Purpose, Passion, & Purple Cows

A few years ago if you had asked me where I would be in ten years, my answer was an easy one. “I will be right where I am!” My family lived in a great city, I had a job I loved, our kids were in a wonderful school, and our friends, family, & church were the best.

Then I read these words from Chasing Daylight by Erwin McManus,

“You can choose to play it safe, you can choose to settle for less, but never forget this: You were born to live a great adventure; You were created with a divine destiny; You are called to fulfill a great mission. You were designed for a unique purpose. Now you are called to live it out.”

Designed for a unique purpose? As my wife and I prayed it became clear that it was time for us to move into a new chapter of our lives. Striving to be all that God created us to be and starting a new career path focusing on our core talents and abilities was the right course of action but it also seemed very scary.

Consulting our pastor Ed Litton he said, “Jesus is calling all of us out of our comfort zone”, “Come follow me”, Jesus said (Matthew 4:19). Ouch! Following was challenging and painful. We were leaving career, friends, church, schools and a house that was more than a place to live it was “the home”. I discovered this simple “come follow me” had now turned life into pioneering, exploring, and adventure.

How do we step into a new moment? Here are some ideas from our journey:

-Connect – Find people who have like visions and interests.
When our kids were young my wife connected with other moms at our church in the MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) group and discovered she had a passion for helping parents connect spiritual principles to their toddlers. This was important because it not only gave her an outlet for her passion for families but also it was encouraging to be around other moms who were living a similar life.

-Create meaning – Look for ways to invest your life in creating from your skill set. This could be anything, landscaping, building furniture, writing a blog, or helping the homeless. Why does this matter? It is a discovery process that leads you to your unique purpose and calling and finding your strengths.

-Serve – Helping others achieve their dreams.
The reward of serving and giving maybe at a school, church, or ministry will be a catalyst to bring your passion and purpose alive.

-Learn – Technology has made it easy to find those things that inspire and instruct us. Books, internet, blogs, articles and information are a click away! One of the books I read during my transition was a marketing business book, Purple Cow by Seth Godin. It is a plea for originality, passion, guts, and daring.

"The essence of the Purple Cow -- the reason it would shine among a crowd of perfectly competent, even undeniably excellent cows -- is that it would be remarkable. Something remarkable is worth talking about, worth paying attention to." -Seth Godin

You are a Purple Cow! There is no one else created like you! God has planted seeds of greatness in you and wants you to live your uniqueness!

-Pray - Ask God to help you. Ask family and friends to pray with you and for you.

I am not saying it is easy but don’t miss the significance of how living this life will affect your future and your family. By the way, what better way for your children to find their purpose, passion, and to be the purple cow God created them to be than by seeing you live this way every day!

The moment of NOW

"For a moment, nothing happened.
Then, after a second or so,
nothing continued to happen.”- Douglas Adams

Being very transparent with you, these are the moments that scare me.....a moment where nothing is happening.

I don't know if it is me, or our culture, or just a desire to "fill" the moment with something....... but I am starting to see that these moments are crucial.

Crucial, because I truly do determine whether I will take the moment and consider and listen to God or if I will "fill" it with simply the next thing....is this moment important?

"This moment contains all moments."
--C.S. Lewis

This famous C.S. Lewis quote comes from his book, The Great Divorce. The book is not about divorce, but is about how and why we make the choices that determine our path. In The Great Divorce, the story's narrator takes a bus trip during which he observes people who are forced to confront (for the last time) their decision to embrace God's ways and purposes or to exist on their own terms.

I don't want to be fearful of these moments and I definitely don't want to waste them....how about you?

Here is something from my friend Mark Batterson that is helping me with this....hope it helps you too!

I will not let what's wrong with me keep me from worshiping what's right with God.

I will go after the dream He's given me that's "God-sized" enough to fail without Him.

I will stop complaining and find creative ways to become a part of the solution.

I will step out of my comfort zone and value every experience--even the difficult ones.

I will worry less about what people think and more about what God thinks.

I will follow Him wherever He leads me. - Mark Batterson

Fearing LESS

This past week we released a new product called Fearless Worship a companion to Max Lucado's new book Fearless in which Max leads us on an incredible journey asking us the question,

"What if faith, not fear, was your default reaction to threats?"

Max has been given the gift of looking at our world and seeing the "God perspective" in a way that makes us say, "oh yeah, of course that is what I should be doing". He talks to us in a way that is life giving and encouraging...as a friend....and I don't know about you but I need more of this encouragement in my life.

There is a verse in the book of Mark that has always felt more directed at me than the disciples Jesus was speaking to:

Mark 4:40 says this,

He said to his disciples, "Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?"

