Category — Outflow

Have you noticed that on every cover of Oprah’s magazine she is smiling? Think what you want, but I believe her smile is sincere. She does nothing for financial gain—that point in her life passed long ago. For Oprah, it’s about spiritual meaning.

Measuring America’s Spiritual Hunger
If spiritual health is measured according to outward matters, the decline of the Roman, Protestant (you name it) empire is upon us. But maybe spiritual health is not so one-dimensional as 30-second phone polls can measure when we are disturbed in the evening hours.

Attendance, size, the counting of heads is not the sole barometer most “Influentials” in history have relied upon to measure the state of true spiritual affairs.

Jesus did not pay one spit of attention to the fluctuating attendance of the crowds who showed up when He spoke. If He had bought into this emotional roller coaster of such passing silliness, confusion would have perhaps ensued.

If we insist on counting something, Jesus might encourage us to count backward—to measure what we divest ourselves of. America has had it with “come and see” spirituality. Now is the day of “go and do.” And Jesus launched that movement some time ago.

Does Oprah Understand What Others Don’t?
Oprah has vast spiritual influence over most of the Western world. When Oprah speaks, things happen.

This is no news flash, though. Oprah’s vast influence extends beyond the media scene and into the deepest parts of the spiritual heart of the United States. How? you wonder. She is in touch with non-complex heart leanings in each of us—inclinations that have been placed in us by God.

On her hit prime-time show, Oprah’s Big Give, Oprah has noticed the power generosity has to change lives. Like every reality show, this one has an abundance of adrenaline-filled contestants. Jumping abounds. There is an unnatural amount of smiling going on. But her show is unique as well. The winner is the one who gives away the greatest amount of money over several weeks—in as wise ways as possible.

Ms. Oprah has tapped into the depths of all of us. It’s the “if money were no object” dream we talk about—and this dream is becoming viral. Everyone is chatting about it. This virus might just get out of control, in the best sense.

Kindness, Schmindness. So What?
Kindness is a word that has been bandied about in recent years. We confuse it with similar words (like niceness), but it stands head and shoulders above synonyms.

You might wonder, Why bring God into this consideration? The “God factor” is what distinguishes kindness from niceness or other even less powerful encounters. Any of us can be nice when the mood strikes us, when we are feeling rested, well, etc. Kindness is another matter completely. Kindness, to be clear, is only possible when God shows up.

You and I don’t know each other, but this I suspect about you: Regardless of how broken your upbringing may have been, there were moments when kindness occurred along your journey.

I did not grow up attending church (to be accurate, I was downright skeptical of all things church-ish), but I can now see the seeds of kindness that were scattered into my soul, which led to a profound conversion during college. Those seeds were slow-growing, undetected, but they eventually bore fruit. It was God at work beneath the surface.

When our lives have been touched by authentic kindness, we tend to never forget those moments. They are everlasting, living encounters. Only the God of the universe can orchestrate such.

Friend or Faux?
In recent years, many have begun to notice the latent power of kindness, serving and generosity. More than a small percentage of spiritual organizations have sought to use kindness as a tool—something to promote a message. In that equation, the understanding is: We serve; then people will listen. Kindness is not a tool one can use to gain advantage over others!

Any thinking in this direction is to manipulate both God and His people. Neither God nor most people will put up with such nonsense. People are not oblivious when agendas are present. To be kind but not genuine is to destroy the possible conveying of any positive message.

Indeed, a message will be conveyed—a tragic one where cocooning occurs. That is, those in the community isolate themselves further and further away from anything down the road that is real.

Breaking Free
When God’s kindness is loosed, a culture begins to build. Each day I connect with many people in simple ways that ease their burdens—much like Oprah. One hundred percent of them ask why I am showing them practical kindness (paying for their Starbucks drink, showing them respect by remembering their names at the places I frequent, getting cashiers a bottle of water and insisting they take it).

There is plenty to chat with people about when kindness is afoot. Let’s just go and do with a clean heart.

Check out this recent radio interview with Steve Sjogren and Colin Lambert on the Moody Broadcasting Network! Steve and Colin discuss Outflow and learning to notice your way into other people’s lives.

Everywhere that I have had a bank account, the understanding is basically the same.

First you must make a deposit.  There is a period of waiting until the initial check clears.  Then if you choose, a withdrawal can be made.

I have never heard of a bank that allows a withdrawal before a deposit has been made. (If you know of such a bank, you really owe it to the rest of the planet to let us in on this amazing institution…  This deal must be advertised a bit.  How they would stay in business is not important to us - it’s just important that they allow people to withdraw from a nonexistent fund!)

This routine of “Deposit First - Withdraw Later” is violated continually, by regular church people - and without realizing what they are doing - church leaders-teachers-pastors are encouraging this pattern.  How so?

We model and strongly encourage people to approach virtual strangers with a call to a dramatic life change.  This is akin to not just a spiritual drive-by.  Think drive-by with a rapid fire bazooka and you are close to the reality here.

