Breakthrough series 5: Pillars of the earth

Break-though series 4: Nothing is as it seems

Breakthrough series 3: Audit God's strength, not your own

Breakthough series 2: God is my rock

Practical Christianity 10 - change is needed if we want to reach our spiritual potential

Practical Christianity 9: Tame the tongue - rather find your spiritual identity

Practical Christianity 4: Lets make it legal

Practical Christianity 2: So what comes first: practicality or spirituality?

Practical Christianity 1: What comes first, chicken or egg, practicality or spirituality?

Prayer 5: So, who is God?

Prayer 2: If God be for us, who can be against - Romans 8:31

There always were just two basic concepts of God. Those have variations on a theme, but the two were there from the beginning and still are.

It started when two brothers competed for his favor. Abel was merely a good steward of what God had entrusted to him and he brought that back as an un-embellished, simple sacrifice. 

He sought to please God as a man would  please his beloved, not formulaically but from the heart.

Let's start at the very beginning

And now we have a motive too … ISIS felt that Parisians had to die because “that city is a place of infidels and prostitution”, but probably more because of its "crusade" against them.

Of course it didn’t mention the captured women that ISIS regularly sells or the children they feed to its leaders. You don’t need more details – it is sordid, but I do wonder why they don’t sort out their backyard mess before sorting out everyone else’s?

However, it’s not limited to them. Although long-forgotten, Catholicism was as pernicious in the dark ages. Other groups around the world are as intolerant and brutal.

Its a world full of people

A client related a great story to me. A woman accidentally shut herself inside a cold room on a Friday afternoon. 

No one heard her shouts and her body temperature was falling rapidly. Then, a good while later, a security guard found her. "What led you here", she asked? 

"Mam", he added, "of all the employees who work here, you are the reason I come to work. You greet me in the morning, you wave to me at night and when you can you chat or give me some food. So I wouldn't have missed anyone else, but I was expecting you to come out of the building and wave to me as you went home, and when you didn't appear I knew something was wrong. I searched all over until I found you down here, in this cold room".

Love changes everything

I was debating this morning over some coffee, why some coffee shops treat clients as work-in-progress, whilst others treat them like people. They let them relax, don’t process them, enjoy the hospitality, order more coffee when and if they want to, and, perhaps have something to eat, or don’t … “No problem, we are just happy to see you – pop in tomorrow”.

End First

Stephen Covey said that we should always start with the end in mind. The bible does that too. A key example is a verse in Ephesians 4:13, which says "... until we all come into the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man".

Surely He will bless ...

Every day I hear speculations that sound so good to the ear but remain so far from God's heart. I think it was A W Tozer who said, "Our thoughts are too worldly for God".

Hey you, um what's your name again ... I do appreciate you, now please sign here

During my Master’s studies we did a case study on two banks. Bank A scored 9 out of 10 on its customer satisfaction index – a near perfect score. Bank B only achieved 6 out of 10. The problem was that Bank B still had better market share and customers indicated a continuing preference for the lower-rated organisation. When asked why, they simply stated, “They know my name”.

That most human of gestures is ably captured in an African greeting, which simply translates as “I see you”.

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We live in such a depersonalized world and wonder why we still battle to sustain market shares and profitability or success in our lives. Even churches have reduced people to numbers – and still wonder why they battle to keep what they have.

Social networks involve a numbers game that will depersonalize us further, to rob the next generation of the power of personal engagement. Its just not good enough though. People are people and until we get that we won’t keep them and if we fail to do that we will have failed in the essence of Godly stewardship, which is “to feed His lambs”.

The emergence of mass production systems has led to canned approaches to service, driven by cold, heartless machines. You don’t agree – well stop paying or buying and see how quickly they turn you off, then you will know how much you matter.

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What is about all these titles that lesser men love and greater men eschew?

Ouch this is a thorny subject. Its one I have resisted for so long, for fear of detracting from my primary objectives. Even so, it is something to be handled with care. I am referring to "Titles". I regularly get FB or Twitter connection requests from people with all kinds of assumed titles ... and I have to ask why? What intrigues me most is that it is evidently not helpful, often divisive, almost always repressive and it is also out of kilter with biblical and contemporary thinking on leadership.

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Jesus, deserved significant respect, but New Testament writers still generally called Him "Jesus". Paul, another significant leader, never called himself, "The Apostle Paul", but sometimes appended his vocation. Peter was Peter and James was James.

Jesus even argued against titles in Matthew 23:8, saying: "But do not be called Rabbi; for One is your Teacher, and you are all brothers. "And do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven. "And do not be called leaders; for One is your Leader, that is, Christ."

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Integrity of purpose

Ken Follet, author of the great novel "Pillars of the earth", makes a point in the sequel, "World without end": "Integrity is like a sword, you shouldn't wave it until you are about to put it to the test. Its when you want so badly to do something wrong ... that's when you need the rules".

That reminds me of a haunting moment in Schindler's list. Amon Goetz, whilst whiling away a sundowning moment taking mindless potshots at the helpless Jewish inmates of his prison camp, says to Oscar Schindler, "See how much power I have".

In reply, Schindler states, "Real power is knowing you can kill who you want to and choosing not to."

Integrity is what happens in the shadows where no one is watching.

Abide with me

A good friend in a time of great need, recently observed that "when days are dark, friends are few". Whilst I can testify to that, it is not something I like to talk about. However, the theme kept knocking at my heart until I turned over a piece of paper and saw the words of that great hymn, "Abide with me". It has been sung on battlefields and in great sports gatherings: a stirring piece of music that is more prayer than hymn.

"Abide with me fast falls the eventide: the darkness deepens, Lord with me abide,

When other helpers fail and comforts flee, help of the helpless, oh abide with me."