How To Conquer, In Love

As I suspected, my article “Priests Pray, Kings Conquer” has lent itself to a number of comments. Some encouraging others, not so encouraging.

The great thing about this blog is the intent is not to receive public approval. Frankly, I could care less. (Bob cares more than I do, for the record.) My goal is get you all to think, by sharing my personal journey of being a believer and running/owning a business.

Over the years, many have asked for principles or step by step to implement running a Christian business. Instead of principles, I find it better to share examples, allowing you to form your own processes. Let me explain what I mean.

In case you didn’t know this, our special forces in the US Military are the tip of the spear. The Navy SEALS, US Rangers, Green Beret, etc are on the front lines of the battle for our countries freedom.

If you’ve ever read any of the books (Chosen Solider, Lone Survivor) you would realize the overwhelming majority of our Special Forces soliders are believers. They are highly trained in numerous different skills. They can fire any gun, create bombs, survive the in the wilderness and are very smart. In many cases these young men are highly intelligent, many attending some of our best Universities.

When we insert special forces into say.. Afghanistan, it’s not how you would think. The members of the special forces grow beards like the locals, dress in the garb of the locals, eat their foods, speak their language, observe their customs.  They do not come in like in the movies and blow the crap out of everything. They assimilate into the society and become one of the locals. Building trust, helping out the locals and being of value to the community.  All with a gun by their side just in case.

They conquer in love.

Occasionally they will get into fire fights. They will be attacked. Guess what they do… they fight back. If shot at, they fire back, they kill their enemy. And if the enemy is wounded and when the fire fight is done, they offer medical services to the wounded enemy.

In WW II in the European theater, this was a common approach. The US Military would engage the enemy and after we won, we would then start helping their wounded survive, by offering medical treatment. One minute the solider was trying to kill the man, then next minute trying to save their life.

You see, we all want a set of principles and list of things to do as business owners. How much debt, if any should I have. What kind of compensation, what to do if a fellow believer does wrong, should we go public or not go public, how to handle unruly customers, blah, blah, blah.

Here’s my advice. If you are doing  business with a company that doesn’t even remotely know God. Maybe they have orgies in the office. Instead of not doing business with them, why not engage them in business. Why not come in and become special forces for the Kingdom of God. It’s what Paul, John, Peter and others did.  Just don’t engage in the orgies.

Don’t invite them to a Bible study. Just love them in the process they are in. Win their trust, do business with the company. Get to know the people you are in contact with at the company. Don’t have an agenda, just engage them in a conversation. Bring the Kingdom in that fashion.

If you are buying out an evil company, just take dominion. Do the deal, then gently over time, expose them to the teachings. Don’t use “Jesus said… or in John 12:3 -10… Just love them well.”

Some of you may say, I’m denying Christ. I’m not. I just have found it’s a whole lot easier to make in roads with people when you have their trust and aren’t playing the Jesus card.

Think of the special forces. Love these people. That’s Jesus called us to do. Love our neighbor as ourselves. Your neighbor can be the guy who is cheating on his wife, surfing porn and cheating the company finances. He may be your contact and direct person. Just love him well.

That’s just one way to conquer.

Popularity: 21%

It’s Not Black Or White

So often in our personal lives, our businesses, and our faith, we are always seeking out the question, “Who’s Right?” or “What’s Right?”.  This reduces all of life to deciding between 2 colors – black or white.  We refer to everything else as “gray area”.  In my 40 years of living, I believe that 99.9% of life is lived in the gray area.  Very few things can be reduced to 1 of 2 choices.  Last time I checked, God uses an entire color spectrum in his creation, so it’s rarely a black or white decision.

I am very close to a delicate situation occurring right now and I’ve been asked by several to provide some wise counsel on what “I thought was right”.  Every time I have discussed this matter, my answer has not changed – I said both parties are right, and both parties are wrong.  What’s missing from this situation is LOVE.

I said, if party A was showing love, they would be more sensitive to the entire scope of this person’s actions and approach the situation from a perspective of understanding and love versus accusation and forming a postion of being morally “right”.

Party B would understand that personal actions have consequences and ripple effects that are far more reaching than just in their own life, and a position within an organization comes with some written, and unwritten rules.

But far more important than determining who is more right in this situation, I’ve given my opinion that while love appears to be the motivation, love is not the motivation – at least for all those affected.  More than that, I told several people that in most situations like this, you can never come to a consensus or acceptable common ground because of the complexity and emotions involved.

I want to refer to a blog post i read today from Steve McVey.  The entire post can be read at http://gracewalkministries.blogspot.com/2010/07/musings-of-middle-aged-man.html

For a long time, I thought life was all about right and wrong. “Do right and teach others to do right.” That was my aim. It was the template through which I reared my children, through which I taught my congregation, through which I evaluated myself and others. But I was wrong – seriously wrong. To live that way is to live from “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”
Life isn’t about right behavior. Life is about loving relationships. We came into being out of a loving relationship among the members of the Trinity and we exist for loving relationships with Him and with each other.

By God’s grace, I’m done with judging people. I’ve learned I can’t even change me, let alone somebody else. I want to just love people, no matter who they are, how they live, what they believe or anything else that used to separate me from others created and loved by our Father. Their behavior isn’t my business. That’s up to God. Loving them is my business.

