This past weekend at Connexus we told a story in our message about inviting friends that will likely stick with me the rest of my life.

In the video Jessie, a woman in her early twenties who attends one of our campuses, explains how she and her husband Russ invited a friend who didn’t go to church to come with them.  The story is worth watching and it’s near the end of the message called “Invite”.  You can watch it here on our website or get the video podcast on iTunes.

Jessie and Russ’ invitation led to their friends inviting some friends, who invited a friend, who in turn invited friends.  That single invitation just a year or two later has resulted in 12 formerly unchurched people now attending church, and the process, and some have surrendered their lives to Christ.  Powerful.

But the line that stuck out with me was when Jessie simply said “30 seconds of you being uncomfortable could change someone’s eternity.”

I think she nailed it.  One of the main reasons we don’t invite people into a something that can change their lives is our personal discomfort.  And we she named that, I realized I have to get so much more uncomfortable if I want to make a difference.

I’m going to get uncomfortable in the next few weeks and extend some invitations.

But I won’t stop there.

How much transformation have you put off because you fear a little bit of discomfort?

If you were to spend some time getting over 30 seconds of discomfort five times today, what would happen?

You might:

• pick up the phone and apologize, mending a friendship.
• talk through a tough issue, slaying the elephant in the room that’s been lingering for months.
• actually do the most important work you could do today, pushing past your procrastination.
• not spend the money you were going to, and pay down some debt instead.
• invite that friend you’ve been praying for to church
• go for a run…the one you’ve put off for a day/month/week/decade.
• read to the end of the chapter of the bible you’re in…and let God speak to you
• put away the ice cream and drop a pound in the next week.

30 seconds of you being uncomfortable could change someone’s eternity.  So so true!

It might even change much more.

Why don’t you spend some time being uncomfortable today?

For years I’ve kept a file I simply call “encouragement”.

Back in the day it used to be an old school filing cabinet file folder.  Now it’s a a gmail folder.  One day it will be something else.  It matters far less how it’s done than it does that I do it.

The rule is simple. Every time someone sends me something that encourages me (an email, a blog comment, a DM, a card, a note), I put it in that file.   Often it’s a thank you for something I said or did, a short message of encouragement, and sometimes it’s a life-change story (love those!).

Here’s why I keep it (hang on, my reasoning is complicated): I get discouraged.

That’s it.  I just get discouraged.

The one email of complaint out of 99 ordinary emails gets to me.  The one “that message didn’t really connect with me” deflates me faster than a bullet through a balloon.  The “he’s such a great speaker…oh, and we appreciate you too” gets to me.  So does the “why do you….[fill in the blank]?” and the “I can’t believe you….“.  Sometimes it doesn’t even take a comment from anyone.  I can discourage myself in no time flat.

Now just to put this in perspective, I get at least a 10:1 positive stream coming my way.  Actually it’s probably something more like 100:1 or even 1000:1.  I know my skin should be thicker.  I know I shouldn’t be so sensitive. And I’m getting better at it, but that stuff still gets me.

As I’m sure, it does you.

I keep the file because I want it to be there fore me on the days I get discouraged and even think about throwing in the towel.

I only end up going into the encouragement file once or twice a year at the most.  Sometimes I just look at it and realize there are 20 new notes from the last month, and that alone is enough.

I just need to be reminded that God has a reason for me doing this, and that the good outweighs the bad. I am convinced that one of the leading factors in the lackluster state of the church and in many areas of life is that people quit long before they break through because the discouragement got to them.

So I keep an encouragement file.

What do you do to get you through your bad days?

Earlier this week we looked at five signs that show you lack integrity. It’s one thing to know you might lack it in certain areas, but the question is how do you build integrity? How do you develop it?

Integrity is about more than just doing the right thing, It’s about buidling the kind of character that can survive a crisis intact. In the same way a building that has integrity can survive a storm, a life that has integrity can do the same.

So how do you build integrity?

1. Be ruthlessly honest with yourself. Of all the lies we tell, the ones we tell ourselves are the most deadly. Question your motives. Stop justifying what you know to be wrong. Stop excusing yourself.

2. Seek wise counsel. We all have blind spots. It’s one thing to be honest with yourself, but sometimes you and I are just blind to faults others can see. Find three or four people who believe in you and ask them for feedback on your life.

3. Decide to honour God, not please people. Doing the right thing is almost never the easy thing, and sometimes it’s not the popular thing. Honouring God is not the same as believing you are always right and everyone else is wrong – it simply means you are going to live with a long view of what to do, informed by scripture. It means enduring short term pain for longer term gain. To avoid becoming arrogant or deluded, make sure you test what obedience looks like for you not only against scripture and prayer, but also with your circle of wise counsel (see above). They will see things you can’t see.

