Making Thanksgiving Dinner

I have prepared the Thanksgiving dinner at our house for many year now.  In fact I've taken on the role of meal preparation pretty much altogether.  Along the way I've learned a lot and developed some recipes which have become family favorites . . . as well as made some definite failures - who knew potato and sauerkraut tacos wouldn't work????

Anyway, I've learned to follow recipes and directions on boxes and discovered an amazing thing:  if you are careful to follow the directions the result will almost always turn out OK . . . and with some practice you might even be able to improve on the original.  I suppose this isn't really amazing, after all, the whole point of the directions to begin with is to produce the intended result.

As I was essentially learning to cook, it became obvious to me that the trick isn't in the preparation of any single dish (just follow the directions); what sets apart the true "cook" is the ability to get everything done and on the table AT THE SAME TIME.  It is all about sequencing the work to achieve the intended goal, which is greater than any single dish - no matter how wonderful.  Just because you can make a great Turkey is pretty meaningless if it gets cold waiting for all the other parts of the meal to get finished.

I think I was actually exposed to this lesson as a boy growing up watching my Dad.  Dad was a building contractor who built over a 100 homes and many churches.  Watching him coordinate the flow of sub-contractors and supplies to his own crew made a deep impression on me at an early age.

This is the same thing is most areas of life, including business, education and faith.  It is the difference between success and failure.  Identifying the goal (e.g. having ALL the items on the menu done and on the table at the right time), and then sequencing the work so that each part is started in proper relationship to all the others defines the true "cook" or contractor, or LEADER.

So before you begin, take a moment to think about the end, the parts that have to come together for the "end" to be gauged a success, and develop your plan to sequence each part to reach that goal. 

The Battleground: Holiness and Spiritual Warfare - excerpt1

Excerpt  from the introduction of my upcoming book:  The Battleground: Holiness and Spiritual Warfare

I am not sure when I first noticed it, but there was no doubt in my mind as I stood to preach that Sunday night what had been happening. We had just prayed over a cloth anointed with oil for the healing of one of the body of believers where I served as pastor.  A young lady stood to sing; as she sang her praises to God, I felt His spirit wash over me in a powerful way. I sat there, practically overwhelmed with a sense of the Spirit and power. In those moments, God revealed to me what I had seen, but not understood. 

A few months ago I had begun to teach a series of lessons on spiritual warfare. About that time things began to happen in the congregation: deaths, sickness, personal trauma, financial disasters. You would think I would have made the connection; after all, these are merely the manifestations of warfare in a higher realm. Within a few weeks, however, even though the negative effects of the battle were still being felt, God’s power began to break through into the life of the congregation. Four individuals over the course of two weeks, individuals with little or no contact with the church, were saved. The previous Sunday, six people came forward to be sanctified, baptized by the Holy Spirit. Worship, an important part of what goes on at our church, became endued with a special power, even though those leading were untrained and developing their own style. As I stood to preach, God redirected my message to unity in the battle and perseverance.

                Over the next few months and years God has shown me some aspects of the battle and how to be effective as a spiritual warrior. This book is about those strategies, tactics, and weapons. I believe in the final victory but I also want to be as effective for the Lord as possible on a day-to-day basis. The lessons contained in the following pages will give you a different way of looking at life, and, I hope, new tools to be victorious in your own personal battle.

This book should be available on Amazon in print version within the next month.  I'll post an an announcement at that time.  If you have any comments or thoughts, please feel free to share.

 

Think Oblique

Several of the books I've been reading lately have got me thinking about problem solving.  Two of those that come immediately to mind are Decisive by Dan and Chip Heath and David and Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell.  Although I don't remember either of these books mentioning this precise term, the concept is there. 

By Thinking Oblique, I mean that when faced with a challenge, instead of following the normal and expected road to the solution, head off at an angle.  Some might call this "thinking outside the box" but for me that isn't quite right.  I respect that concept, but when I say Think Oblique, I have a slightly different context in mind.

An oblique angle in geometry is any angle which is not 90 degrees.  Acute angles are less than 90 degrees and obtuse angles are more than 90 degrees.  In actuality my focus on Think Oblique is really focused on the acute angle.  The idea goes like this:  If linear thinking is hitting a dead end or a barrier, then take a different track, one which may require re-conceptualizing the problem as


well as what the solution "should" look like.  Try to remove the constraints of the linear and Think Oblique.