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Books that shaped me in 2018

January 3, 2019 — Leave a comment

These are the books that I read throughout the year in 2018. If you like to read and want to interact over books, you should join me over on Goodreads.

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future – Vance
The High Definition Leader: Building Multiethnic Churches in a Multiethnic World – Gray
Dream With Me – John Perkins
Empowering Leadership: How a Leadership Development Culture Builds Better Leaders Faster – Fletcher
The Culture Code: The Secrets of Highly Successful Groups – Coyle
Building a StoryBrand: Clarify Your Message So Customers Will Listen – Miller
The Matheny Manifesto: A Young Manager’s Old School Views on Success in Sports and Life – Matheny
Onward: How Starbucks Fought for It’s Life Without Losing Its Soul – Schultz
The Phenomenon: Pressure, the Yips, and the Pitch that Changed My Life – Ankiel
A Dirty Job – Moore
Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church – Rachel Held Evans
Living with a SEAL: 31 Days Training with the Toughest Man on the Planet – Itzler
Paul: A Biography – NT Wright
Ninety Percent Mental: An All-Star Player Turned Mental Skills Coach Reveals the Hidden Game of Baseball – Tewksbury
The Tech-Wise Family: Everyday Steps for Putting Technology in its Proper Place – Crouch
The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life and Freedom on Death Row – Anthony Ray Hinton
I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness – Brown
Smart Money Smart Kids: Raising the Next Generation to Win with Money – Ramsey , Cruze
The Idiot – Dostoevsky
Capital Gaines: Smart Things I Learned Doing Stupid Stuff – Chip Gaines
Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose – Hsieh
Everybody, Always: Becoming Love in a World Full of Setbacks and Difficult People – Goff
The Sacred Enneagram: Finding Your Unique Path to Spiritual Growth – Heuertz
Cracking Your Church’s Culture Code: Seven Keys to Unleashing Vision and Inspiration – Chand
Irresistible: Reclaiming the New that Jesus Unleashed for the World – Stanley
How to Break Growth Barriers: Revise Your Role, Release Your People, and Capture Overlooked Opportunities for Your Church – George, Bird
A Long Obedience in the Same Direction: Discipleship in an Instant Society – Peterson
The Road Back to You: An Enneagram Journey to Self-Discovery – Cron
From This Day Forward: Five Commitments to Fail-Proof Your Marriage – Groeschel
I Declare War: Four Keys to Winning the Battle with Yourself – Lusko

Maybe you’re wondering about my favorite? It’s hard to say. I would say that the most impactful, meaningful book for me personally was Eugene Peterson’s “A Long Obedience in the Same Direction.” Eugene Peterson died this year but left an incredible dent on the world through his quiet, faithful life. I loved learning from his experience.

As always, I’d love suggestions for 2019!

In LEARNING

I didn’t reach my goals

January 1, 2019 — Leave a comment

I set some pretty lofty goals for myself in 2018. Lofty enough that I knew that for them to happen, I was going to have to be disciplined. Everything was going to have to go right and I wasn’t going to be able to get lazy or distracted. Well, I don’t know that I got lazy, but certainly other things happened that disrupted my plans. For instance, I set a goal and planned to run 750 miles in 2018. For me, that was a TON. It was going to be at least double what I had done before. I thought that I had a good plan in place. But then life changed. Less than a month after the start of the year we added a not-yet two year old to our family through fostering. I also began working outside of the home more, spending more time in the car, and leaving the house earlier to get my daughter to school. All that said, I ended up running over 560 miles. For me, a HUGE achievement. And truthfully, the pace I ended the year on over the last two months is exactly what it will take to actually reach that 750 plateau in 2019.

Similarly I set a goal to read 40 books. My usual pace is two a month – 24 for the year. I knew it would be a push for me but I set the goal and planned to figure it out through a combination of audio books, kindle, and old fashioned paper. Reading for me goes through phases. There are some phases where I read in a sprint. I can finish 4-5 books in a month. Other times, I can let one book drag for 6 weeks or so. All in all, I finished 30 books this year. Well short of my goal. But on the other hand, I can’t remember a time when I read 30 books in a single year.

So a few takeaways for me:

Every goal needs a plan for accomplishing that goal.
Every plan will have to be adapted. Plan to change the plan. There’s always going to be a sickness, an injury, a change of routine. How will we accomplish the goals even though the circumstances change?
Celebrate the reach. While I didn’t reach the goal, I reached farther than I ever had before. That’s worth celebrating.

In LEADING, LEARNING

Courage day: A lot can happen in 10 years

August 1, 2018 — Leave a comment

(pictured: our moving crew, then and just last week for the 10 year reunion tour!)

