Month: October 2017

A Ministry of Presence

Posted on October 19, 2017 by - Articles, Leading Others, Relational Intelligence, Resilience, Servant Leadership, Wellness

The excerpt below is from Brené Brown’s (GLS 2013, 2015) newly released book, Braving The Wilderness.

Only holiness will call people to listen now. And the work of holiness is not about perfection or niceness; it is about belonging, that sense of being in the Presence and through the quality of that belonging, the mild magnetic of implicating others in the Presence. . . . This is not about forging a relationship with a distant God but about the realization that we are already within God.

—John O’Donohue

Just recently I found myself in the overflow room of a church in a small Texas town. I was at the funeral for my good friend Laura’s father. There were no choir members or pianos in the overflow room, just a few hundred people in folding chairs watching the eulogies in the main church via a projector and computer screen.

When we were asked to stand and sing one of his (and my) favorite hymns, “How Great Thou Art,” I wasn’t so sure how two hundred or so strangers could pull off singing an old hymn a cappella in a reception hall. But we did, and it was a holy experience.

Laura’s dad was a small-town hero who never met a stranger. All I could think in that moment was, He would have loved our messy voices and singing hearts.

The neurologist Oliver Sacks writes, “Music, uniquely among the arts, is both completely abstract and profoundly emotional. . . . Music can pierce the heart directly; it needs no mediation.”

Funerals, in fact, are one of the most powerful examples of collective pain. They feature in a surprising finding from my research on trust. When I asked participants to identify three to five specific behaviors that their friends, family, and colleagues do that raise their level of trust with them, funerals always emerged in the top three responses.

Funerals matter. Showing up to them matters. And funerals matter not just to the people grieving, but to everyone who is there. The collective pain (and sometimes joy) we experience when gathering in any way to celebrate the end of a life is perhaps one of the most powerful experiences of inextricable connection. Death, loss, and grief are the great equalizers.

My aunt Betty died while I was writing this book. When I think of her I think of laughing, camping, swimming in the Nueces River, driving to her ranch in Hondo, Texas, and our silent agreement that we would never discuss politics.

I also think of the time when I was about seven years old and I begged her to let me go into the “card room” where the parents, grandparents, and oldest cousins were yelling, laughing, cussing, smoking, and playing Rook (our family’s favorite card game). I was stuck in the “kids’ room,” which was so boring. She held my cheeks in her hand and said, “I can’t let you go in there. Plus, trust me, you don’t want to see what’s in there. It ain’t pretty.”

Rather than holding a funeral, it was Betty’s wish that we come together for a family barbecue potluck in my cousin Danny’s backyard. She just wanted us to laugh and be together. Danny led us in prayer, we told funny stories, and Nathan played the guitar while Diana sang the “Ave Maria.”

It was 90 degrees in the Texas Hill Country and you could barely hear the stories and music over the shrilling of the cicadas. I kept thinking, This is exactly what it means to be human.

This humanity transcends all of those differences that keep up us apart.

In Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant’s beautiful 2017 book about grief and courage, Option B, Sandberg tells a wrenching and wholehearted story about collective pain. Her husband, Dave, died suddenly while they were on vacation. Their children were in second and fourth grade. She writes, “When we arrived at the cemetery, my children got out of the car and fell to the ground, unable to take another step. I lay on the grass, holding them as they wailed. Their cousins came and lay down with us, all piled up in a big sobbing heap with adult arms trying in vain to protect them from their sorrow.”

Sandberg told her children, “This is the second worst moment of our lives. We lived through the first and we will live through this. It can only get better from here.” She then started singing a song she knew from childhood, “Oseh Shalom,” a prayer for peace.

She writes, “I don’t remember deciding to sing or how I picked this song. I later learned that it is the last line of the Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for mourning, which may explain why it poured out of me. Soon all the adults joined in, the children followed, and the wailing stopped.”

An experience of collective pain does not deliver us from grief or sadness; it is a ministry of presence. These moments remind us that we are not alone in our darkness and that our broken heart is connected to every heart that has known pain since the beginning of time.

Excerpted with permission from the new book Braving the Wilderness by Brené Brown. Published by Random House, an imprint and division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York. Copyright © 2017 by Brené Brown. All rights reserved.

Look at Haiti Differently | 3 Game Changers to Turn the Country Around

Posted on October 18, 2017 by - Africa, Because of the GLS, Calling, Central America, Latin America, Stories

When people think of Haiti, most people don’t remember it for its rich history and culture. Most people don’t remember that Christopher Columbus landed there in 1492, and few think of its beautiful beaches and luscious landscape.

When most people think of Haiti, they think of poverty, hurricane disasters, regime change or corruption.

But Edner Jeanty, local pastor in Port au Prince, seminary professor, PHD and key leader for the GLS in Haiti for the last 11 years, sees more in Haiti than most people. He sees God doing amazing work, in part, because of what God is doing through the GLS to build up its leaders, raise the value of leadership and empower youth to bring change to the country. There are three game changers for Haiti that the GLS provides – leadership resources in French, a jumpstart on ideas to serve communities, and the strengthening of grander visions already placed on leaders’ hearts.

