Archive - January, 2010

21 Ways to Upgrade Your Relationships (Part 1)

January 28, 2010 in Family/Marriage, Relationships with 5 Comments

I was once in a conversation with a man who was very critical and derogatory toward another man. I gathered he had experienced something very negative with this man and now he resented the guy. Sometime later, I saw these two men together. The man who had made these cutting remarks was now smiling and behaving as if they were good friends. It was a strange contrast with what I had witnessed earlier.   

We are in a variety of relationships with others including:

Spouse

Parents

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Friends

Co-workers

Extended family members

People in our church

Yet, many of our relationships rock along, year after year, with very little attention or energy invested.

This series is about upgrading our relationships. What are some practical ways to invest in the relationships that really matter?

Consider these 21 ways to upgrade your relationships:

1. Take inventory of some of the relationships that are most significant to you. How would you rate your marriage right now? How would your spouse rate this same relationship? Is there a relationship with one of your children that is either strained or non-existent? Is this a relationship in which your own renewed investment of time, energy, and attention might make a significant difference? What about your friendships? Is there a friend with whom you need to take the initiative to reconnect?

2. Choose a person (spouse, child, friend) today and do something that communicates to this person that you value her.

3. Make a list of 5 to 10 people who are important to you. List how each of these people adds value to your life. Thank God for each person. Communicate your gratitude to at least one person this weekend.

(to be continued)


Question:

What have you found to be helpful toward upgrading your relationships?

Burying Those Feelings Never Works

January 26, 2010 in Emotional Maturity, Self-Care, Stress with 12 Comments

There is often a high price to pay when you bury your feelings.

Feelings exist.

I may not like these feelings.

I may not feel comfortable with these feelings.

I may be very uneasy by what I am feeling.

I can try to bury my feelings but they will not stay buried. At some point in time, they will surface again. Quite often when they do surface, they impact us in negative ways.

Consider:

*Your father dies of cancer. A few months after his funeral, you lose your job. Then, to top this off, your daughter files for divorce. One day you say to a close friend, “I don’t think that I have really begun to grieve the death of my father. So much has gone on in the last few months. There has been so much loss.”

*You are a minister in a church. You are so tired. It seems like there has been loss after loss. You have done one funeral per month in the last twelve months. A few of these were people you knew well and loved. You really don’t feel as if you ever grieved any of these deaths. You were too busy trying to deal with the conflict in your church. You’ve experienced conflict before in churches but this was particularly hurtful. You learned that a man you thought one of your best friends in the church was being openly critical toward your ministry and was accusing you personally of lacking integrity.

*You dated this girl while both of you were students at the university. To this day, you can’t figure out why you stayed together so long. She was manipulative and untrustworthy. Again and again, she cheated on you with other guys. Now, several years later, you find yourself in a similar relationship. You wonder what you are doing to attract these kinds of people. Some very negative feelings are starting to surface that you thought long ago were buried. You never went to counseling after this traumatic first relationship or even process these feelings with another person.

Feelings may be buried for a time but eventually they will bubble up and surface.

Recently I was reading a post by Anne Jackson in which she mentions an important lesson she learned in an English class regarding feelings and expressing them:

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As I entered into my last semester of high school in the spring of 1997, I was in an abusive relationship, was still lonely from moving, and had nowhere to turn.

It was also that semester when my senior English class had a student teacher from a local university. His project for us was to keep a journal every day for that semester.

My journal entries started out more like a diary:

“Went to school. Skipped third and fourth period. Went to work. Did homework. Went to bed.”

“It’s my brother’s birthday. I forgot.”

However, we didn’t just keep the journal in class. We read literature and we studied grammar and we wrote an endless amount of book reports. And I don’t remember the context, but at some point mid-semester, the student teacher said something in class that I’ll never forget.

“When you feel something, no matter how good or bad it is, feel it as deeply as you can. And remember it. Write it down.”

Now that last line really struck me. In fact, I read it several times. This is so much healthier than doing what I have done on far too many occasions when I have attempted to bury feelings.

So what prompts us to bury our feelings?

  1. We may hear old messages from the past. “You really shouldn’t feel this way.” “If you really loved the Lord, you wouldn’t have these feelings.” On and on it goes. Such messages can encourage one to bury feelings.
  2. We may decide that being “nice” is a primary value. Consequently, being nice is placed at the front of the line. If feelings don’t seem to harmonize with being nice then they are buried. Some ministers particularly get into trouble with this one, thinking that they are called to be nice (even toward someone who is rude, ill-mannered, and behaves like a jerk). Note that Jesus does not model being nice. He models what it means to be a loving person.
  3. We may be afraid of these feelings. Some feelings like grief, shame, and loss are very painful and quite difficult.

