Category Archives: ministry

I’m Tired of Happy Christians

Posted by chriswilliamsde on

I’m tired of happy Christians.  I am not saying that want them to be unhappy; only that I think it is time for Christians to start being real with each other and the world around them.

Over the course of my Christian experience I have bumped into people who, as followers of Christ, have lost the ability to stay in touch with real emotions. They walk through life with a smile, a prayer, and a few memory verses they can quote to negate any bad feeling they or another person might have. At the top of their arsenal of Scripture verses are “All things work together for good for those who love the Lord.” This is the emotional trump card.

Your closest loved one just died in a tragic automobile accident…All things work together for good for those that love the Lord!

You are experiencing a dark period in your life as you battle depression…All things work together for good!

You were just diagnosed with cancer…All things work together for good!

Your business is failing…You guessed it…All things work together for good!

To be sure, I believe that God has good purposes for those who are committed to them and if we stay open to him in those circumstances we can discover those purposes and learn lessons that help us mature. In question here is not the truth of Scripture or the validity of this theological proposition. Rather, I am disappointed with how this verse is used to sweep hurtful circumstances and painful experiences under the rug as if they are not real and do not matter.

Life is hard.  Emotions are real.  And things that we experience in life bring hurt and pain. It is not unChristian to feel bad when bad things happen to us. It is human.

And guess what?  Christians are human.

Mature Christians have emotional integrity.  They feel what they are experiencing and they honor the feelings of others by entering into that feeling with them.  Instead of covering over it with a smile and a verse they decide to “weep with those who weep and rejoice with those who rejoice” (Rom. 12:15).

Cultivating Emotional Integrity

So how do we cultivate emotional integrity? Let me suggest a few ways I am attempting to grow my emotional integrity.

1. Slow down and pay attention. 

Life moves quickly and we are busy people. We move too fast to feel. We don’t take the time to reflect and we do not allow ourselves the space to explore our feelings. One thing I am doing to re-awaken my emotional awareness is a practice I picked up from Julie Cameron in her book The Artist’s Way. She details a journaling ritual called morning pages. This writing experience done every day, first thing in the morning, requires you to write with pen on paper for three pages. This is not polished writing; it is stream of consciousness, or whatever comes to mind.

I began the practice with much skepticism and the first few days it did not do too much for me. However, I stuck with it and after the first week my writing began to explore deeper issues. I found that I was stepping back to view situations and circumstances from a different perspective. And then something wonderful and dreadful happened. I became aware of my feelings. This is a healthy thing, but it is also scary, especially when I had for so long been too busy to feel anything. Clearly, this writing practice does not magically make a person emotional mature, but it does help a person slow down every day to pay attention to what is happening and how it feels. This is where the journey to emotional integrity begins.

2. Listen to yourself and others.

You cannot feel what you are experiencing or honor the feelings of others if you do tune into those emotions. This requires you to listen. Listen to the internal conversation you are having with yourself as you walk through various situations in your day. What are you telling yourself? How are physically responding to the situation? Is your heart rate increasing? Are you tensing up? Is your blood boiling? Are you feeling sad or afraid or distressed?  Listen to yourself and what you are feeling.

As you begin to slow down and listen to yourself you will begin to cultivate the ability to listen to others around you.  Listen for the emotions that are running behind the words they are saying.  As you respond to them, don’t just respond to the words; connect with the emotions they are expressing.

When a person vents to you about how busy they have been and how they are running from one thing to another and wondering if they are going to get it all done.  You can respond by saying, “Slow down, relax, make a list, and do one thing at a time.  You’ll get it done.”  This may be good advice.  But if you want to connect with them at an emotional level, you can identify the feelings you’ve heard them express.  ”This is a stressful time for you.  It sounds like you are carrying a heavy load during this season.  How can I be helpful to you?”

The first response offers sound advice that may be helpful.  The second response makes a connection and allows the other person to know that you have heard them.  The first response keeps you as the advice giver separate from the other person; you remain outside their situation as a teacher.  The second response places you next to them in the circumstance; you enter into their situation as a servant.  People with emotional integrity hear the other person, enter into their situation, identify with what they are feeling, and take on the posture of a servant ready to help.

