The Reagan Diaries (book review)

March 6, 2013 — Craig T. Owens

The Reagan DiariesPresident Ronald Reagan was the first president I was old enough to vote for, so he’s always held a special place in my own personal history. After reading several books about President Reagan, I wanted to read something in his own words. I’m so glad I did! The Reagan Diaries is a forthright look at an amazing man.

If you have studied American history during the Reagan presidency—or maybe you lived through that era of our history—you will gain a greater appreciation for the tough decisions that were made during this time. Reagan came into office on a platform that brought a sense of encouragement to an American people who were feeling a bit beat up, and then he tirelessly worked to follow through on the promises he had made, despite a Congress that was initially very antagonistic toward his policies.

Several things really stood out in these diaries. First is Reagan’s reliance on God. Time and again he writes about the wisdom he found in the Scriptures, or the strength he received in prayer. His faith is inseparable from his success in the White House. His faith was one that came to the forefront especially in dark times. Laying in the emergency room after being shot by a would-be assassin, he wrote:

“I focused on that tiled ceiling and prayer. But I realized I couldn’t ask for God’s help while at the same time I felt hatred for the mixed up young man who had shot me. Isn’t that the meaning of the lost sheep? We are all God’s children & therefore equally beloved by Him. I began to pray for his soul and that he would find his way back to the fold. …Whatever happens now I owe my life to God and will try to serve Him in every way I can.”

Another thing that appears in page after page is his love for Nancy. He writes frequently about how lonely the White House seemed when she was gone, he counted down the days until they would be reunited, and he looked forward to the all-too-short times when they could vacation together or take a break on the weekend just to be alone. On the first wedding anniversary they celebrated in the White House, he wrote, “more happiness than any man could rightly deserve.” And back at George Washington Hospital after the assassination attempt he said,

“I opened my eyes to find Nancy there. I pray I’ll never face a day when she isn’t there. Of all the ways God has blessed me giving her to me is the greatest and beyond anything I can ever hope to deserve.”

Finally, I love Reagan’s “realness.” He never took himself too seriously. He remained accessible to as many people in the White House as he could, and spent a lot of time calling and mailing United States’ citizens he read about in the newspapers or saw on the news reports. He was also brutally honest about his own shortcomings. After one press conference he wrote, “I wasn’t very scintillating.”

This is an excellent book to read for both a study in leadership, and as a companion to other U.S. history books of that period. At 700+ pages, it’s a hefty read, but well worth your time.

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Watch Out For Pride

November 30, 2012 — Craig T. Owens

Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.

This post is especially for my fellow pastors, but it would be thoughtful reading for anyone in a leadership position.

Let me state it simply: Pastor, you need to watch out for pride.

Listen to the words of A.W. Tozer—

“A clergyman is a man, and often he has a proud little kingdom of his own, a kingdom of position and often of pride and sometimes with power.”

Pride is so insidious that it can creep into the hearts of leaders at anytime.

  • When things are going well. We think to ourselves, “Look what I’ve done” or we even spiritualize it a bit to say, “Look what God’s done through me.”
  • When things are going poorly. Pride causes us to look out the window at others, instead of looking in the mirror at ourselves.
  • When we’ve successfully handled a situation. We think, “Wow, I’ve really got it!”
  • When we’ve dropped the ball and we make excuses instead of asking for forgiveness.
  • And on and on it goes….

One of the things that has helped me immensely is the thoughts Kenneth Blanchard and Phil Hodges shared in their book Lead Like Jesus. They point out that every leader has an ego. The issue is what kind of ego is it?

It can be negative: E.G.O. = Edging God Out 

It can be positive: E.G.O. = Exalting God Only

So what do we do to make sure we have the God-honoring E.G.O.?

  • Look in the mirror. James says the Bible is the perfect mirror. So how does your life line up with the Scripture? Don’t sugarcoat it … Don’t make excuses … Say the words “Look at me” or “Wow, I’ve got it” out loud. Do you find those in God’s Word? If not, root it out!
  • Get some tough guys around you. You need some loving people around you that aren’t the ones writing your press releases. You need people around you that can boldly say, “Ahem! You appear to be getting off track.”
  • Monitor your gut-level responses. If you feel defensive, or if you feel the need to justify or make excuses, watch out because that’s pride’s signature.
  • Stay on your knees. Not only in prayer, but in service too. It’s awfully hard to get full of yourself when you’re washing feet, or scrubbing toilets. If you ever think any job is beneath you, watch out because you may have been infected by pride.