A decade. Wow. 10 years ago today we packed it all up, pulled out of our driveway in Southern California and left everything we ever knew to go on the adventure we call Story Church. My daughters were 4 years old and 7 months old. My son was still just a dream. We had NO IDEA what we were doing or what we were getting ourselves into. We had some financial support, some prayer support — but not enough of either. I so quickly realized I was in over my head that I started reading voraciously. Church planting books, entrepreneurship books, leadership books. It was such a surreal time. There were so many dreams and ideas of church in my head but nothing in reality. The steps between dreaming it up and seeing it happen were so uncertain.

When I think back and try to feel or remember that time I can definitely recall lots of uncertainty, a feeling of “this is crazy!” But there was excitement. I knew we were walking in faith. It was a courageous moment. In the face of fear and the unknown, we were doing it. We had resigned a steady job and paycheck. We left family and friends and support systems behind. We only knew one person in the entire state of North Carolina. Every interaction we had was a hopeful connection.Every trip to the mailbox was expectant (did someone remember us today and send us a letter or…. Money?!?!). Every prayer was faith-filled. Some were desperate prayers.

The truth is, sometimes I really miss those first years. Today our lives are different. It doesn’t feel like we are hoping to survive anymore. We’re established. We have a wide circle of friends and contacts here. There’s a church, with a building, filled with stuff. We have a board and a staff, ministries, a Dream Team of volunteers. We have traditions. But make no mistake, this church was birthed through courage and faith. I’m so proud of that fact. We’re not yet everything I dreamed of — and that’s ok. The road has been longer and more difficult than I ever could have imagined. But’s it’s been the adventure of a lifetime. I’m so grateful for how God has provided. He’s never failed us. These ten years have been hard. painful at times. Lonely. Filled with insecurity and self-doubt. There’s been loss, failure, stress, depression even. But God hasn’t let us go. We are more blessed today than ever.

It’s impossible to imagine where the next ten years will lead us, just like I never could have imagined how these last ten years would unfold. But I’m confident that some things will forever be true: God will be faithful. He will provide. He won’t abandon us or forget us. A life of courage and faith is better than one without.

In FOLLOWING, STORYCHURCH

Black History Month

February 12, 2018 — Leave a comment

I grew up in a small community in southern CA. It was mostly white with a growing hispanic population as well. There were very few black families. I don’t know specific demographics, but if I had to guess I would put the number well south of 1% of our city.

Today I live in a city without a majority population. It’s roughly 45% white and 43% black with a collection of other ethnicities as well. I absolutely love it. I love that my daily interactions in the world are always going to include people different than me.

That being said, I’m fairly ignorant when it comes to Black History. It wasn’t exactly a topic we spent a lot of time on in my city growing up. In fact, there were very few voices in my life from people of color at all (if any?). So one of my goals the last couple of years has been to really grow in this area of my life and one of the best ways I know to do that is through reading. So here’s some of the authors I’ve been reading the last couple of years. I’d encourage you to check some of these out!

Rod Hairston – Cover Her (Rod’s a friend, a pastor and a real mentor to me)
Derwin Gray – HD Leader (former NFL player turned pastor)
Archbishop Desmond Tutu – The Book of Joy (the funniest Archbishop you’ll ever read)
Lisa Sharon Harper – The Very Good Gospel (holy smokes. Incredible.)
John Perkins – Dream With Me (a legend in the civil rights movement)
Tony Dungy – Uncommon Marriage (NFL guy, commentator with an incredible ministry to dads)
Michelle Alexander – The New Jim Crow (One of the most important books in the world right now, in my opinion)

In Uncategorized

Books that shaped me in 2017

January 1, 2018 — 1 Comment

Well, after a whopping 2 blog posts in 2017, here’s my first of 2018 – an annual tradition for me of posting the books I’ve read in the prior year.

Dare to Serve – Bachelder
Art of Neighboring – Pathak
Jesus Feminist – Bessey
The Sabbath: It’s meaning for Modern Man – Heschel
The Power of Your Words – Morris
Open (Audio) – Agassi
The Worship Pastor – Hicks
What is the Bible? – Bell
Bonhoeffer (Audio) – Metaxas
Love is an Orientation – Marin
Originals: How Nonconformists Move the World – Grant
How’s Your Soul? – Smith
Where Nobody Knows Your Name: Life in the Minor Leagues (Audio) – Feinstein
Macbeth – Shakespeare
Leading on Empty – Cordeiro
Uncommon Marriage – Dungy
Born Standing Up (Audio) – Martin
Shoe Dog: A memoir by the creator of Nike (Audio) – Knight
The Book of Joy – Dalai Lama & Desmond Tutu
Living in the Light – Piper
Finding God in the Waves (Audio) – McHargue
Steve Jobs (Audio) – Isaacson
The Storyteller’s Secret (Audio) – Gallo
Astrophysics for People in a Hurry (Audio) – Tyson
The Soul of Shame: Retelling the stories we believe about ourselves – Thompson
The Everything Store (Audio) – Stone
Meet Generation Z – White
Braving the Wilderness (Audio) – Brown