3.  Sit with the questions.

Some of the most raw emotions I have experienced in my own life or when dealing with others have come as I have confronted hard questions about life, tragedy, failure, pain, and loss.  Where is God?  Why did this happen?  If God is good, how could he allow this to occur?  The temptation for the happy Christian is to avoid these tough questions with one of those syrupy smiles and a rote response from Scripture.  As I have asked my questions, I have been on the receiving end of some of these ill-timed happy responses.  Instead of feeling loved and cared for I have felt belittled, minimized, and overlooked.  Fortunately, I have had some key individuals who have had the ability to sit with my questions.  They didn’t try to answer them or even respond to them.  They just acknowledged that I was raising a tough question and that they did not have an answer for me.  This allowed me to face those questions instead of feeling guilty for asking them.  Learning to sit with questions that you and others have is a mark of emotional integrity.

Help Me Think More Fully About Emotional Integrity

What thoughts do you have on the concept of emotional integrity?  I’d love to hear your insights, questions, and practical ideas for how to cultivate this aspect of our character.  Leave a comment below and enrich the conversation.

Executive Book Summary: The Truth About Leadership

Posted by chriswilliamsde on

Book Summary

The Truth about Leadership: The No-fads, Heart-of-the-Matter Facts You Need to Know is a book about leadership fundamentals.  Kouzes and Posner have rolled their 30 years of experience research, writing, and presenting on leadership into this very readable guidebook to the art and skill of leading.  In preparation for a speech they were to deliver they sought to highlight some groundbreaking discovery they had recently made on leadership.  As they thought and wrestled over the writing of this speech they were struck by the fact that over their 30 years of experience the fundamentals remained the same.  They captured the fundamentals in 10 “truths” about leadership.  Each chapter of the book expounds on one of the ten truths highlighted below.

Ten Truths About Leadership

1.  You make a difference.

“Before you can lead other, you have to lead yourself and believe that you can have a positive impact on others.  You have to believe that your words can inspire and your actions can move others.  You have to believe that what you do counts for something.  If you don’t, you won’t even try.  Leadership begins with you.” (p. 1)

2.  Credibility is the foundation of leadership.

“Leadership begins with you and your belief in yourself.  Leadership continues only if other people also believe in you.” (p. 15)

3.  Values drive commitment.

“People want to know your values and beliefs, what you really care about, and what keeps you awake at night.  They want to know what drives you, what makes you happy, and what ticks you off.  They want to understand your personal story.  They want to know why they ought to be following you.” (p. 29)

4.  Focusing on the future sets leaders apart.

“The capacity to imagine and articulate exciting future possibilities is the defining competence of leaders.  Leaders are custodians of the future.  They are concerned about tomorrow’s world and who will inherit it.” (p. 45)

5.  You can’t do it alone.

“Leaders are here to serve others, and not the other way around.” (p. 61)

6.  Trust rules.

“Trust rules your personal credibility.  Trust rules your ability to get things done.  Trust rules your team’s cohesiveness.  Trust rules your organization’s innovativeness and performance.  Trust rules your brand image.  Trust rules just about everything you do.” (p. 75)

7.  Challenge is the crucible for greatness.

“The historical leaders whom people admire most always faced and led others through major challenges.” (p. 91)

8.  You either lead by example or you don’t lead at all.

“Walk the talk, practice what you preach, put your money where your mouth is, and follow through on your promises…they all mean the same thing.  Your actions had better be consistent with your words.  In the final analysis, people believe what you do over what you say.” (p. 106)

9.  The best leaders are the best learners.

“The potential to lead exists in you.  If you apply your head, your heart, and your courage, you can learn to lead.” (p. 119)

10.  Leadership is an affair of the heart.

“Nothing important ever gets done without heart.  Purely and simply, exemplary leaders excel at improving performance because they pay great attention to the human heart.” (p. 135)

Top Twelve Quotes

“Leadership is a demanding, noble discipline not to be entered into frivolously or casually. It requires an elevated sense of mastery. And, you can do it. It’s a matter of technique, of skill, of practice. It’s also a matter of desire and commitment.”

“Myth and legend treat leadership as if it were the private reserve of a very few charismatic men and women. Nothing is further from the truth. Leadership is much more broadly distributed in the population, and it’s accessible to anyone who has passion and purpose to change the way things are.”

“Everything you need to be a successful leader you already have: your intelligence to see an issue and a way to fix it, your heart to stay motivated, and your courage not to give up. You can’t look for the man behind the curtain to solve your concerns. Everything you need you already have. It’s all about taking the first step.”

“No one can make you a leader, either. You have to take that first step for yourself. You have to be willing to take actions that others will want to follow.”

“Only credible leaders earn commitment, and only commitment builds and regenerates great organizations and communities.”

“Before anyone is going to willingly follow you—or any other leader—he or she wants to know that you are honest, forward-looking, inspiring, and competent.”

“If you don’t believe in the messenger, you won’t believe the message.”