“A former missionary once told me that Haiti has a lot of good leaders but they immigrate to other countries because they need to train and care for their families and they cannot do that in Haiti. But we cannot afford to lose them.”

Edner believes that the potential for ministry, business and education is already present in the country, and if we invest more in these three things, the country will turn around for the better. “When there are leaders, and there are jobs, then a lot of the other things take place,” says Edner.

“When something is not working, like the economy, that’s when you need leadership, and that’s where the GLS comes in. In training people, and inspiring people to take leadership seriously, leaders can change the order of things to move our people forward.”

Here are three different ways the GLS is a game changer in the context of Haiti:

  1. The GLS provides Christian leadership resources in French

“The Summit makes good leadership insights available in French in our community,” says Edner. “This is very important because there are many resources in English and Spanish, but good Christian literature is not as readily available in French.

“Just this week, a pastor asked for a video on the four disciplines of execution to use in a training for his French-speaking deacons. We were able to provide it, and that’s one of the blessings.”

  1. The GLS jumpstarts ideas for new projects that serve the community

“We have people who come to the GLS and as a result, they start a project,” says Edner. “After the Summit, one leader started his own church, and now the church is growing, and they have services for children who are orphans in the community.”

 

 

  1. The GLS strengthens grander visions that change nations

“When I was under 20 years old, I wanted to train up young people who were committed to go out and serve in rural areas where there are no good schools, so they could be school teachers and trainers for the community, and bring new ideas and development to those areas.

“Today, I’m involved with the Barnabas Center here in Haiti, and we’re having more of a youth focus. It is the way to influence the next generation.”

Edner’s grander vision would be a game changer for the country. “We have 40,000 young Haitians who are studying foreign language in the Dominican Republic,” Edner explains. “It would be great if 10 big churches started a university in each of Haiti’s 10 provinces so the next generation of Haitian leaders could be trained in the biblical world view, and gain critical skills necessary to be the leaders of the next generation.

“Currently 80 percent of the people with more than a second year of education live outside Haiti. So we need to educate more people in Haiti. But it’s not just education. We need more people educated under the Christian worldview who have integrity, and who are developing their character and who can gain the trust of the people and bring about the change we want to see in the country.

“That is one of my grander visions. I’d like to see young people commit their lives to Christ, live with integrity, and grow in their leadership, and in their vocation and continue to serve here in the country. It would be a game changer for Haiti.”

Thank you from Haiti

“We are very thankful for the ongoing commitment of Willow Creek for leadership development in Haiti. We know the GLS happens through donors who share sacrificially so leaders in Haiti can have access to this leadership training. This training helps people, and helps leaders by encouraging them not to quit. It helps leaders by providing resources and insights. Thank you. We hope people will continue to support the cause so we can create more sites and more people can enjoy and benefit from the great mission of the GLS.”

Adding Value to Women in Prison in Kenya through the GLS

Posted on October 16, 2017 by - Africa, Diversity, Government, Prison, Stories

In Lang’ata Women’s Remand Prison in Kenya, 110 women awaiting judgement on their court cases experienced their first GLS event. The 700 women incarcerated in the prison’s maximum security area will soon experience a GLS as well.

Kenya has come a long way in regards to prison reform and fair justice in the court system. When prison reforms began happening in Kenya, women prisoners were eventually allowed to stay with their babies up to the age of four. This prison has a daycare, kindergarten and nursery school. This prison also offers activities for the women, including farming, baking, tailoring, hairdressing, etc. They are encouraged to occupy their time enhancing their skills so when they have served their time, they are equipped to work and take care of themselves and their families.

The GLS event was introduced to these women at a critical time in their lives, when a single message has the potential to change the trajectory of their future.

“When we showed the John Maxwell talk from 2016 and the Christine Caine talk from 2010, the ladies were shouting ‘God values people!’ and ‘God values me!’,” says Miriam Chumbi, key leader for the GLS in Kenya.

“They also repeated, ‘God values people I don’t like.’”

The event continued with a local leader and facilitator, Rev. Grace Bukachi, who shared a story about when she was in Bible College, and how God challenged her to value people no matter where they are. “She talked about how she met a pastor at the prison, and was moved by God to regularly connect with three ladies in prison who were in great need and in a hopeless situation,” Miriam explains. “The women were on death row, and had been told they’d never to be released. But she visited and prayed with them until God did the impossible. These condemned women were released in subsequent years. One lady had been imprisoned for over 20 years!” And now these women, Kawira, Pauline and Anastasia, know both physical freedom and freedom in Jesus because Rev. Grace chose to value people, no matter where they are.

When the event was over, the women sang a song in Kiswahili, that translates to:

Be blessed. Be more blessed. Come back again, come again more, and when you come again, may you not find us.

They hope to be released and return to their lives as free women, using the GLS lessons they learned to embark on a new future, adding value to everyone around them.