This was the year of the audiobook for me. I spend a lot of time in the car apparently (and I did a lot of housework painting and installing floors!), so listening to books became a great option for me. I can’t imagine listening to books that I would really want to read carefully or take notes in, but listening to biographies or just good stories seems like a pretty good fit.

I had a goal to read more biographies this year and that ended up being the highlight for me this year. I was fascinated by Andre Agassi’s story, of Bonhoeffer, Steve Jobs, Phil Knight, Steve Martin and Jeff Bezos.

I think one of the more significant books of the year for me was “The Book of Joy.” It was fascinating to read about the secret to a joyful life from two old spiritual giants. Their friendship and joy despite (maybe because of?) their hard lives was profoundly impacting for me.

Did you read any of these? What was your favorite book of 2017? What would you recommend I read next?

In LEADING, LEARNING

5 things that are making my world better

January 16, 2017 — Leave a comment

These are just a few random things that have become a part of my life and have helped me, so I thought I’d share them with you:

1. Slack – This is an app that runs my work life communication. I can’t imagine doing what I do without it now. It has virtually eliminated email between me and my team. It’s where we share ideas, plan things together and touch base on everything from the major to the minor. We can share documents, links, photos and more.

2. A treadmill – It was this time last year that we made the big purchase. Every once in a while I’ll still go outside and run but then I remember why a treadmill is so nice. Mainly, I don’t hurt as bad. My joints and my feet thank me. I get to watch Netflix to forget that I’m running, and I get to dress the same every time – no special arctic running gear necessary. I don’t run for the joy of it like some crazy people, I run to be healthy. So anything I can do to turn a discipline into something more enjoyable is worth it to me.

3. VidAngel – Well, this app is currently not available because of some legal issues. But if it ever comes back, it’s something you should know about. It allowed us to “rent” movies via streaming for $1 each. Before watching users got the chance to filter anything they wanted to filter out of the movie. It really helped to be able to feel good about what I was showing my kids, but I appreciated the filtering option for me as well.

4. The 5 year journal – I heard about the idea of a 5 year journal on a podcast. I’ve never been able to keep the habit of journaling, mostly because I felt this pressure to write a lot. This journal has a few lines per entry. It’s a place to capture a quick thought about the day, about something I learned, a prayer, etc. I’ve found that writing in it at the end of a day works best for me. I still don’t do it every day, but it’s more than ever. And the cool thing is that you keep using the same journal for five years, so at some point I’ll start seeing past entries and what was happening in prior years on that same day. Pretty cool. (The one I purchased is by Levenger and is linked above.)

5. Podcasts – I know, it’s not anything new. But I don’t know that I understand people who don’t use these as a primary way of learning and growth. Last year I added a few that were more storytelling than anything else. I binged my way through Serial, as well as Revisionist History. But my regulars include the Relevant podcast, the Andy Stanley Leadership podcast, the Craig Groeschel Leadership podcast, The Matt Keller Leadership Channel.

In Uncategorized

Books that shaped me in 2016

January 4, 2017 — 1 Comment

Time to dust off the blog. This is my annual list of the books I read and a little commentary on some of the highlights.

Jesus’ Son – Johnson
Our Story Begins – Wolff
The Heroic Path – Sowers
Defining Moments – Heath (not yet published)
How to be Here – Bell
The most excellent way to lead – Noble
The Divine Conspiracy – Willard (re-read)
Girl at the end of the world – Esther
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team – Lencioni (re-read)
The Emotionally Healthy Leader – Scazzero
The Ideal Team Player – Lencioni
Band of Brothers – Ambrose
Addicted to Busy – Bloye
The Customer Service Revolution – DiJulius
I don’t care if we never get back – Blatt & Brewster
Intentional Living – Maxwell
Emotionally Healthy Spirituality – Scazzero
The Very Good Gospel – Harper
Rooted – Liebscher
Crucial Conversations – Patterson, etc.
The New Jim Crow – Alexander
The Bible Tells Me So… – Enns
The Pastor – Peterson
When your father dies – Veerman and Barton
Extreme Ownership – Willink and Babin

So many good reads here. (Speaking of goodreads, see below if you want to connect there.) The theme of the year seems to be going deeper inside myself. I read a lot about emotional health (Scazzero books), about healthy rhythms and rest (Intentional Living, Addicted to Busy, How to be Here), and about calling and purpose (Rooted, The Pastor, The Heroic Path) and ultimately about grief and understanding loss (When Your Father Dies).