Jesus came to show us the Father’s love. If He thought it worthy to spend His life doing that very thing, then I assume there’s no higher use of my life than to do the same. I still find myself looking at people through the condescending eyes of judgment sometimes, but I’m asking my Father to free me from that and I’m seeing progress.

I want to love my family with agape love. I want to love my friends that way. I want to love strangers that way. I even want to love those who see me as the enemy that way. It’s a God-sized goal and only He can make it happen in me, but I’m trusting that He will do that very thing.

I just thought Steve nailed it, and I always appreciate God’s timing on providing us wisdom from others when we need confirmation.

Matt and I have blogged often that life and business is not about finding a formula, a set of principles, or the secret door.  We all think that we can solve all of our personal and business problems by finding the right answers and following them.  Unfortunately, the Kingdom does not operate that way.   We operate in a place where up is down and left is right.  Answers are not found in books, they are found in a person and unlocked in loving relationships.  This is what makes God sing over his Kingdom.  His relationship with us, and our relationships with others.  He unlocks the mysteries of the universe and life through himself and through those he connects us with in our lifetime.

So let’s not go through life trying to BE RIGHT or FIND THE RIGHT ANSWER. If we miss the love, we miss the answers.  We also miss an opportunity when we choose to seek truth over love, and we might even lose a relationship.

What do you think?

Popularity: 79%

The Need to Fire Employees by Phil Cooke

I read this post on Phil Cooke’s blog at http://www.philcooke.com/firing.  This is very instructive for business owners, especially Christian Business owners.  I’ll post my comments at the end of the guest post.

Ever struggled with firing someone? I was teaching media professionals in Santiago, Chile a few years ago, and found this post I had written shortly after the visit. One morning before class, I was reading in the last section of Acts 15 and the beginning of the next chapter from the New Testament. It was about a division that arose over a potential partner in ministry:

36- “Then after some days Paul said to Barnabas, “Let us now go back and visit our brethren in every city where we have preached the word of the Lord, and see how they are doing.” 37 Now Barnabas was determined to take with them John called Mark. 38 But Paul insisted that they should not take with them the one who had departed from them in Pamphylia, and had not gone with them to the work. 39 Then the contention became so sharp that they parted from one another. And so Barnabas took Mark and sailed to Cyprus; 40 but Paul chose Silas and departed, being commended by the brethren to the grace of God. 41 And he went through Syria and Cilicia, strengthening the churches.”
(NKJV)

It’s interesting that Paul and Barnabas were a team up to that point, but for their next journey, Barnabas wanted to include someone named John (called Mark). But Paul knew that John had left them once before – in other words, (and for whatever reason), he just couldn’t cut it at the level they were working.

I’m sure Barnabas wanted to be sensitive an give him more chances. He probably said something like “But he has a good heart, he loves God, and should go with us.” But Paul absolutely stood his ground – not willing to take someone who had quit on them or not produced in the past. So they decided to go two different ways. Paul chose Silas – someone with a proven past – and Barnabas took John called Mark with him.

Then I did a search, and discovered that that’s the last time you hear anything at all about Barnabas and his work with John (called Mark.) It may have been successful, but considering how much the Bible had mentioned him earlier, if it was successful, I tend to think it would have been recorded in some way. On the other hand, Paul went on to another 12 chapters of journeys, exploits, and success for the Kingdom of God, and yet the trip Barnabas and John called Mark took is never mentioned again.

That’s when I was struck by the gravity of hiring employees, shaping the members of our team, and building departments in the hope of becoming more effective. In the book “Good to Great – Why Some Companies Make the Leap, and Others Don’t” by Jim Collins, he uses the analogy of a school bus. He believes the key to a successful organization is:

1) Getting the right people on the bus
2) Getting them in the right seats
3) And getting the wrong people off the bus

Chances are, what you’re doing in hiring, firing, and developing the team around you is probably more critical and important than even you might realize. I don’t know your particular situation, but as leadership expert John Maxwell would put it, developing the leaders around you is the most important aspect of your job.

My point? In the Christian community, we all tend to be compassionate when it comes to firing people, and as a result, our churches, ministries, and religious media organizations are filled with people who are unqualified, unenthusiastic, and costing us money, time, and momentum. If you encounter an employee who is detrimental to achieving your vision – for whatever reason – by all means help him or her, but first – get them “off the bus” so they stop becoming an obstacle to the forward movement of the organization. Believe me – all the other employees know that person is a problem, and it’s most likely causing great anxiety and resentment. So by all means, get them help if they want it, but first, get them off the team and replace them with someone who values your vision, and is committed to seeing that vision accomplished.

I’d like to hear from anyone who’s experienced anxiety over firing anyone, but who discovered that once it was done, it was the right thing for the organization…

I encourage you to visit Phil’s blog at http://www.philcooke.com/firing and enter your own comments.  Here’s what I commented:

Phil, You’re spot on. I had to fire several people in the past year, both for performance reasons and for financial. Firing someone was the hardest, most emotional thing I ever had to do. I was physically sick about it, but this person was not catching the vision, was mishandling client relationships, and costing me money – but yet I wanted to be gracious. I misunderstood was grace was. That by enabling this person, I was doing damage to her, to my clients, to my other staff, and to me. It had to be done. Doesn’t mean we don’t love the people, it can be done in love, but when it has to be done. It has to be done.

What do you think?

Popularity: 100%

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