4. Be appropriately transparent. We’d all like to be something we’re not. Admit your shortcomings. You don’t have to tell everyone what you’re struggling with, but you need to tell someone. Part of being honest with yourself is being honest with others. And as much as you might be afraid that everyone will think less of you, living transparently and not pretending to be someone you aren’t actually makes people think more of you. It’s counter-intuitive. It’s also transformative.

5. Put yourself first when it comes to personal growth. I know that sounds selfish, even unbibilical, but I’m not sure it is. Jesus prepared for thirty years before ministering for three. And during those three years he often disappeared to pray. You can only give what you’ve got. And he spent whole seasons of his life receiving from God what he needed to give to the world. Cancel some appointments. Tell the kids to wait. You need to build a solid spiritual, emotional and relational foundation for your life. Pray. Open the Bible (for you – not for anyone else pastors). Go for a run. Eat something healthy. Go for dinner with a friend who gives you life. If your cup is empty, how are you going to fill anyone else’s?

These are five practices I’ve found helpful in my life. What have you discovered helps you build integrity?

Integrity is something we all desire, but how do you know if you have it?  And what exactly is it anyway?

Sometimes it’s easiest to think about something out of its immediate context.  When something is well built, we say it has structural integrity.  So in an earthquake, the building with excellent structural integrity survives.  When something physically collapses, we say it didn’t have the integrity to withstand the impact.

All of this springs from the original latin root of integrity, which means ‘intact’.  Can you withstand the crisis intact?

Many  people aren’t withstanding crises well these days. The storm buffets and they collapse along with their family or their organization.

The tension is that no one sees the problem until the storm hits. ‘Normal’ doesn’t really test your integrity.   Crises do.  But when a crisis comes, it’s often too late to fix what’s wrong.  The damage is happening in real time.

While there are many things that compromise our integrity, here are five signs that show your integrity is in question:

1.  It’s all about you. You can say it’s about God.  You can say it’s about others.  But only you and God know your heart.  Selfish people harm their organizations, families and friends.  If it’s all about you, you won’t go the distance.  Or you will,  but you’ll hurt a lot of people in the process and you’ll never know what could have happened if you made it about God and others.

2. Your self esteem rises and falls with the opinion of others. A secure leader can see the right way and lead people there through tough conditions.  An insecure leader will bend with every change in public opinion. Which means you’re not actually leading anyone, not even yourself.

3. You’re hiding things. You shouldn’t be telling everyone everything (that’s not healthy) - but someone needs to know everything.  If you’re keeping secrets, you’re heading for a fall.  Between my wife, elders, close friends and counselor, I have an inner circle that knows everything about me.  (By the way, if you’re afraid to give your password on your computer or phone to anyone in that circle, you’re hiding things.)

4.  You fail to do what you said you were going to do. This isn’t just about keeping promises; it’s about keeping your word in everything.  Better to say nothing and surprise someone by delivering than blurt out an intention you can’t fulfil.   Ultimately, people lose confidence in you when you fail to deliver.  It’s a trust issue.   A fairly easy way to address this is to say less and deliver more.  A great follow up system also helps (sometimes a lack of integrity isn’t even a moral issue – just an awareness and organization issue).

5.  You make too many compromises. Leadership is not about getting everyone to like you or about finding the easiest path.  It’s about discerning the best way forward.  It’s about getting people to go where they wouldn’t go if it wasn’t for leadership.  If you make too many decisional compromises or even a handful of personal compromises, your effectiveness will be–you guessed it– compromised.

Don’t just think of these things as character flaws, think of what’s at stake: when the crises hit (and they will), you won’t be left standing.  Simple as that.  When you attend to these things, you integrity grows, and so does your ability to live and lead through difficult times.

What insights have you gained on integrity?  What signs would you add to this list?

There are two potential teachers in your life: pain and wisdom.

Like many people, pain has been an incredibly instructive teacher for me.  In the same way that twisting your ankle while running on a cheap pair of shoes reminds you to buy better shoes next time, pain is immediate, memorable and disruptive.  Which makes it a teacher of sorts.

Pain makes us want to take back words we just spoke, redo projects we just blew, unhurt a friends, or wish we’d never tried that fiery hot sauce. Pain can incite change.

This shouldn’t be surprising, because for the most part, people change when the pain associated with the status quo is greater than the pain associated with change.

But there’s another teacher, in fact, a much better teacher than pain: wisdom.  Wisdom shows up earlier.  It seeks to teach before you take action, before there’s a pressing need or the searing pain of regret. Which is why wisdom is so much more difficult to obey than pain.

Pain is selfish, it demands you stop what you’re doing and pay attention.

Wisdom whispers.

Wisdom takes forethought, reflection, prayer and insight.  It often requires counsel – input before an event.