Question:

When have you been tempted to bury your feelings? Have you experienced the futility of attempting to bury your feelings?

  

Questions that Some Ministers are Never Asked

January 21, 2010 in Ministry with 9 Comments

I’ll admit it.questions.jpg

I like ministers.

Well, at least most of them. Yes, some of them (us?) can be difficult to like. There are some ministers who behave unethically and even immorally. Some do not treat their congregations right.   

Yet, It also concerns me when I hear the stories of how poorly some ministers and their families are treated. In fact, in some instances, it is downright shameful! I am thinking about good men and women who are treated thoughtlessly.

Many times, we just don’t think. We don’t think about these men and women who would be encouraged greatly by being asked some good questions by elders and/or others in the congregation.

The follow are questions that some ministers are never asked:

1. How are you really doing? (Some people are rarely if ever asked how they are really doing.)

2. Is there anything we could do as a church that would bring more joy to your life?

3. What could we (elders/staff ministers/key people) do that might bring greater satisfaction to you in your ministry?

4. Is your salary sufficient? Are we, as a church, providing for your financial needs adequately?

5. Do you feel like this is a good place for your spouse and children?

6. Are there ways that we (perhaps unknowingly) put roadblocks before you, making your ministry and life difficult?

7. Is there anything about your work and ministry here that is particularly hard on your family life? If so, is there a way that we could work together to make this a better situation for everyone?

8. What part of your work is energy producing and life giving? What aspect of your work is draining and energy depleting?

9. Do you believe that you are using your best gifts in your ministry here? What would you really like to be doing?

10. Is there an “elephant” in the room (this congregation) that impacts you personally that really needs to be addressed?     

Now obviously, this is a two-way street. Ministers have responsibilities as well and need to be thoughtful regarding the elders, their co-workers, and others in the congregation.Yet for now, I want to suggest that these are some questions that some ministers are never asked.


Question:

What question would you add to this list?


I Have Heard So Many Secrets

January 15, 2010 in Books, Family/Marriage with 14 Comments

Through the years, as a minister, I have sat with person after person and listened to sad, difficult stories.closingtime.jpg

I have heard so many secrets.

  • The alcoholic father who told me of his affair with his high school daughter’s friend.
  • The foster children who told me of a cruel woman who isolated them in a basement each evening, while the rest of the family ate dinner together. Later, they were brought the family’s leftovers.
  • The mother who grew up constantly hearing critical, demeaning words from her mother.
  • The man, who as a child, had lived with a brutal, bullying father. Yet at church, his father was perceived to be very godly.
  • The young woman who told me of the abortion she had while in college and how she had lived with this secret for several decades.

I am reading Joe Queenan’s memoir, Closing Time .

It is the story of a boy who grew up in a Philadelphia housing project. He and his three sisters are forced to make do. They live with their father and mother in an atmosphere that does not feel emotionally or physically safe. Their mother repeatedly said to her children that she wished she had never had children. Their mother seemed emotionally disconnected from the family. Meanwhile, their father was a violent man — especially when he drank:

My father got broke when he was young, and he never got fixed. He may have wanted to be a good father, a good husband, a good man, but he was not cut out for that job. He liked to drink, and unlike some men who like to drink, it was the only thing he liked to do. Among our relatives, he had a reputation as a happy-go-lucky fellow who, once he got a few beers in him, would turn into the life of the party. He was not the life of our party. Most of the time he was already dead drunk when he came home from work, spoiling for a fight with whoever crossed him first. (p. 7)

What memories.

His father, when he was drunk, beat his children, quite often. The rest of the family, instead of condemning such behavior, seemed more interested in providing excuses for such behavior. Queenan says that, “Manufacturing excuses for my father’s behavior was a family industry.” (p. 9)

Does this kind of excuse-making sound familiar to you?

Do you know what it is to have been hurt, abused, cheated, betrayed by family or friends and then have loved ones make excuses for such behaviors?

  • “Your daddy is under a lot of stress and he sometimes explodes when he is home.”
  • “Now I’m not saying I agree with what he did. But you haven’t been the best wife either.”
  • “You should not have upset your mother. If you kids would straighten up, she wouldn’t act that way.”
  • “Well, he probably didn’t really mean to say those things. He just looses his temper when you don’t do what he wants.”
  • “Your husband is a good man. I’m sure the situation is not as bad as you describe it.”