I love to read leadership books and this year was no exception. Probably my favorite in that department was a less traditional leadership book – Band of Brothers. I had finally watched the show by the same name this year on Netflix and so reading the book was me wanting more. I gleaned so much from the real life examples of this incredible group of men.

I tried to be intentional this year in learning and growing in my understanding of injustice. I’ve only just begun that journey but I was so moved by The New Jim Crow and The Very Good Gospel. The first was an incredibly eye-opening journey into inequality and injustice in current day America and the second was a more theological journey. Both have left a lasting impression on me.

I think my favorite book I read this year was “The Pastor.” It was written by Eugene Peterson (The Message translation author). It’s a memoir of his life and calling and the ways he wrestled with the role God gave him as a pastor. It’s packed full of wisdom from a man who has done this a very long time. I’m deeply grateful for his wisdom and insight and will come back to it a lot I’m sure.

So there’s the list. What would you recommend I put on my list for 2017?

**Connect with me on GoodReads here.

In Uncategorized

When the pastor is wrong

August 29, 2016 — Leave a comment

Some Monday mornings I wake up and wonder “Did I really say that yesterday?” Usually it’s more of a situation where I wish I had made my point clearer, or maybe not said that one joke that seemed to bomb. And then there’s today.

Yesterday at STORYCHURCH I shared the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000. Somewhere during the message I went out of my way to make the point that the Sunday school song and story we had all learned about the little boy offering his lunch was, in fact, not real. In my preparation for the message I read through Matthew, Mark, and Luke’s account of the story and the boy is nowhere to be found.

But then this morning…. I started having doubts. Something seemed… fishy. A very quick (embarrassingly quick) google search pointed me to that pesky fourth gospel writer – John.

John 6:8-9
8 Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up, 9 “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?”

So there you have it. That dang little boy. Right there in John. With his five loaves and his two fish and his puppy dog eyes.

Gripes.

So here I am on a Monday morning, thankful for grace and laughing at myself. Hope that gives you a little laugh today as well!

In STORYCHURCH

Hearing God

April 25, 2016 — Leave a comment

I love the story of Samuel in the Old Testament. As a young boy he ends up serving in the temple under the priest Eli. Eli had grown old and his sons were out of control, but there was Samuel – faithfully doing what the priest should be doing.

There’s an interesting line at the beginning of 1 Samuel 3:

1 The boy Samuel ministered before the Lord under Eli. In those days the word of the Lord was rare; there were not many visions.

The word of the Lord was rare.

Ever felt like that? Like the word of the Lord was rare or even absent in your life? I’ve gone through seasons where I wondered if God was still listening. Or whether he was even present at all anymore.

In the story, Eli the priest seems to have given up hearing from God. The last time he heard from God it wasn’t good news and it’s almost as if he’s quit on everything. And so we see this interesting detail:

2 One night Eli, whose eyes were becoming so weak that he could barely see, was lying down in his usual place. 3 The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the house of the Lord, where the ark of God was. 4 Then the Lord called Samuel.

Did you catch that? Eli is in “his usual place” while Samuel is lying down “in the house of the Lord.” And guess who hears from God?

Here’s the thing. If the word of the Lord is rare in your life, maybe it’s because you are doing what you usually do. Maybe your “usual place” isn’t where you need to be. The truth is that if you do what you usually do, you’ll get what you usually get.

If you do what you usually do, you’ll get what you usually get.

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For me, I find that I hear most clearly from God when I get out of my usual routines and do something different. It’s when I get out on a lake to fish. When I go to another city and get away from my normal work for a few days. If the word of the Lord is rare in your life, break a routine. Fast, pray, change something. Take a different route home. Turn off the radio. Silence the social media. Go to a conference. Sit on a dock. Go for a walk.

I’m praying for you this week to hear the voice of God in your life.

*For a full message I did on this subject, check out this podcast.

In FOLLOWING discernment

New Song

March 17, 2016 — Leave a comment

A few days ago, Alastair Vance shared this song with me as we were working on planning our Easter services. It’s been on repeat ever since. I hope you’ll listen and if you’re a STORYCHURCHer I hope you’ll learn it – we’ll be singing it on Easter!

In STORYCHURCH

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