“If people are going to willingly follow you, it is because they believe you are credible.  To be credible in action, you must do what you say you will do.”

“The brick walls are there for a reason. They’re not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something.”

“While leadership can be learned, not everyone learns it, and not all those who learn leadership master it. Why? Because to master leadership you have to have a strong desire to excel, you have to believe strongly that you can learn new skills and abilities, and you have to be willing to devote yourself to continuous learning and deliberate practice. No matter how good you are, you can always get better.”

“Leaders put their hearts in their businesses and their businesses in their hearts.”

“To become the best leader you can be, you have to fall in love with the work you are doing and with the reason you are doing it.”

Personal Reflection

As I read this book I was reminded of three key concepts that shape my own leadership.

First, leadership flows out of who I am.  In order to lead, I need to be credible and trustworthy.  In order to be credible and trustworthy, I must be a person of character.  Who I am plays a major role in determining the quality of the leadership I provide.  I cannot develop my leadership without working on the interior aspects of my spirituality, character, and integrity.

Second, leadership requires continual learning and ongoing development.  Leadership is made up of key practices and behaviors.  Kouzes and Posner make it clear that these aspects of leadership can be learned if a person is committed to the journey of personal growth and development.  To faithfully steward my calling and capacity as a leader, I must keep learning, stretching, growing, and developing.

Third, leadership is done with others for others.  Leaders rally people.  They forge unity.  They shape culture.  They build teams.  They inspire commitment to a greater cause.  They give of themselves and compel others to do the same.  They work with others to accomplish things that help others.  This is what makes leadership a noble pursuit.

How About You?

As you read this book summary and reflect on the key ideas presented here, what thoughts about leadership do you have?  What strikes you about these leadership truths?  What resonates?  What causes dissonance?  Share your thoughts below.  I’d love to hear from you.

Facing Myself

Posted by chriswilliamsde on

Facing Yourself and Discovering You Don’t Like What You See

Recently I read a post from Donald Miller that resonated with me.  In particular, it put words to what happened to me in July 2011.  In this post (What Happens When You Stop Running), he spoke of his attempt to keep up the facade that all was okay by continuing to push and run and be productive.  It took a friend to call him on it and challenge him to stop running and face himself.

Last July, we returned from a three week vacation.  That’s right…three whole weeks.  We spent time with my in-laws at their lake home in northern Wisconsin.  The weather was great, the activities were fun, and the schedule was relaxing.  I should have returned home rested and ready to conquer the next season of leadership.  Instead, I came home empty.

This summer getaway has been a tradition for the last several years of our lives and each year when I return from this mini-sabbatical I am geared up for leadership and recharged to conquer the next frontier of ministry.  I expected a similar experience this past year, but it was not to be.  I was tired.  Not tired like I just needed a good night of sleep, but utterly exhausted in every way.  For the first time in my life I was completely disengaged.  I did not want to get out bed, did not want to be around people, did not want to spend time with God, did want to go to work.  I did not want to do anything.

The three weeks of vacation did not offer me the renewal I had hoped for, but it did fulfill an important role in my journey.  It helped me to stop running and face myself.  It caused me to slow down enough to consider who I was and what I had become.  It gave me space to reflect on the meaning and purpose of my life.  I had stopped running.  I faced myself.  And I did not like what I saw.

The Backstory

The year prior to my July meltdown had been a crazy season.  In May of 2010 I was pastoring a church and making strategic plans for the next phase of development there when I received an out-of-the-blue offer to take a new role at the district level in my denomination.  This new opportunity was a great opportunity to more closely align my role with my life purpose while at the same time expanding my platform for influence.  It was not an easy decision though.  I loved the church and the people I was leading…I still do.  I did not want to leave them.  Yet, God had opened the door for me to move on and confirmed in my own heart that I should.  So, with excitement, anticipation, and a great deal of pain, I said “yes” to this new role.

Two weeks after saying “yes” I started my new role.  One month after starting the new position our family moved from Frankford, DE to Annapolis, MD.  Moving is stressful.  Moving a family of five, two weeks before school starts is even more stressful.  But we did it and lived to tell the tale.  The week after we moved, my next seminary course started.  Did I mention that it was a crazy year?

So for the next 9 months I, along with my family, went through the ups and downs of transitioning to a new community, new school system, and new ministry role.  We were busy as a family.  I was busy as a ministry leader.  Too busy to face myself.

