessons, and am looking forward to finally getting back on track with blogging and Next in Line in general.
These last couple of months have shown me that the hardest things that a leader will face can't be completely prepared for.  As teachers, we can academically prepare our students for a lot of things, but our students will have to experience them to understand and learn from these experiences. 
Academically, we can teach our students how to make hard decisions; but they will never know the stress and pain that making them entails.  We can academically teach our students how to confront someone, even one of their closest friends, but we can't teach them how difficult it really is, or how much anguish there can be in confrontation. 
Only experience can teach these things, and they are lessons that will stick with them for the rest of their lives.  The hardest lessons learned are those that will be strongest in their minds throughout their lives.
Does this mean we shouldn't try to academically prepare them?  No, of course it doesn't.  By training students in the proper way to handle a situation such as confrontation or decision making, we can help them push through the emotional aspect and make the right decision, or confront in a loving and productive way.  We can and must continue to teach our students to do things correctly and in a Christ-honoring manner; however we can't expect them to fully understand some of these situations until they have gone through them themselves. 
Along with academically preparing them, we also have to let them get real experience in the leadership world.  By allowing our students to "get their hands dirty" we allow them to have some of these hard experiences early, where we can come alongside of them and help them through.  The earlier these hard lessons are learned, the more prepared our students will be for where God will put them in life.
Keep carrying on, and remember that the hardest lessons learned will also be some of the most important lessons learned.

Training Tomorrow's Leaders Today,
Matt

The Forgotten

We've had a busy day here in Peru. We went to Canete; and when I say that we went to Canete, I mean we went to a surrounding village where the people and the animals live very close to the same existence. In fact, I saw some places where they literally lived side by side.


When we came into the village, I was privelaged to talk to two people. Both were fascinating, but one in particular caught my immediate attention. He knew who he was talking to, and his was a cry for help. He told us that they lived in poverty (which was obvious), and that the government had forgotten them. Forgotten them. Candidates often campaign there and promise running water, but then of course conveniently forget their promises. The people live in whatever hovels they can eek out, and they work in the fields or as mototaxis pilots throughout town. They drive donkey carts. They also herd goats and sheep.

Needless to say, this saddened me, but something hit me as hard as that man's statement:

They are not forgotten. Though every man on the face of the planet may forget them, and they are oppressed beyond measure, they are not forgotten.

God knows their names, and has numbered the hairs on their head. They are not forgotten.

God is moving among them right now. As I write, He is raising up people with a heart for the people of Canete and with the right mix of Spiritual Gifts and natural talents to serve them. He has moved, is moving, and will move.

The people of Canete are not forgotten.