One of the great things about having older kids is the luxury of both time and expendable income they enjoy.  It affords them the luxury of cultural relevancy.  (I think that thing about being “connected” in that informational technology sort of way probably has something to do with that as well.)  When it comes to movies or music, they seem to be perpetually informed of the latest, greatest, and the “not to be missed”.

My wife and I took in the latest recommendation from the kids by catching a showing of “About Time” on a recent date night.  The trailer reveals the most important and determining plot element; the males of a family are given the privilege of traveling back in time.  The young protagonist uses his newly awakened ability to procure the girl of his dreams.  It was a story that was clever enough to hold my attention and infused with enough heart and sentimentality to hold my wife’s as well.

We started a 4-day weekend on Thursday with a group of men by having them think about some fundamental questions: Who am I?, Who is God?, & What does He think of me?

Knowing the true answers to these three very simple questions will change the balance of a man’s life.  If every man knew, with a deep kind of heart knowledge of God, that…

• They are known by Him
• They are loved by Him
• There is nothing they could ever do to make Him love them less
• And that, He has grand intentions for their lives

…the world would be a radically different place.  Families, neighborhoods, churches, companies, and even cities, would transform.  The need for psychiatrists, counselors, mood stabilizers, and every other manner we use to anesthetize that deep sense that we and everything else in the world is not okay, would diminish.  The necessity of so much that we institutionally provide for, would no longer exist.

One of the core convictions around our company is that it is imperative to have healthy leaders if you are going to have healthy organizations.  Given that one of our core mentors, Patrick Lencioni, believes that organizational health is the single greatest determinant of long-term success, trumping all other business proficiencies, practices, or disciplines, having healthy leaders is a pretty big deal.

I am currently preparing for a “boot camp” that starts this Thursday.  ”Boot camp” is the name we use for a 3 day men’s retreat where we deeply intersect with a man through the masculine journey.  It is a powerful redefining experience that allows many men the chance to break through the snare of the stories they’ve lived and find unprecedented clarity and healing.  It takes a tremendous amount of courage and conviction to make this trek.

There is that moment for every leader.  When hope and expectation becomes reality.  When time and energy invested seems to have taken root.  When all you have encouraged, desired, and hoped for, is reflected back to you.  It is fleeting and feels far too infrequent, but it is part of the essential air that leaders breathe.

Every parent has felt that great sense of satisfaction…the realization that our awkward attempts at leading a family weren’t an exercise in futility.  Despite so much evidence to the contrary (and the determined whispers of our enemy), that maybe the child set in front of us was going to turn out okay.  Reading one of my children’s blogs and seeing the quote above was one of those moments.

My friend Mitch writes a lot about the abundance of God’s Kingdom versus he economy of scarcity that dictates our Western culture.  When we all generatively govern out of the time, talents, and treasures we have all been given, we become stewards instead of leaders.  We become maximizers of life for the wellbeing of all people.  This is not only the privilege, but the mandate for all Christian leaders in their context.

Last week, we assembled a collection of folks around our “Purpose Project” idea.  They consisted of a consultant from the HR field, a “retired” sage with decades of experience, our current HR and administration managers, Scott, and I.  We used personal story, quotes, passages, and some multimedia, to paint a vision of what intending God’s purposes in the lives of all we govern (employ or lead in other contexts) might look like.

We saw them invigorated around God’s vision for providing stewardship over team members (employees) at the highest level.  We saw them grab the reins, form a subcommittee, circle part of the project, and take the ball to start running.