Crumbling from the Inside Out

The transition, along with an insane level of busyness and the stress of a steep learning curve associated with my new role, sapped my energy and changed my approach to life.  One by one, key disciplines and rituals fell away.  First, I reduced my sleep to unhealthy levels.  I was, as they say, burning the candle at both ends.  I was getting up (or at least trying to get up) at five in the morning and retiring to bed at eleven or twelve each night.  Five hours sleep works for a little while, but it is not a long-term strategy for a rested body and healthy life.  My limited sleep was being offset by my “weekend crash.”  I would sleep late on Saturdays and take long naps during the afternoons on the weekend.  This took me away from time with my wife and kids on the days when they were home.

Over time, I decided that I would sleep a little longer.  Until six or six-thirty each day.  To manage this adjustment, I gave up working out.  This was the second ritual to fall away.  I was getting slightly more sleep (six hours a night) but my overall energy continued to decline as my physical health decreased.

The third ritual to fall away was my personal time with God.  I had for twelve years been a pastor with a solid routine for time with God.  My schedule was flexible and I had cultivated the practice of setting aside a chunk of time every morning to be with God.  In my new role, my list of things to do had grown exponentially overnight and much of my work was done at my desk.  My schedule was more demanding and my workflow had changed.  I underestimated this aspect of my transition.  In order to stay on top of the tasks on my to-do lists, I simply started going to work earlier and staying later.  I was focused on getting things done.  Unfortunately, one of the things that wasn’t getting done was my investment in growing my relationship with God.  Time in the Word became limited to seminary assignments and prayer was non-existent.

As these three disciplines began to fall away, the pressure began to build.  I wanted to carry my responsibilities faithfully.  I wanted to be effective and fruitful.  I wanted to do a good job.  Yet, I was neglecting the internal aspects of who I was.  Like a house that puts up the appearance that all is well while the termites are eating away the structure that supports it, my life looked good from the outside while my insides were being hollowed out.  When I returned from vacation in July, I realized that I was empty inside and that my life was crumbling in on itself because there was no longer any structure to support it.  I was crumbling from the inside out.

The Wake-Up Call

A week or so after we returned from vacation, I had a very restless night.  The weight of my crumbling life was pressing on me and I could not sleep.  I was afraid, broken, hurting, and hopeless.  In those early moments of that morning, I uttered desperate words to my wife: “I cannot go on like this anymore.”  For the next couple of hours we sat out in our screened-in porch discussing the reality of my situation.  I was tired, lonely, passionless, spiritually dry, and searching for purpose and meaning.  Was this a mid-life crisis?  A nervous breakdown?  Was I losing my mind?  Visions of straight-jackets and padded rooms crossed my mind more than once.

I shared with my beautiful bride that night that I needed help.  That I could not find a way out on my own.  Her response?  ”I cannot help you through this.”  She wasn’t saying that she wouldn’t be there for me.  She was only responding honestly that this was beyond her capacity to help me.  She was forthrightly encouraging me to pursue help from trained and skilled professionals.  Her honesty served as a crystal clear wake-up call for me.  This was serious and demanded high-priority attention.

The Recovery Journey Begins

The next morning I emailed a friend of mine who works at Life Counseling Center and asked her for a referral to a counselor.  She responded back quickly with a couple of names and a recommendation.  I made the call to the counseling center and set an appointment for the following week.  Next up, I sent an email to a mentor of mine, Umfindisi Jim Lo, asking him to serve as my spiritual director through this process.  After securing a counselor and a spiritual director, I contacted a couple of friends and asked them to pray for me specifically regarding this situation I was experiencing.  I then informed my boss of what I was going through and the steps I was taking to seek recovery.  He offered his full support, earnest prayers, and an always open door.  Finally, I committed to three simple disciplines that I would engage in throughout the process to help me find the renewal I desperately needed.  I would journal every day, read and reflect on Scripture, and spend time in listening prayer to tune into the voice of God again (I will be writing about these disciplines in an upcoming post).

These simple steps were not without challenge or setbacks.  The daily disciplines were not always practiced. The recovery was not quick, and at times did not seem possible, but the journey to recovery had begun.  It would be a full five months before I could say that renewal was in full-swing.  It would be a full-five months before I could face myself and begin again to like what I was seeing.  To be clear, there is still much that I see that I do not like.  Recovery is not complete and there is still work to be done, but the recovery journey has begun and is progressing.

Upcoming Posts

I have just begun processing all that has occurred in my life since July of 2011.  I am going to be writing a series of posts related to my experience.  Here are a few posts that are on my writing docket:

I’d Like to Hear From You

What has been your experience with stopping to face yourself?  What have you learned about seeking renewal?  What disciplines aid you in staying charged up, ready to serve and lead?

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