Am I suggesting one ought never to call a complete stranger to conversion?  Not in the least.  What I am saying is that a dramatic encounter such as this is the exception to the norm.  The norm is that we ‘bring’ the gospel.  We don’t ‘send’ the gospel.  To bring anything has everything to do with personal connections, relationship, a touch, and the word we love to use around Christmas - ‘Incarnation.’

It’s funny how we love to talk about ‘Incarnation’ around Christmas, but shun that word / concept after December 26th.  We bring the message of Jesus every time we connect with people.  If you continue to ‘send’ the message - well, you will continue to see lots of rejections. 

When those rejections come, do all of us a favor - for Pete’s sake, don’t sit back and glibly mutter something about the hard-heartedness of this generation.  You may be partly right.  Then again, you may be referring to your own hard-heartedness.

As we are living life at a slow enough pace and with a friendly enough perspective, we are doing just two things – asking people their names as we introduce ourselves… AND asking them their story.

Everyone has a story.  Everyone wants to tell their story.  Why?  No one is or has been willing to listen to them tell their story.
Is it so amazingly simple.

I have been involved in a lengthy email dialog with a group who have been miffed over some folks who were doing kindness outreaches incorrectly. Kindness incorrectly! What the heck? The whole thing escalated to the point that a story was written about it in the local paper. Won’t say where it happened but it was in one of my favorite writer’s hometown – Ernest Hemmingway. He spoke of his town as having “Broad lawns and narrow minds…” But then again, since when has a prophet been recognized in his / her own hometown.

How do we walk into the future equipped, with as few surprises as possible?

It’s not about merely reading. I have been a big advocate of reading over the years – I will always read, watch, listen. I am hooked on learning as I hope all I have an influence upon are.
Yet the ultimate learning experience is based upon Socratic methods of going forward.
Socrates taught in the following ways:

1. Small groups

2. People who followed him closely – he mentored them / he coached them regarding how to effectively live life.

3. In learning situations that were in “high gear” the learning took place by Socrates asking questions of the group.

4. With the larger group of up to a dozen, he would break the group down into 2s and 3s.

With this in mind, we too as teachers, coaches can draw a tremendous amount from the classic style of communicating with our understudies. No more talking heads.

With our soon to come UnConference in Charlotte, NC much of the above will be taking place.

Early Bird Registrations are still available for the North Carolina UnConference, Walking in the Outflow with Steve Sjogren.

If I were any more thrilled about the “Un Conference," I would have to be twins! For more details about the North Carolina event, and to sign up, you can go to the online "brochure."

I have been in contact with one of our Coastland team guys, Scott Bane, who has been in South Africa for the past three weeks. This has been a major sacrifice for him, all things considered (wife at home with three small children – not overly established financially – made the trip on an offering only basis with them agreeing to only pay for his fare). With risk, sacrifice in response to the invitation of Jesus, comes the common elements of God’s kingdom’s presence. Scott had read about this prior to his trip, but had never experienced this.

The response to him spreading the empowering message of what we are nicknaming “Outflow," simply that Jesus wants to involve 100% of us as inviters of our friends, family, neighbors, all who cross our paths by serving our way into their lives, has been amazing.

Usually with this message there is a lag time between the scattering of the “seeds” of kindness, generosity, love – but in this case the response has been nearly immediate. Keep in mind the churches he has been speaking at have mostly been made up mostly of Afrikaners (Dutch descendants who are gradually becoming integrated) and vary in size from a few hundred to a thousand. A VERY large church in South Africa of this sort would be 2-3,000. Several hundred have come to Christ within days of being served or shown kindness. Experience shows me that in North America and most of Europe, that process is typically a year or more, in the best case scenario.

Scott is experiencing an apostolic level of God’s presence as he has moved out on this trip. Don’t be fearful of that adjective – he is not an “apostle” – I / we are not comfortable using that word – there is much misunderstanding with that vocabulary. But there is that sort of biblical activity going on around him and his team. More to follow when he returns mid-week. Check out his blog.

Weds

Today is the greatest day for reflecting on God in the entire calendar.

Church people may count it at Christmas or Easter - those are indeed great days of reflection - but there is not much to actively DO on those days toward others.
 
There is not a call to action on those other days.

On Feb. 14th each year there is a tremendous call to action. A call to live as God lives - a call to love others.

If we all are paying even the slightest attention to what is going on in and around us we catch on that there is no love in any of us to give to anyone - ourselves included. All love is found in God alone. We are void of such things.

The discovery of this - the “Aha” moment of this - I like to call it the moment of “Bottoming Out” - is a life changing time when all can either turn on a dime the right way - toward real life - or it can turn away from real life and toward hiding.

Unfortunately the vast majority of people - especially Church people - choose the latter.

The words of “Fernando” of SNL of the late 70s come to mind: “Is better to look good than to feel good.”