Growth Plan Pt.3

This post was supposed to be written on Monday, yet it’s Thursday at 4:30 AM and I am just getting to it.  The start of 2012 has been intense.  A lot of illness and an impending 10 days of insanity are looming starting tomorrow.  But I wanted to finish with the rest of growth plan before sharing some of the other things coming up.  So here they are my final there areas of planned growth for 2012.

Physical – This is the most common New Years goal for most people including myself, because at the beginning, it’s not all that fun to work at.

1. Exercise – I love to run and workout, when I am already in shape.  So…right now it’s not all that easy.  I am going to work out 5-6 days a week.  Right now its P90x.  Starting April 1st, it’s training for a half-marathon.
2. No Pizza, Chips, Pop or Greasy Fast Food – Put simply, these are my favorite food groups.  Sweets are not nearly the temptation these are.  My struggle tends to be I can’t have just one piece of pizza, I like it too much.  I do not intend to stay away from these forever, that would be a sad existence, but to achieve what I need to achieve this year, some drastic changes need to happen.
3. Help Megan make time to exercise – We really want this to be something we eventually do together, but with 4 under 5, that’s not realistic.  This is the year to start these habits.
4. Run Chicago Half-Marathon for Avishi – On June 9th, Megan and I along with some other friends and family will run a half marathon for a purpose.  As Our Own is an organization that works with some of the major social injustices of our day.  One way they raise funds is by having teams raise money at half marathons.  If you are interested in more, here is the link to our team’s page ‘Hoke’s Slow Pokes’.

Career – As a youth pastor, it’s hard to separate career from ministry.  But the reality is that to me, all of ministry is disciplemaking.  And as I am working towards all of the aspects of personal growth this year, I am growing as a disciplemaker.  So here are the career specific goal I have for the year.

1. Become more proficient at the action method – Scott Belsky wrote an incredible book, Making Ideas Happen, a couple years back.  The subtitle reads, “Overcoming the Obstacles Between Vision and Reality”.  As an ENFP, this is basically the weakness in my personality.  Incredible vision and conceptual thinking on the front end of projects, with a struggle to fully see the idea come to fruition.  The Action Method speaks of disciplining yourself to work on the most important things vs. reactionary workflow (simply reacting to everything that comes at us).  This is a goal that has it hands on how I do everything that I do.

Ministry – To me, ministry is best defined as making disciples, who make disciples, who make disciples…so my goals this year…

1. To start 3 disciplemaking groups with students.  A group of 2-5 people learning to study the Bible to know God, learning to live in prayerful dependance, viewing all of life as worship and loving other people as the foundational posture of our lives.
2. To see the leader’s of Westbrook Student Ministry become a Disciplemaking Learning Community and not just adults spending time with students.

There you have it.  These are the guiding goals behind 2012 for me.

Growth Plan Part 2

You don’t need a new plan for next year. You need a commitment. – Seth Godin

This is the quote that greeted me in my blog reader this morning and I think that Seth Godin nails this one.  In most areas of life we have dreams and goals, visions of grandeur and success, and even well thought out plans.  The issue is commitment.  Are we committed to the plan?  This was my prayer as I laid down last night, before I even read this quote.  That I would take serious the gravity of the ‘resolutions’ I am setting out.  Here are the rest of them.

Intellectual

1. No mindless TV or video games while I still have homework.  This is a fight.  Last night it was a fight because I had a couple hundred pages to read and there was some amazing bowl games on.  I finished one book, and have about 60 pages left in the other.
2. Be diligent in school.  I am the king of excuses when it comes to school.  I never studied for a test in high school, and most of college I just sort of coasted through. One of the minor goals of going to seminary is to actually live out Colossians 3:23-24 as I read and prepare for what God will do in this program.
3. Blog.  Part of this blog is brought on by my desire to be a better thinker and writer.  There are days when I sit down to write messages and just can’t think.  I can’t talk all day, but not write.  The more I write, the more easily it is to write more.  Seth Godin wrote about this issue in his blog entitled ‘Talkers Block’.                                                                                                                             “The reason we don’t get talker’s block is that we’re in the habit of talking without a lot of concern for whether or not our inane blather will come back to haunt us. Talk is cheap. Talk is ephemeral. Talk can be easily denied.We talk poorly and then, eventually (or sometimes), we talk smart. We get better at talking precisely because we talk. We see what works and what doesn’t, and if we’re insightful, do more of what works. How can one get talker’s block after all this practice?”

Financial – This is one of those areas that we are not supposed to talk about.  It is ‘private’ and nobodies business.  I think this is primarily because our financial prowess is our biggest status symbol.  Our earthly security is rooted here.  For our family, this last year was crazy.  I worked in a factory making Ford Focus Trunk Liners for the first 3 months, then we moved to Wisconsin and I started working at a church that in many ways is my dream job.  And to be honest, if we weren’t young and dumb (or younger and dumber at least) 5-8 years ago, we wouldn’t be tight.  But then maybe we would have never had to learn dependency.  Throughout this year, when we were in need, God provided.  His people have blessed us.  He has provided in ways that we never knew were possible.  This years goals are simple.