What complicates this even further is when a husband/wife or father/mother is perceived to be a Christian by those in their church, and yet family members live with this person’s ruthless, manipulative behavior during the week.

Perhaps none of this is a part of your experience. You may, however, have witnessed this kind of behavior in other families.

Meanwhile, many people spend years working through the impact of these secrets on their thinking, their emotions, and their faith.


Question:

How do such secrets impact an adult in later years? How does excuse-making complicate life?



Haiti

January 14, 2010 in Prayer with 5 Comments

Destruction. Chaos. Poverty. Death.
 haiti.jpg

The pictures are haunting after this horrific earthquake.

Children alone in the ruble.

The wounded dazed and in shock wandering through the streets.

A nation, 700 miles from Miami, Florida, already the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere has now been ravaged by this disaster.

Meanwhile, we pray to God.

We look for practical ways to help. (Like here or here.)

We give these people the dignity they deserve as fellow human beings, created by God, by paying attention to what is happening there.

Feel free to add your own thought or prayer as a comment.

Do You Have an iPhone?

January 12, 2010 in Spiritual Life with 0 Comments

You can read this blog, “A Place For The God-Hungry” on your iPhone.iphone.jpg

You can find the app, “GodHungry,” at the iTunes store or go to the App Store on your iPhone. Once you install the app “GodHungry,” you will be able to read the most recent posts on my blog.

Enjoy!

WInning More Than a Game

January 11, 2010 in Leadership with 5 Comments

Some athletes win more than a game.

I have been a sports fan for as long as I can remember. My favorite team sport is football.

Every fall, I follow my favorite teams. I watch the games on television. I keep track of the standings. I read the sports pages. At the end of the season, some teams will stand out because they won. (Usually, these are not my teams. :) ) These teams will have won the big game. A college teams and a pro team will be designated as the best.

Yet, there are others who win. There are individuals who win the respect and the admiration of men and women across the nation because of their character. Coach Tony Dungy has made such a positive impact on people because of his character. His story can be read in his books, Quiet Strength and Uncommon: Finding Your Path to Significance. Hear him reflect on life in this video:

There are several college players who have recently encouraged many people through their character. I think of people like Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow (The University of Florida). Sam Bradford (The University of Oklahoma) and Colt McCoy (The University of Texas) are two positive examples. (See their “We are Second” video here.) I was impressed with Mark Ingram (The University of Alabama) and his humility as he accepted the Heisman Trophy. (See his Heisman speech here).

Just the other night, Alabama beat Texas in the BCS National Championship. Colt McCoy was injured in the opening moments of the game and did not play for the remainder of the game. Even though his team lost the game, McCoy continued to earn the respect of people across the nation as he shared these remarks:

No doubt, there are many, many other men and women athletes who could be listed in this post. I am grateful for these people who are visible before so many people and who represent good character.

They are winning more than a game.



Much Fear in Many Churches

January 5, 2010 in Fear with 35 Comments

Fear.  

It is everywhere! No, I am not talking about the fear of the Lord. Nor am I talking about any sort of healthy fear.

No, I am referring to another kind of fear — an unhealthy fear.

She sat just outside the main doors to our auditorium (sanctuary, worship center, etc.). She was in her late 40s, had alcohol on her breath, and looked as if she had been crying for days. The doors were open and the service was about to begin. She sat in a chair and refused to go in. She said something about not being worthy. She sat in that chair, legs crossed, and rocked.

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I knew this woman and some of her family. She was an alcoholic and had lived in much pain and had caused much pain for many years. She had lived a sad life.

Deep within this woman was much fear. She was fearful that God no longer loved her. She was afraid to stop drinking and afraid to continue. She had been hurt deeply by others. She had been through one broken marriage and wondered if she would be loved again.

Fear.

There is much fear in many churches. For example:

  • The fear of being known.
  • The fear of being known and then rejected.
  • The fear of being left out.
  • The fear of being seen as “less than.”
  • The fear of being discovered.
  • The fear of having another see my guilt.
  • The fear of having another see my ignorance.
  • The fear of having another see my insecurity.
  • The fear of having another see how fearful I really am.

On and on it goes.

When I first began working with a church as a minister, I remember feeling fear. I was afraid that people would be very disappointed if they knew that I didn’t have it all together. I was afraid that some would be disappointed that I wasn’t like the Apostle Paul or Peter, not to mention Jesus. No, I was a minister and was living as a Christ-follower. Yet, I was also me — just a regular guy.