It is like Jesus is showing that fear and faith stand opposite each other and the two can’t exist in the same place....so it has always led me to questions:

Why is fear opposite to faith? What makes faith the opposite of fear? Why is fear such a controlling emotion? Why is fear so central to the human dilemma? How is fear related to sin? Is fear sin? How does fear separate us from God? How does faith re-connect us with God? What about faith is terrifying? What about fear is security? Does Jesus want to know why I am still afraid? Does Jesus want to know why I still have no faith?

I want to achieve great things but I sometimes get trapped in my fear and as you can see, questions....this may be a strange thing to say but the "fear" of fear makes me fearful....I get into a serious downward spiral!

Max helps me with this in the book. Here is an excerpt from Chapter 1 of Fearless:

"Fear feels dreadful. It sucks the life out of the soul, curls us into an embryonic state, and drains us dry of contentment. We become abandoned barns, rickety and tilting from the winds, a place where humanity used to eat, thrive, and find warmth. No longer. When fear shapes our lives, safety becomes our god. When safety becomes our god, we worship the risk-free life. Can the safety lover do anything great? Can the risk-averse accomplish noble deeds? For God? For others? No. the fear-filled cannot love deeply. Love is risky. They cannot give to the poor. Benevolence has no guarantee of return. The fear-filled cannot dream wildly. What if their dreams sputter and fall from the sky? the worship of safety emasculates greatness. No wonder Jesus wages such a war against fear."

Here is what we should take hope in.....Jesus' words directly to us:

"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me." John 14:1 (NIV)

So I am pushing toward having less fear and more faith which is giving me much HOPE! I am praying it does the same for you!

Hope says, “Tomorrow also is God’s. Enough has happened already to assure you that the rest is on the way.”—Thomas Smail

Check out our new Fearless worship project which has a special Bonus DVD with a teaching segment from Max here: www.fearlessworship.com you can hear the music and also connect to find out about Max's new book Fearless. (#8 on the New York Times Best Seller list this week by the way, seems like a lot of us are dealing with fear issues!)

A HIPPO with wings...

Everyday we have a choice....what we decide matters.

Carl Sandburg said,

“There is an eagle in me that wants to soar, and there is a hippopotamus in me that wants to wallow in the mud.”

I would like to say I am always an eagle soaring and making the decisions that propel me forward to doing great things....ok maybe not great thing maybe just the things on my "to do" list. But the truth is there are those days I have made the decision to be more like a hippo....and no matter how great my "planning" is....there I am doing what I want to instead of what I am supposed to do....result; a hippo.

While I am talking about my faults, I might as well tell you I have also been guilty of dreaming about doing something but then not taking action to accomplish my dreams. I equate this to more like trying to grow eagle wings on a hippo.....wanting to fly but not wanting to risk or get out of my comfortable mud hole.

“Dreaming about a thing in order to do it properly is right; but dreaming about it when we should be doing it is wrong.” ~ Oswald Chambers

Every day, and every moment of every day, I have the power to choose my environment: soaring in the sky or wallowing with the other hippos.

We all have access to both places, and access is unrestricted — it just depends on where we prefer to be.

Ok...gotta go and start soaring instead of trying to be a hippo with wings :-)

PASSON & COURAGE

Winston Churchill was recently chosen by the people of the United Kingdom as the most important person ever in their history. (Greatest Britons of All Time)

Now that is an achievement!

No doubt Prime Minister Churchill received this honor because of his unbelievable passion and courage during World War II.
He really did inspire his nation and gave them the will to win and the will to fight because of his own passion and courage.

I love this quote from Churchill:

Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never--in nothing, great or small, large or petty--never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy. -Winston Churchill

It seems he understood that in the face of adversity that most great people throughout history had these two things: Passion and Courage.

Lee Cockerell former Disney executive and leadership guru put it this way:

"Passion and courage will get you further than brains alone. Intelligence is a really great thing; but if you don't have the passion and courage to act and to accomplish something, then what does it really matter how smart you are?"

From time to time there might be one or two who are ready to pronounce you, or your ideas, dead on arrival.

There’s only one way to prove them wrong. Just as Churchill did, show your passion and courage. Keep showing up. Keep plugging away. When you get knocked, get back up. It’s not what anyone says that matters, or even what they think that matters. It matters how you respond.

We need to remember the words of Paul:

Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ. Galatians 1:10 (NIV)

Legacy SEEDS

One day a young man saw an elderly man planting a tree and he asked him,
“What are you planting?”

The elderly gardener answered, “A Carob tree.”

“In how many years will it bear fruit?” asked the young man.

“It will be 70 years before it produces its best fruit,” the old man responded.

“But you are very old,” the young man continued. “Will you live to see it bear fruit?”

The old man answered,

“When I came I found trees planted by those who lived before me. I am only doing for future generations what was done for me."

What are we planting today that will leave a legacy for future generations?

seeds of hope? seeds of encouragement?
seeds of truth?

Dream BIG

Inspire HOPE

Cultivate CHANGE

Build a Legacy of FAITH