You likely have a to do list.  Mine’s often a bit long and always changing.

A to do list is one thing, but I wonder what would happen if we created a to-be list? 

There’s so much to do that often in the process of doing I forget to tend to who I am becoming.  What if I spent as much time developing my character as I do trying to accomplish tasks?

After all, doesn’t character ultimately nuance and even determine what we accomplish? I love Switchfoot, but I like them even more after @jonathanforeman (Switchfoot’s front man) twittered about this rendition of one of their new songs.  A fairly famous guy gave a teenage girl who home videoed one of his songs a shout out to thousands of people.  How cool is that? It says so much about his character.

Great people are great because of who they are as much as for what they accomplish.  Great people forgive liberally.  They add value to people they meet.  They stand up for things that matter but are just as happy to take a back seat so others can shine.  They love radically and serve with selfless abandon.

For me to be more like that takes work.  Maybe we need to-be lists as badly as we need to-do lists.

I’m thinking for me these days, I’d start with one word on my to-be list: kindness.  In my daily interactions with everyone, I want to be more kind.  

If you had a to-be list today, what would be on it?  How might it change you?  How might working on being, not just doing, change your life?

I think the hardest thing I do every day is not to build or sustain momentum for the church. It’s not writing messages, or even giving leadership to our team.  The hardest thing I do is to keep the church outsider focused. 

That actually shouldn’t surprise me because the hardest thing I have to do in self-leadership is to keep my personal life pointing toward others, not myself.

The drift inward – for organizations and individuals – is automatic, gravitational and effortless.  Almost all organizations would rather care for their own interests, not the interest of others.  Like employees at a retail store who look bothered when a customer interrupts their personal conversation to ask for help, most communities are self absorbed.  Why? Because (no surprise), most of us are self-absorbed.  The nature of sin is self-focus.  We evaluate church through the lens of personal preferences (I like this…I don’t like that….), not through the lens of what will reach our neighbours or be faithful to the ultimate purpose Christ has for the church.

If an organization becomes self-focused, ultimately it becomes selfish, unprogressive, resistant to change and indifferent or even hostile to the needs of others.  An outward focused organization becomes more generous, more compassionate, more responsive and ultimately far more effective.  No surprise there of course, because Jesus said when we give our life away for His sake we’ll find it.

I’m increasingly convinced that when the church in North America is declining it’s because we are self-focused, and that when the church in North America is growing its because we are others-focused and Christ-focused.  We plant churches all the time that claim they exist to reach the lost but function as though they exist to please their members. 

But focusing outward is incredibly hard work.  Because an inward drift is steady and instinctual, an outward focus has to be intentional,  deliberate and sacrficial.

Every day, I feel like I am on a personal and collective journey to make this life about Christ and about others.  I wish it was getting easier, but it’s just hard work.

How about you?  What’s the hardest thing you do?  How is your life and your community becoming more inward focused or more outward focused?

So we’re gearing up for a December series on hope at Connexus.  Here’s the tension for the series:  Everywhere I turn in the Bible I read about hope, and yet hope seems so absent for so many Christians and those who don’t believe.

I twittered about hope last week and got a surprising number of DMs and even email messages from people who struggle with hope.

I’d love to open the conversation more widely today and hear what you have to say (of course, you can DM or create a pseudonym here on the blog too).

Some questions:

What makes you lose hope?

What makes you hopeful?

How do you remain hopeful in tough circumstances?

How fragile do you feel hope is in your life right now?  What’s making it fragile?

Could you share some stories and thoughts?  I find these real life stories so helpful when writing a series, and – as always, the series will be available to everyone free on www.connexuscommunity.com and on iTunes. 

Love to hear from you – post away.

So I’m having a non-productive day today.  A great breakfast meeting, but my focus started fading shortly thereafter.  No shortage of stuff to do and I don’t even want to take a nap – just not enough focus to accomplish anything significant.

Question:  do our body and mind ever conspire to force us into time off?

I am haunted by a verse in 2 Chronicles.  It talks about Israel being overthrown and defeated as a nation.  Originally, the people of Israel were supposed to let the land lay fallow every seven years (no crops), celebrate a year of Jubilee every 50th year, and observe the Sabbath week to week.  Did they? Pretty much they didn’t. Never.  Ever. 

Instead of resting, they worked.  Gotta make money.  Gotta get ahead.  We’re driven.  If I don’t make it happen, it’s not going to happen.