Fear.

Fear has a way of keeping our relationships shallow and our friendships surface level. Fear has a way of keeping others at arm’s length, even those who appear to be safe.

What about you?

What kind of fear have you seen among Christian people?

  

Getting Out From Under the Clutter

January 4, 2010 in A New Year with 0 Comments

Today, the world’s tallest skyscraper opened in Dubai. It is 2,684 feet tall, with 160 floors. The building has space for 1,044 apartments, 49 floors of office space, as well as an Armani hotel. Supposedly, the 160 floor tower can be seen as far as 59 miles away.

The building was designed by a Chicago based firm. According to one structural and civil engineer with the firm, “We thought that it would be slightly taller than the existing tallest tower of Taipei 101. (Emaar) kept on asking us to go higher but we didn’t know how high we could go. We were able to tune the building like we tune a music instrument. As we went higher and higher and higher, we discovered that by doing that process… we were able to reach heights much higher than we ever thought we could ”

No doubt this building will receive the attention of a lot of people.

Today, is the first Monday of the new year.

Most of us are not beginning the year with a grand opening nor are we making headlines in some way. No, most of us are beginning the week doing the ordinary. We got up this morning and made a cup of coffee just as we do every day. Most will go to work and expect an ordinary day.

Yet, we might use this rhythm of time (this New Year) as an opportunity to pause for a moment and think about the way we have been living (2009) and the way we intend to live (2010).

One question to consider: Do I live in clutter? dubaitower.jpg

Maybe you know what it’s like to have a home that is cluttered. (No, I haven’t seen your garage.) In the house there might be stacks and piles of things: papers, magazines, and all sorts of gadgets. Rarely is there anything thrown away. Perhaps you have an office. Maybe there are stacks of papers or books on your desk.

Perhaps such clutter is not even an issue for you. Yet, there are many people whose lifestyles are very cluttered. Sometimes we find ourselves so busy that we feel like our lifestyles have become cluttered. When our children were growing up, they were involved in all kinds of extra activities and team sports. There were times when it just got to be too much. They (or we) has said “yes” to too many things. Does this sound familiar?    

Some of us may be constantly on the go. Yet, we may not be experiencing any depth at all in our lives. We simply skim the surface, bouncing from activity to the next. People have described such a lifestyle as: “… frustrating; like I can’t breathe; I feel like I’m under constant pressure; whatever I’m doing I feel like I should be somewhere else; I feel trapped; I hear the clock ticking; life is zooming by and I’m missing it.” In his book Margin, Richard Swenson writes:

People are tired and frazzled. People are anxious and depressed. People don’t have time to heal anymore. There is a psychic instability in our day that prevents peace from implanting itself very firmly in the human spirit.  

Beware of a cluttered mind that has no sense of purpose or mission.

Peggy Noonan wrote a terrific piece in the Wall Street Journal regarding the problem with organizations and institutions that have lost their mission or purpose:

And as all these institutions forgot their mission, they entered the empire of spin. They turned more and more attention, resources and effort to the public perception of their institution, and not to the reality of it.

Everyone gave their efforts to how things seemed and not how they were. Press secretaries, press assistants, media managers, public relations experts—they abound more than ever in our business and public life.


Question


When have you recognized that your life had become cluttered with too many activities, projects, etc.? What was helpful to you in addressing this problem?



Before You Move On With Another Year

January 1, 2010 in A New Year with 4 Comments

Yesterday, Charlotte and I spent the day in Austin. Much of the time was spent looking for another car. (My Ford Explorer was pronounced “near death” by our local auto repair shop.) We also spent time wandering through various stores, just enjoying the day. At lunch, we enjoyed a delicious pizza at Mandola’s Italian Market, a wonderful place to eat. It was an enjoyable, leisurely way to close out the year, the end of 2009.

So today is January 1, 2010

Before you continue on with life — pause for a moment.

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I know. There is nothing magical about a New Year. Yes, we talk about New Year’s resolutions and how those are often broken shortly after we make them. At the same time, the New Year is a wonderful time to pause and reflect on the past (2009) and consider the future (2010). The New Year is a part of the rhythm of our lives. Perhaps this is why I use this time each year to reflect on my life, both where I have been and where I seem to be going.

Questions:

I would love to hear your response to either/or both of these questions:

*What are you especially thankful for, as you reflect upon 2009?

*What is one of your prayer concerns as you anticipate 2010?