“Depth under depth of self-love and self-admiration. Pride! It was through Pride that the devil became the devil; it is the complete anti-God state of mind. Pride is essentially competitive in a way the other vices are not. Pride is a spiritual cancer.” —C.S. Lewis

I have two companion chapters in my book Shepherd Leadership: The Metrics That Really Matter that dive deeper into this topic: “A confident leader’s attitude adjustment” and “A humble leader’s attitude adjustment.” I hope you will pick up a copy.

►► Would you please prayerfully consider supporting this ministry? My Patreon supporters get behind-the-scenes access to exclusive materials. ◀︎◀︎

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The Present Of Presence

November 2, 2012 — Craig T. Owens

Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.

The words Paul writes to Timothy (his young protege) are the wise counsel of a seasoned veteran to a young pastor. These are words of wisdom that pastors should be especially attentive to, but they also apply to anyone who is in a position of leadership (like a parent, teacher, coach, or employer).

After challenging Timothy to set an example by his lifestyle, Paul adds these words—

Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers. (1 Timothy 4:15-16)

“So that everyone may see your progress.” Quite simply: you have to be present—you have to be around people so they can see what’s going on in your life. Your presence in their lives is your present to their lives!

I need to monitor what I’m doing and why I’m doing it; what I’m teaching and how I’m teaching; what I believe and why I believe it.

I need to have goals and benchmarks. I need to make my goals—and my successes and failures in hitting my goals—known to others.

I need to be in it for the long haul. It’s awfully difficult to be an example in the present if my eyes and thoughts are always on “the next thing” down the road.

Look at the blessings—the presents—of living this way: You will save both yourself and your hearers.

Not only is my presence a present to others, but having others present in my life is a present to me! The present of presence works both ways! 

Are you living so that everyone may see your progress? If not, start giving the present of your presence today!

►► Would you please prayerfully consider supporting this ministry? My Patreon supporters get behind-the-scenes access to exclusive materials. ◀︎◀︎

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Next Level: James

September 27, 2012 — Craig T. Owens

It was a time of explosive growth. And with that growth came challenges, questions, problems, and opportunities! I’m talking about the Church in its earliest days in Jerusalem.

The Bible tells us that God prepares people in advance (Colossians 2:10) to do the works that He has equipped them to do. Into this environment of rapid growth and previously unheard-of opportunities stepped a man named James. His leadership and wisdom were just what the church needed then.

And his leadership and wisdom are just what the church needs now.

That’s why I’m leading our Next Level study group into an in-depth look at the book James wrote. The wisdom that is found in the Book of James has been called “the proverbs of the New Testament,” and we’ll be learning how to apply those proverbs to our lives and our church.

Please join me for this fascinating and informative study at 5pm each Sunday afternoon.

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Prayer Focus: Our Youth

September 5, 2012 — Craig T. Owens

As this week marks the beginning of a “new year,” (as students are heading back to school and we’re all settling in to our fall routines), we are taking time to focus our prayers.

Today’s pray focus is on our youth.

Our future is not “somewhere around the corner”; it’s now! Our future is in the lives of the children in our homes and schools at this very moment. Because the enemy knows how important our kids are, satan is doing all he can to try to thwart their plans, discourage them about their prospects, and get them thinking that their lives are not very valuable.

An American College Health Association survey found:

  • 94% of students feel overwhelmed by their lifestyles.
  • 44% feel so depressed it was almost difficult to function.
  • 10% considered suicide in the past year.

As a result, many of our youth have begun to “check out” of life. This can be deadly for our future. Noted author and researcher Dr. Tim Elmore said of this generation, “In cultures where males stop setting a healthy example, there is trouble. Crime rates rise, the percentage of teen pregnancies and unwed mothers go up, the number of gangs increase, unemployment swells, and depression and delinquency rise.”

