vision

Under New Management

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Chuck and I enjoy eating out. We have our favorite go-to spots and a list of got-to-try places. As we left Corner 16 the other night, we recalled this memory of eating there when the girls were little.  Only then it was a Ruby Tuesday.  We watched that Ruby Tuesday slowly die. Declining food quality, bad service. Every time we went in there you could tell the place was gasping for air. No one seemed to care. So no one was surprised it closed down.

It was, after all, a bad location. Nothing could ever really succeed there. Blah, blah, blah.

As we exited the packed parking lot of Corner 16, with a wait at the door to get in, I told Chuck it was amazing to see how new management with a fresh vision and creativity could turn something around.

Turns out it wasn’t such a bad location, after all.

This picture in the natural captures my spiritual attention. What areas of my life, or your life,  are slowly dying, and all we throw at it is neglect, hopelessness, and resignation?

Do we have dreams or incredible ideas God has given us that at the moment are hard, declining, or frustrating? Sometimes, we would rather make excuses instead of asking for radical help.

I find often instead of going to Him for “new management with a fresh vision and creativity,” I am blaming and quitting. How about you?

Here’s the point. Jesus changes everything. Can you even imagine how the lame man felt when Jesus asked him, “Do you want to be well?” (John 5)

Imagine if I went to the Ruby Tuesday management,  and I said, “Do you want to have a thriving, brand-new concept that will blow your mind? It’s going to cost you more than money. It’s going to cost your very belief system. You will have to rethink, reshape and re-order your whole life. You in?”

The lame man looked at the King Over All Impossibilities and — made excuses. No one to help me…While I am trying…Someone else gets ahead…

The crucial moment followed. Jesus gave the lame man specific instructions.

Get up.
Pick up your mat.
And Walk.

Or. Stay the same.

The last part Jesus didn’t audibly say. But the choice was crystal clear. Get up in faith and take radical action to go forward, or stay where you are in the same mess and hurt and sadness.

Look at your world and THE world. New Management is on the scene. It can’t help but change. Healing of every human wound and heartache and sin is on the scene.

Radical help and radical healing are ours. What can we do today to get up and walk?

Great Minds: All You Need to Know

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I really enjoy the blogs from Seth Godin. He doesn’t take it all the way home for me sometimes. But I read his stuff and want to let out a Warrior Yell. Read this:

All you need to know…

is that it’s possible.

Mike sent me a great story about an ultra-lightweight backpacker:

“Wolf was carrying a super-small pack which weighed 14 pounds including food and water. When asked how he got his pack weight so low, Wolf would reply, ‘All you need to know is that it’s possible.'”

One of the under-reported stories of the internet is this: it constantly reports on what’s possible. Somewhere in the world, someone is doing something that you decided couldn’t be done. By calling your bluff and by pointing out the possibilities, this reporting of possibility changes everything.

You can view this as a horrible burden, one that raises the bar and eliminates any sinecure of comfort and hiding you can find, or you can embrace it as a chance to stretch.

Most organizations forget to ask the question in the first place.

What I mean by taking it all the way home is the God factor. All you need to know —is that it is possible. And that With God, All things are possible. What are you about? What you shooting for?  What are you letting stop you that others have pressed through? If they can, you can.  Yes and Amen!

Looking Beyond

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I have a lot of BIG things on the horizon for 2010. But I told dear friends of mine last night, “When I look out, it starts getting very dark and fuzzy; I can’t see very far right now.”

Funny how God does that. He calls things forth in dreams and Scripture. He confirms what He has said many times in many ways. But then when I go to look at the map of “how to get there,” it turns kind of gray and dim. I think God is brilliant for doing it like that, because if I had my way, I would grab the map out of His hand and take off down the road. Without Him.

But, if I know where we are going yet don’t know the way, we HAVE to go together.  Which is honestly what my soul longs for anyway. To journey with Him into crazy adventures.

So for today, soak on the incredible quote another friend sent to me:
“Never be afraid of an unknown future to a known God.”  ~Corrie Ten Boom

Just because we don’t know the future doesn’t mean that God doesn’t know. He knows the plan for our hope and future. We don’t have to be afraid; He knows, He cares. Here is the song He woke me up with:

“Since The World Began” – Matt Maher, Amy Grant, Ed Cash, Mac Powell
Isaiah 64:1-9 (NLT)

Verse 1:

Oh, that You would burst from the heavens
And how the mountains would quake
But You would make the nations tremble
All Your enemies would learn from Your fame

How then shall we be saved?
How can we be saved?

Since the world began,
No ear has heard, no eye has seen a God like You
Since the world began,
No ear has heard, no eye has seen a God like You

Like autumn leaves, we all wither
Swept away by the wind
Oh, have mercy on us Father!
Please don’t remember our sins!

How then shall we be saved?
How can we be saved?

Since the world began,
No ear has heard, no eye has seen a God like You
Since the world began,
No ear has heard, no eye has seen a God like You

O Lord, You are our Father,
We are clay, You are the Potter
We are all formed by Your hand
According to Your plan

Since the world began,
No ear has heard, no eye has seen a God like You
Since the world began,
No ear has heard, no eye has seen a God like You

God Speaks In Funny Places

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Just in case you think hearing from God is crazy. . . . It is, but it is also wonderful.  I love how creative He is in talking to us.  And I love how if you ask, seek and knock, He will answer, find and open!  

This year has been one of birthing and refining a vision.  I have been asking, “What exactly are God’s plans for me, for WGR, for the ministry?”  And so every couple of weeks He speaks in more power, more clarity, more truth.  Here is the latest download from Him.

As we were taking in the new city sites, I was just praying and thinking.  Here is a conversation that happened, all through billboards, each one building on the other.

The question from me was, “Lord, tell me again what we are doing?”

His answer was the following:

Masters Inn.

Grace.  (Read that: Masters in grace.)

I believe.  (Complete with butterfly photo!)

Dedicated people, Dedicated energy.

It’s amazing what we can do together.

A glimmer of hope in a needy world.

We raise ambition.

Be one.

We know women.

 We do things a bit differently.

I believe.

Thank You, Lord, for Your presence.  For Your mysterious ways of
interrupting our lives.  Thank You for speaking and making known the
paths of life.  Amen.

Real Question #5: What About Boredom?

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May I be candid?  Boredom is often a lack of vision and gratitude.  Hear me out.  When you lack vision and purpose, then you can easily feel like what you are doing is beneath you or insignificant.  But when you know the greater good or goal, then the mundane (which is still mundane) becomes part of a bigger puzzle rather than the end result.

For example, laundry wears me out.  It is tiresome, boring and never-ending.  But it is not the sum total of me as a woman, wife or mother.  It is a piece of the mundane that simply gets done.  Here is where the gratitude kicks in.  The other day, I literally said out loud as  I was changing the clothes over, “Thank you, Lord, that I don’t have to carry all these clothes to a river and pound them with a rock.  Thank you that I have machines that wash and dry them.  Thank you that I have clean water to wash them in.”  Granny always said, “Count your blessings.”

If you find you are “bored” with your life as a whole, then that is a great invitation to go back to the Lord to discover your strengths, dream and passions.  I am currently reading the  book, Your Strongest Life.  It is specifically written for women who want to live life to the fullest.  I highly recommend it as a temperature check on whether you are checking out, wimping out, or launching!

www.stronglifetest.com