If you had a choice of teacher, I think we’d all pick wisdom.  Which begs the deeper question: why don’t we?

Want to know how you’re really doing?  Sit in silence.

Sit silently for at least 10 minutes – even an hour if you can handle it.

More and more, I’m learning that silence reveals what’s really happening inside me.

Whenever I eliminate all the noise around me and sit in complete silence, I find the quiet either reveals a peace or a disquiet.

I wish that silence always revealed a peace, but I find often it doesn’t.  I might find frustration, tension, anger, resentment, lust, envy, restlessness or any combination of things.

The valuable thing for me is that when I discover that, I also discover what I am confident God wants to work on.  Whatever the quiet reveals can be fuel for my prayer life.  It can reveal something I need to work through with God, with friends or sometimes even with a counselor.

Best of all, I’m finding resonance in the biblical truth that it is when we are still that we best know that God is God (Psalm 46).

The challenge of course is that no one will ever ask you to simply sit still for an hour.  No one ever texts you and asks you if you can carve out some time for silence and reflection.  Everybody just wants one more small slice of you.  And truthfully, those of us who resist silence like that.

It is easier to stay busy than it is to stay honest with ourselves.  It’s easier to pretend everything’s great even if we suspect it might not be.

Which would be a mistake.  Because soul work is the most important work we can do.  It animates and impacts every other aspect of our lives from our relationships to our work to our family.

Ever take a silence test?

I’m taking them often.  I don’t even like what I find much of the time.  Which is exactly the point.

I was at Elephant Room this week, a forum hosted by Harvest Bible Chapel for pastors and church leaders.

The best part for me was the honesty, candour and wisdom shared by the panel:  James MacDonald, Mark Driscoll, Steven Furtick, Jack Graham, T.D. Jakes,  Wayne Cordeiro and Crawford Lorritz.

Here are a few insights that really impacted me (in no particular order):

“It’s easier to be a critic than to be a pastor.”  Mark Driscoll

“The devil can’t steal my ministry.  He has no authority.  So he’ll just steal the joy of my ministry.”  Wayne Cordeiro

“Write the cheque.  Go back to sleep.”  James MacDonald on the limits of cheque-book evangelism.

“None of our books will be on sale in heaven.”  T.D. Jakes, on the limits of human theology.

“You can’t integrate the church until you integrate your life.”  T.D. Jakes on racial integration.

“You are ready for restoration in ministry when you are known more for your repentance than for your sin.” Spurgeon (via T.D. Jakes)

“You can teach what you know but you reproduce what you are.”  Wayne Cordeiro

“We use anger as a substitute for the anointing of God.” T.D. Jakes on how some preachers over-rely on anger in preaching.

“Just because someone doesn’t want you in their circle anymore doesn’t mean that they can’t be in yours.”  James Macdonald quoting Craig Groeschel

“There is a difference between leadership development and developing leaders.” (missed the source)

And finally, this raw confession:

“I always knew God loved me, but I thought it was because he had to. Now I realize he wants to.”  Steven Furtick

Loved the Elephant Room.

What other insights have you gleaned lately, at the ER or elsewhere that have helped you?

So what are you committing yourself to?

In most cases, you will be tempted to commit yourself to one of two things: process or outcome.

I found myself on the elliptical the other morning.  Unfortunately there was a mirror in front of it.  I saw visitbly the 15 pounds that still need to come off.  Then I had this thought:  there are a lot of overweight people who work out every day (please understand, I’m not slamming overweight people…I just know I have no excuse for being one.)

I’m tempted to give myself points for showing up.  Points for engaging the process.  I did a solid hour on the elliptical plus ab crunches and some push ups.  That counts right?  And I biked three hours last week.  Good for me right?

Well, sort of.  If you’re only scoring process.  But if you’re scoring outcomes, well that’s different. I know I’ve needed to get back to ideal weight now for a few years.  And I’m not there.

In every area of life, it’s easy for me to measure process rather than outcome.

I worked for hours on this message.

I followed everything everyone told me to do.

I got it done in record time.

I had exactly the number of people you asked for engaged on the project.

You have no idea how hard our team worked on that.

Everything was done precisely according to format.

And that’s fine.  The problem is that’s often where it ends: it’s just fine.  And sometimes it’s not even that.

Process is important, but what if you started measuring outcomes instead?

That message helped hundreds of people get closer to God.

That series drew a record number of new attenders.

Our client was so thrilled with the project he brought us five new referrals.

The 100th phone call finally resulted in a great job offer.

I lost 10 pounds this month.

People can’t stop talking about that event.

We had 35 new families register with us after that appeal.

People who measure outcomes keep changing the process until they get the results they need.  And then they change it again to see if they can do better.

What are you measuring?  Process or outcome?