Yet Jesus made it clear that the way children received the Kingdom of God in faith is to be the pacesetting example for all of us (see Mark 10:15-16). With this in mind, the Apostle Paul challenged his young protege Timothy to be the example for all others to follow. His charge to Timothy is a part of our prayer focus today:

Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity. …Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. (1 Timothy 4:12, 15)

Please pray with us throughout the day for our youth. And if you can join us tonight, the church will be open for prayer from 5:30-6:30pm.

UPDATE: You can download the PowerPoint of our prayer points for today by clicking here → Week of prayer – students.

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Organizational Health

August 22, 2012 — Craig T. Owens

I’m still working through the pages of notes I took during the Willow Creek Leadership Summit a couple of weeks ago. Another speak whom I really appreciated was Patrick Lencioni. I’ve read many of his books, and I think he has such a knack for explaining business principles in a way that seem so easy to process and apply.

Patrick talked about the two needed ingredients for organizational success: things that are smart and things that are healthy. He said that most of the time we cannot do the smart things because we are not healthy enough to do them.

So, how do we make our organization healthy? Here are four disciplines he encouraged us to pursue:

1.  Build and maintain a cohesive team at the top. [This is behavioral alignment.]

2.  Create clarity by asking these questions:

  • Why do we exist? [core purpose]
  • How do we behave? [core values]

These need to be core values, not our aspirational values.

There should only be one or two endemic values.

Core values are those that we will stick to even if we don’t get rewarded for it.

  • What do we actually do?
  • How will we succeed? [strategy]

These are the myriad of intentional decisions we make that help us be successful.

As an example, consider the three strategic anchors for Southwest Airlines: (1) make the customer happy; (2) keep the plane on time; (3) keep fares low.

  • What is most important in our organization right now?
  • Who must do what?

3.  Over-communicate the answer to the above six questions. I love this: Patrick said, “If your people cannot do a good impression of you, you’re not communicating enough.”

4.  Reinforce the system through creative ideas.

The bottom line: “Organizational health provides significant advantages for organizational success.”

I’m working on the application of these thoughts for the organizations I help lead, and I’m really excited to encourage some conversations around these great thoughts from Patrick Lencioni.

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Negotiating Conflict

August 14, 2012 — Craig T. Owens

Last week I spent two jam-packed days at the Willow Creek Leadership Summit. As always, I was on information overload with the great content that is presented every year. So I’ve been taking some time to ponder what I learned.

There are a couple of past post on my blog that consistently rank near the top of the list of “most read”:

With that in mind, William Ury’s discussion on how to successfully negotiate conflict really caught my attention.

Ury pointed out that conflict isn’t bad; it’s natural. Therefore, we don’t need to eliminate conflict, but find ways to deal with it in constructive ways.

I’ve tried to learn to look at myself in the mirror before entering into discussions where the potential for conflict is high. This thought was reinforced when Ury said: The greatest obstacle to successful negotiation is: Me. Why? Because I tend to react. “When you’re angry, you’ll make the best speech you’ll ever regret,” he said.

The greatest power we have in negotiation is the power NOT to react. 

Here are some strategies William Ury shared for successful negotiations:

  • Separate people from the problem. Be soft with people and hard with the problem. Soft means listening, empathy, and respect. Change the game: instead of squaring-off against each other face-to-face, be side-by-side facing the problem.
  • Focus on interests not positions. Probe behind the position to find out what the underlying interest is. He gave a great example about two girls who each wanted the one remaining orange. Our natural instinct is to divide the orange so each girl gets one half. But in watching what happens next, we see one girl throw away the peel and eat the fruit; the other throws away the fruit and uses the peel to complete her cake recipe. If we had figured out the interests of each girl, both girls could have had a whole orange! 
  • Develop multiple options. Search for creative options that meet the needs of everyone. Ury shared an example of a successful solution to a problem in the Middle East. Egypt wanted the Sinai peninsula because it was their historic possession; Israel wanted the same piece of land as a security buffer. The solution: let Egypt have sovereign control of the Sinai peninsula, but make it a demilitarized zone. Both sides got what they wanted.
  • Expand the pie before we divide it up. Uses standards that are objectively fair to each side.