But then they got defeated.  Completely.  Captured – taken into exile.  And this is the poignant observation of scripture on their defeat:

So the message of the Lord spoken through Jeremiah was fulfilled. The land finally enjoyed its Sabbath rest, lying desolate until the seventy years were fulfilled, just as the prophet had said.  2 Chronicles 36.21

Ouch.  I don’t want my body to enjoy its Sabbath rest involuntarily. 

I love to work, but God created each of us with limits.  I fear being lazy, so I work extra hard.  (Best definition of laziness I ever heard was from Stuart Hall – laziness is resting before you are tired).  I’m always trying to push past my limits, but maybe God just doesn’t want me to. 

When I analyze why I work too hard, I shudder:

- I feel I can run the universe better than God can. 

- I like too much control and not enough dependence.

- I want to be significant, and am not comfortable enough letting God be significant.

I get terrified by the idea of a real Sabbath – a day where I produce nothing…absolutely nothing and simply let God be enough for me.  I’ve had very few days in my life where I completely did nothing…produced nothing, got distracted by nothing (no sports, no movies, no biking, no reading) and just let me be in the presence of God.  Wonder what that would be like?

I’m planning on taking tomorrow off.   Maybe my body is telling me I should have taken today off too. 

What do you think?  Do you pay attention to God-ordained limits?  If not, why not?

At Connexus, like at many North Point Strategic Partnerships, we relentlessly ask this question:  how do we know we’re winning?  It’s another way of saying ‘how do we know we’re accomplishing our mission?

That’s a very different question than "are we growing?"  or "are we meeting budget?" or "do we like what we’re doing?"  (three easy questions to ask).  

Primarily we ask these three questions: 

- Are we creating a church unchurched people love to attend? 

- Are we leading people into a growing relationship with Jesus Christ? 

- Are we helping parents and families win at home?

The first answers our vision statement, the second, our mission statement and the third, our family ministry philosophy. 

But I find as a leader I am tempted to dump these questions in favour of this question:  Did I try really hard?  I find this to be true: the more I invest in a message/series/project/venture the more likely I’m going to declare it a win whether it’s a win or not. 

I am constantly tempted to measure organizational success by effort rather than results.  I think it’s one of the key ways organizations get off track.  It’s how 50 very sincere Christians can end up building a church no one but them wants to attend.  It’s how artists produce music no one wants to listen to or preachers pour their hearts in messages that have little relevance.  It’s how a great organization can become a once-great organization.

Our entire team can work relentlessly hard on a project, but if we fail to reach unchurched people, don’t help people grow in their relationship with Christ or avoid helping families win at home, we’re engaged in a heartfelt exercise in missing the point. That’s not why we started the church.  It’s not why we exist. 

As we plan for 2010, we are focusing increasingly on measuring outcomes.  As I regularly share with our staff, staff spend 99% of their time planning for ministry and 1% evaluating ministry.  The congregation and community do exactly the opposite – they spend 1% of their time planning and 99% of their time evaluating.

How about you?  Do you find it easy to keep focus?  What helps you stay focused?  How do you measure what really matters most?

You’ve seen it happen on twitter, or email.   Messages that were intended to be direct messages (DMs) or private replies go public instead, all because the sender hit the wrong button.  Fun times.  Especially if you enjoy mild heart attacks. 

Almost happened to me today on Gmail.  It turns out I did NOT send what was supposed to be a private note to our leadership team as a ‘reply all’ to a  wider community.  But for ten minutes, I was away from my screen and convinced myself that I had hit the wrong button. 

All I could think about is "how would others read it"?  It wasn’t a bad email at all (nothing off colour or inappropriate), but something that was a celebration for our little leadership team might not be heard that way by others who were not celebrating the same news we got.

In the end, it was all good.  But it made me think:  are my private conversations  always ready to go public? 

You know what I’m talking about…if the person you’re talking about walked in the room, would you still say what you had been saying?  If someone else heard what you just said (or wrote), would it be all good?  If your private note became your face book status, how cool would that be? 

Jesus challenges me so deeply.  Let your yes be yes, and your no be no.  What you say in private will be shouted from the rooftops.

I’m working to get to a place where all my DMs could be headlines and it really woudn’t make a difference.  Sometimes it might be a good thing to hit the wrong button just to test your character.  What do you think?