Good morning from Chicago. I am here with colleagues preparing for an all day leadership meeting to discuss the future of a very compelling Brand Communications firm, CHANGEffect
www.changeffect.com, with whom I am honored to work with the past three years. It is a time for wandering in the desert and caves and broken trails to find "its way" into the future. It involves issues leadership, control, trust, roles, accountability, projections, financial recaps, strategic planning, maybe a little posturing and more of the kind of things you might expect to find in such wanderings. In their own way they are going through their own LOST AND FOUND, as in their decade of existence they move from adolescence to adulthood. Trust me when I say this is not an easy process, and definitely should not be done alone without supervision!! As we move through it we will ask such questions as we ask our own clients:
- What business are you in...really?
- How do you define success?
- "What you can count on from me."
My challenge to each of them, and each of us, is that we celebrate the joys found in partnering with hte ambiguities of life and faith. That we ask ourselves in any dilemma, crisis of faith, economc downturn, boom year and the like two simple questions:
1. Where is God in this situation?
2. If we are blessed men and women...HOW do blessed men and women behave?
Also, as we wander thorough our respective caves, looking for what's been lost and what can be found, please read the post I wrote in response to the following post from the most recent posted Segment about LOST AND FOUND. It might give you lump in your heart, one single gem from the dark.
Your humble spelunker and sherpa
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Posts
Great question: Over the past year, I lost most of my interest in wanting much of any kind of relationship with The Lord, after being misled in a very big way by a self proclaimed, devout Christian believer who serves on the board of an organization I was a member of. (Membership requires very high standards of conduct in personal, professional, and spiritual life). I thought I was responding to God’s call for kingdom purposes, and eventually, found myself in an impossible situation with him. As a result, one thing after another, after another, etc. kept unwinding like a falling domino effect - including my faith. Subsequently, I didn’t really have any interest in this relationship with God, or “Christian” people any more (except for my wise Godmother).
What I have found –after about 18 months of a seemingly endless, dry, wilderness experience is: (1) Much greater perspectives of faith than I ever knew before, and (2) God’s rebuilding of my life (still in process) in a much deeper way than I could have imagined. (3) Greater compassion to relate to the struggles of others and (4) That God has much more work to do within me.
The welcomed shift began after I heard the testimony of someone whose ministry in the Middle East had experienced life-threatening bombing incidents, along with rejections of his truths (that were eventually bourne out) by some of the most respected Christian educational leaders in the U.S. Despite these unwanted experiences that were “out of his control”, he is more on fire for God and His work than ever. This testimony revitalized my faith and I gladly became “unstuck”. As has been said before, God cannot richly use us until we have gone through brokenness.
July 13, 2008 3:49 PM
Gvingventures: Is it one of faith's ambiguities, that sometimes to really FIND God, we have to LOSE "our way"...then through some stumbling through deserts, and jungles, and those crowds that gather at the costume parties professing their perfect portrayal of the all the right looks of Christianity...you find your self amidst the mascara streaks and threadbare remnants.
Gives more meaning the Ghandi quote, something like: "I love your Christ, but not your Christians."
Curisoly, when I was early in my introduction to Christianity when working with EMI Christian Music Group, remember that 'nice Jewish boy from Brooklyn", one associate who was struck by my background and role working with EMI gently said,"I hope you will not judge Christianity by the Christians you will meet." As I have experienced both the good, and the underbelly of faith, I have been blessed to mostly have joyfully discovered that "being" Christian and "doing" Christianity is not found in any rules or among 3000 of your intimate friends on Sunday...but in places found, like late last night as I sat with a friend who shared with me her fear of a discovered lump in her breast, her fear of sharing that with her friends because she didn't want to be a burden, as if she did not deserve their involvement and thanked me for hearing, seeing and loving her.
And all I had done was take the time to go by after a long day to say hello and ask about her life.
I say spelunking in dark caves yields gems reveals gems.
tyhi (there you have it)