The final piece of advice William Ury shared was the concept of BATNA = best alternative to a negotiated agreement. I need to think this through before any negotiations start. This is what I have determined ahead of time that I will walk away with if the negotiation doesn’t go as planned. Ury pointed out that we can negotiate with more confidence if we have a BATNA.

I thought this was pretty good advice. What do you think?

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9 Quotes from “Grant: Savior Of The Union”

August 8, 2012 — Craig T. Owens

Grant: Savior Of The Union was a very eye-opening biography to read (you can read my full review by clicking here). Here are nine passages that especially caught my attention:

“This I don’t want you to read to others for I very much dislike speaking of myself.” —Grant, in a letter to his father about the accomplishments of his soldiers 

“The first day out the regiment made it five miles. However, the next morning at six o’clock when Grant resumed the March, his men were unprepared to move. He allowed them time to rise and eat breakfast this time, but the following morning when the men were again not ready to march, Grant left without them. It must have been a sight to see half-dressed soldiers running after their commander. The remainder of the trip to Quincy was conducted in relatively good order. Grant boasted to his father that ‘my men behaved admirably and the lesson has been a good one for them. They can now go into camp and after a day’s March and with as much promptness as veteran troops; they can strike their tents and be on the march with equal celerity.”  —Mitchell Yockelson

At one battle some officers advised retreat. Grant replied, “Retreat? No. I propose to attack at daylight and whip them.”

When some in Washington, D.C., wanted to replace Grant with someone more experienced, President Abraham Lincoln said, “I can’t spare this man; he fights.”

A friend observed that at a banquet where toasts and speeches were made to honor Grant, “his face never changed its unmoved expression. It never lit up with excitement. …His silence was a native endowment, nothing studied, nothing acquired. … His greatest enjoyment was manifestly with [his wife and children]. Their presence and happiness made his face beam as nothing else would.” 

When Grant was given the rank of Lt. General—a rank no one had held since George Washington—Grant’s acceptance speech was very gracious:

“I accept the commission with gratitude for the high honor conferred. With the aid of the noble armies that have fought on so many fields for our common country, it will be my earnest endeavor not to disappoint your expectations. I feel the full weight of the responsibilities now devolving on me and know that if they are net it will be due to those armies. And above all to the favor of that Providence which leads both Nations and men.”

After Robert E. Lee signed the surrender agreement for the armies of the South, word spread to the Union forces, and celebration erupted. “Grant ordered the cheering to stop. He did not want the Union army to gloat and in any way insult the defeated Confederates. ‘The war is over,’ Grant told a staff member. ‘The Rebels are our countrymen again.’”

“It will be a thousand years before Grant’s character is fully appreciated. Grant is the greatest soldier of our time if not all time… he fixes in his mind what is the true objective and abandons all minor ones. He dismisses all possibility of defeat. He believes in himself and in victory. If his plans go wrong he is never disconcerted but promptly devises a new one and is sure to win in the end. Grant more nearly impersonated the American character of 1861-65 than any other living man. Therefore he will stand as the typical hero of the great Civil War in America.” —William T. Sherman

“Of all the American generals of the nineteenth century, it seems to me that Ulysses S. Grant better understood the role of the military in democracy than any other.” —John S.D. Eisenhower, historian and son of Dwight D. Eisenhower

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Grant: Savior Of The Union (book review)

August 6, 2012 — Craig T. Owens

I love to read the biographies of history-making people, so I have thoroughly enjoyed “The Generals” series that Thomas Nelson has produced. Almost every child in a US school has learned about the Civil War, and the two generals which stand at the forefront: Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant. But in Grant: Savior Of The Union, Mitchell Yockelson presents a picture of U.S. Grant that most have not seen.

If you recall what you learned about the Civil War in school, what sort of image comes to mind about General Grant? My textbooks presented a man who was a hard-charging, iron-willed general, who didn’t care how many soldiers he lost to win his battles. With this image in my mind, I could just imagine how distant he must have been as a husband, and how strict he probably was with his children.