There are too many overweight people who work out every day.  Too many preachers who spend three days on messages that help almost no one.  And far too many people who will get to four o’clock and call the day a win because they got through the pile in front of them.

And no one will be much better for it.

How do you measure outcomes?  What keeps you stuck to measuring process?

I’ve got more than a few friends right now who are going through a very difficult season.  Cancer, marriages in crisis and career issues are just a few of the problems in the lives of people I care about.

One question keeps surfacing:

Does God give you more than you can handle?

Strangely, I think the answer is simple:  Yes he does.

As I’ve reflected on my own challenges and those of my friends, I’m reminded of the searing pain of some seasons of life.  Whether it’s leadership challenges, illness, circumstances, or even personal implosions, sometimes it really does seem like more than you can handle.

Which sounds like a recipe to abandon faith.  But actually, it’s the opposite.  Those moments are the ones in which our faith needs to deepen even more.  Here’s why:

God gives us more than we can handle, but he never gives us more than He can handle.

The very moment in which we are most likely to lose faith is the moment in which we need to deepen it.  Because God can handle whatever you are facing, even if you can’t.

A couple of passages have sprung to life for me in this season with my friends.  Here’s one of them.  I love what Paul says:

We think you ought to know, dear brothers and sisters, about the trouble we went through in the province of Asia. We were crushed and overwhelmed beyond our ability to endure, and we thought we would never live through it. In fact, we expected to die. But as a result, we stopped relying on ourselves and learned to rely only on God, who raises the dead. (2 Corinthians 1:8-9)

In fact, we expected to die. But we stopped relying on ourselves and learned to rely only on God, who raises the dead.  Tell me if you’ve seen a more powerful thought recently.  I haven’t. That’ll preach.

Even in leadership, sometimes I get so overwhelmed by the task and things not going the way I had hoped (despite best efforts) that I just have to re-surrender everything to God.

Is it too much for you and me to handle?  Sometimes, absolutely.

Which is why I’m so grateful for a God who can be trusted in every circumstance, no matter what it looks or feels like to us.

What are you learning in this area?  What’s helped you?

A few days ago I was in Germany talking to church leaders about keeping your heart fully engaged as a leader over the long haul.

A the end of the talk, I invited people who were running on empty to stand, offering to pray for people who were standing and in need of a touch from God. At first, no one stood, which, if you’re a communicator, always creates a fun moment.

As I said a few more words, a handful of people stood up. But by the time we were ready to pray, half the room was standing. A thousand leaders on their feet. All of them saying it’s been dry, they’re tired and they long for a touch from God.

I won’t forget that picture for a long time. Because I realized what’s at stake. Could you imagine if half the leaders (volunteer or staff) decided within the next year that they just couldn’t do it anymore?

Could you imagine if the leaders who stayed lost their passion and led from a place of fatigue and emptiness rather than strength and passion? Because I know what happens when you get tired; your heart stops being fully engaged.

This is personal for me because I know what it’s like to be tired in ministry, to be fatigued to the level where you’ve lost the energy that fuels your spirit. The good news is it comes back over time if you continue to see God. You can emerge out of a dry season with more energy and passion than you have ever had.

It’s possible. But it’s not automatic. I doesn’t just happen. And after seeing a thousand great, dedicated church leaders on their feet asking for help, I realized again what a silent but critical issue this is in the church.

So first, be honest with yourself. How are you doing, really? If you’re not honest with yourself, you won’t be honest with God, let alone others. How are you?

If you’re in a season where you’re just barely hanging on, dont just hang on. Deal with it. Here are three things you can do to help (at least they’ve helped me):

Tell someone. You can’t go through this alone. Start with a friend -someone who knows you and cares about you and who can tell you what you don’t always want to hear. And if you need to see a counsellor, don’t hesitate. Community is a gift from God. I was so proud of the leaders who stood up as a first step toward acknowledging how they were feeling and that they needed a touch from God. That was so powerful! They told someone.

Take responsibility. Regardless of how you and I got to where we’re at, we’re responsible for our own spiritual growth and our own care. No one can make me better. At a minimum I need to cooperate with what needs to happen. Better still if I resolve to get the help I need.

Put yourself first when it comes to spiritual growth. Sometimes ministry is a place where you receive, but often it’s a place where you give. Replenish your walk. Take time every day to nourish your relationship with God. Read bible passages you will ever preach on. Pray about things that have nothing to do with your work. Find some friendships that restore and rebuild you and spend time with those friends. Get out on your bike and go for a ride. Do something that refuels you.

So, how are you doing? Really?

I think God has a vision of thousands of leaders serving with passion for years into the future. And you know what I believe? He wants you in that picture. He wants your heart fully engaged.

What helps you keep your heart fully engaged?