the green room:

a simple prospectus

henry luce and briton hadden already owned two publications; but they became fascinated with the title of a small fledgling magazine.  they couldnt care less for the magazine, all they wanted was the name. so for 93,000 dollars, they purchased the rights to use the name of this magazine and began dreaming about what the mission of this publication would be. below is the confidential prospectus for this new magazine: 

THE PURPOSE: To see life; to see the world; to eyewitness great events; to watch the faces of the poor and the gestures of the proud; to see strange things – machines, armies, multitudes, shadows in the jungle and on the moon; to see man's work – our paintings, towers and discoveries; to see things thousands of miles away, things hidden behind walls and within rooms, things dangerous to come to: the women that men love and many children; to see and to take pleasure in seeing; to see and be amazed; to see and be instructed; Thus to see, and to be shown, is now the will and new expectancy of half of humankind. To see, and to show, is the mission now undertaken by a new kind of publication, THE SHOW-BOOK OF THE WORLD…  

this new kind of publication is called LIFE magazine.

in 1936, henry luce penned this opening paragraph, inviting the world to see life in new ways.  for those who would never have the privilege to travel thousands of miles away could now see, be amazed and instructed by the realities of life.  i continue to find myself coming back to this prospectus, reading it over and over and imagining the sheer belief that luce must have had in the power of a great photo. 

if you had to write a prospectus for what you want to create, feel called to do, or are currently doing – what would you say?

Rhythms not balance

a lot of people talk about trying to find balance in life. for a season, my wife and I pursued this as well to only find this to be nearly impossible. i still remember us sitting at our dinner table struggling to figure out how to live a balanced life all the while neglecting the natural rhythms of student ministry, weather in michigan, and the culture of mars hill.

it finally dawned on us that we love the summers here in west Michigan; but struggle with the winters. mars hill students is pretty low key in the summers while in gears up for a huge kick off in the fall. september through the middle of october seem packed and then it feels calm until the beginning of december. this calm season allows me the opportunity to teach outside of the mars community, spend a weekend away with Sarah, or spend 6 straight evenings raking leaves in my yard.

december through march feels a little crazy because of winter retreats. my wife and i try to schedule our vacations during this time so that we can get out of the snow. weekends can feel a little hectic with junior high allnighters and outside retreats but we enjoy the pace when we also have the appropriate time set aside for our family.

march through june feels hectic at mars with the school year and fiscal year coming to an end. this is also the time we have our student staff retreat and get everything finalized for our summers.

all this to say, it is nearly impossible to find balance in student ministry during the busy seasons. so be smart and look ahead with your spouse at what are the true rhythms of the ministry you serve in or lead. look for the pockets that seem to overwhelming, the spaces that are crying out for either a night away by yourself or with your bride. in doing this, you will save yourself a lot of headaches and heartaches because your family will know what to expect.

The 50/50 rule

Yesterday I learned another important leadership nugget from Mike Volkema. When presenting in a setting that will invite questions (parent meeting, elder board meeting, lead team meeting or countless others) always respect the fifty fifty rule.

This is acknowledging the time it will take you to present and then adding that same amount on the backend for further dialogue. So if your presentation takes 15 minutes to give then you need to add 15 more minutes at the end to answer questions. This was a totally new concept for me.

I often come with a list of things and do my best to charge through it with not wasting my teams time. But as I think about it, when I pack everything in so tight I do not allow my audience the privilege to interact with the material.

It will slow things down; but it is worth it to have total buy in...