1. Pay off debt.
2. Retain an emergency fund for actual emergencies.
3. Don’t buy unnecessary things.

There are dollar signs attached to those.  But I don’t want to show my prowess or lack thereof.

On Monday, I will post the final three categories; career, ministry and physical.

Growth Plan Part 1

Over the past 4 years I have been greatly influenced by Dave and Rennie Garda and Bill Allison of Cadre Ministries.  One of the things that comes up when you are around them this time of year is growth plans.  Growth plans differ from the typical New Years resolutions in that they are more thought out and written out.
This article explains it in more detail.  Over the next week I am going to share my growth plan and some of the tools I am using to help the process.

Spiritual – I am the opposite of a planner.  And when it comes to spirituality, it seems even stranger to do so.

1. Read through the Bible Chronologically this year.  This is a plan that was put together by the people that translated the New Living Translation.  I am following the plan on my iPhone/iPad using the youversion app.
2. As a family, we are going to memorize 52 verses this year.  I was searching around the other day for a plan the other day that  would benefit the adults and the kids of our family.  For once I didn’t start with an app in mind, I just looked for a plan.  And then I came across Fighter Verses.  It is a great app with 5 different 52 verse plans.  There is also a great kids verses feature to help them memorize.
3. Practice the ancient discipline of examen each night.  I was made aware of this practice through the book With by Skye Jethani.  This is one of greatest books I have ever started (haven’t finished it yet, which is an indictment of me, not the book).  The goal of this practice is both reflective and awareness more than a task to be completed. To be in commune with the Holy Spirit when reflecting on these questions.   At the end of the day I will journal out what I feel God is saying to me: Desolation – When, today, did I sense being drawn away from God?  When did I feel the most dissatisfied and restricted today?  Was there any time today when I felt discouraged?  What was the most draining part of my day?  Was there a time today when I felt guilty, ashamed, or lonely?  Consolation:  When, today, did I feel most touched by the presence of God?  What events, relationships, or thoughts of the day drew closer to God?  When did I feel most free today?  What was the most life-giving part of my day?  What was most joyful about my day?

Family

1. Bible Breakfast – So family devotions are not so common in our house, we try and end up frustrated that our 5 year old, 2 – 3 year olds, and 2 year old can’t sit still.  So this year our goal is one day a week.  Saturday mornings at breakfast we have a Bible Breakfast and then strive to bring it back in throughout our day.
2. Cole’s Devotions – Megan is so amazing at thinking about this stuff.  She frequently thinks of what we are doing now and how it sets our kids up for the future.  Cole is a very strong reader, so just before Christmas she had the brilliant idea that lets get him in God’s word.  So each morning we are going to help Cole start spending time with God through His Word.  This is the Bible we ordered for him.  2 days in and its pretty sweet.
3. No Solo Technology – I have a the tendency to be in two places at once.  Like sitting with my kids and playing with my toys.  I am striving not to waste time when I am around them.
4. Kid’s Dates – Each Monday, one of our kids gets a date with one of us.  We don’t have the time nor the money to do more than this.  And honestly, the whole point is just some great one on one time.  Very often its something as simply as running errands and grabbing an ice cream or cookie at McDonald’s.  Megan and I want our kids to feel special and when it comes for the dreaded time of them dating for real, they will have sweet standards built up from us attempting to build us up.

Part 2 tomorrow will include Intellectual, Financial, and in my Job.

 

Preparing to Prepare

As I approach the new year (also the year in which I turn 30), I have become certain of a few things about myself.  I have taken personality tests and worked in factories, churches, banks and retail.  And one thing is certain.  I am extremely excitable on the front end of projects, with the propensity to put the details off until it is nearly beyond salvaging.  Nearly is the key word.  I seem to have the ability to pull things off when the pressure is on.  That is if the project at hand is something that can be completed in a short burst of energy.  Paper writing, graphic design, cleaning the kitchen…I can fly.  But if the project requires a steady pursuit of a goal, I probably am going to flame out.  At least that has been my pattern.  But I have some big things on my plate this year.  Some new things and some things that I have conveniently let slide.  And for some reason the reality of 30 makes it a little more serious.  30 is the first birthday I visually remember my parents reaching.  It’s the first  decade you enter that you begin to wonder if you are now old (your kids will say yes while your parents still tell you that they aren’t even old yet).  And for me, for some reason I see it as halftime.  I hope to live much longer than 60, family history and statistics say there is a good chance of that.  But I feel like if I don’t get a handle on the weak sides of my personality, I never will.  That is probably a little dramatic, which happens to be part of personality as well.    So over the next week I will post some of the areas I am planning to grow or shrink in this year.  Thanks to my friends at Cadre Ministries, I have plenty of resources to help me plan out S.M.A.R.T. goals.  Some of the areas I will lay our are Spiritual, Physical, Work, Family, Intellectual, Financial and Ministry.