Yockelson’s amazing biography of Grant shows nothing of the kind. Instead, we see Grant as a master tactician who thoroughly researched troop strengths and geography prior to the battle, to maximize his chances of success. He was a man who lived among his troops in the same housing they had, and who led from the front lines instead of from a safe distance away. He was a man who wanted his wife and children to be with him whenever it was possible, and was described by others as one of the most loving fathers they had ever seen.

And he was a man who loved the men under his care. After one notable victory, the northern newspapers praised Grant and his success. But Grant wrote home to his wife Julia: “These terrible battles are very good things to read about for a person who lost no friends, but I am decidedly in favor of having as little of them as possible.”

Our country owes a deep debt of gratitude to Ulysses Grant for his unshakable courage, deep compassion for his country and its citizens, and for his skills as a military leader. As Frederick Douglass said, “May we not justly say, will it not be the unquestioned sentiment of history that the liberty Mr. Lincoln declared with his pen General Grant made effectual with his sword—by his skill in leading the Union armies to final victory.”

A wonderful read for military history buffs and students of leadership. (By the way, I also reviewed the Thomas Nelson biography of Robert E. Lee here.)

I am a Thomas Nelson book reviewer.

I have also shared some quotes from this biography here.

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15 Quotes From “I Am A Follower”

May 23, 2012 — Craig T. Owens

I Am A Follower by Leonard Sweet turned my leadership thoughts upside down (or is that right-side up?). I would strongly encourage you to read this book, especially if you are in church “leadership.”

It wasn’t easy to do, but here are 15 great quotes from I Am A Follower —

“The Greek noun perichoresis was the early church’s favorite word to describe the interrelationship of the holy Trinity. When the prefix peri (around) is linked with the root of the verb choreuein (to dance), a compelling metaphor is formed or  ‘choreographed’ to describe the ‘one nature in three Persons’ of God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Literally they ‘dance around.’ The choreia or dance of God is the choreography of the cosmos, the interrelationship of Creator, creation, and life itself, the holy creativity of the All in All.”

“Following is the most underrated form of leadership in existence.”

“The cry for leadership is deafening amid our social disintegration, our moral disorientation. We have come to believe that we have a leadership crisis while all along we have been in a drought of discipleship. The Jesus paradox is that only Christians lead by following.”

“The church has become what [Dwight] Eisenhower predicted: a place where everyone is trying to get everyone else to do what they want done but don’t want to do themselves.”

“Leadership is a function. Followership is an identity. … Leadership is a functional position of power and authority. Followership is a relational posture of love and trust. … Being a follower is less about showing how much you know than showing humble gratitude for how much there is to be known.”

“Have we made Christianity more a moment of decision than a momentum for life? Both are important, but have we spent more time on how you become a Christian than on what it means to live as a Christian? Both are important, but have we made holiness more about a destination than a direction?” 

“But to think we can capture and tame Truth is a delusional trap. In fact, the desire for command and control above our desire to please God dams up the rivers of Living Water.”

“Christ does not ask of His followers great success or great fame or great distinction. Christ expects of His followers what He expected of Himself: simply ‘to do the will of Him Who sent Me.’”

“Never in the history of humanity has knowledge been more accessible and of such quality. But when our thirst for information, expertise, and control begins to outrun our thirst for Christ, we can easily trade the waters of the Spirit for a soda-pop substitute. When we place our faith in fillers instead of allowing the Spirit to fill us, we end up selling out not only Christ but ourselves.”

“Leadership culture is strength based. Followership culture is weakness based. …We bless others naturally through our strengths. But we bless others supernaturally through our weaknesses.”

“The disciples were instructed to feed the sheep, not lead them. Christ will lead them. Jesus is the Shepherd. We are the sheep. All of us.”

“Near the end of John’s gospel we find Jesus’ poignant words: ‘As You have sent Me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.’ Did you catch that sneaky as? Jesus’ commissioning of His disciples was simply an echo of His own commissioning.”

“The relationship between leader and follower is this: leaders are over, followers are among. We are all Jesus followers.”

“The leadership paradigm creates folk heroes. Followership creates heroes who are folk.”

“Jesus told His disciples that the sheep always know the Master’s voice. To follow Jesus is not to demand road signs but to respond to the Voice of the Spirit along the way.”

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