Drive '09 - raw & unfiltered

Here we go. My takeaways from session 1 of Drive '09 as fast as I can type them. I hope they are helpful to you and provoke you to think!

Andy Stanley was bringin' it tonight. Pimp as always.
He talked about Leading in Uncertain Times... & I'm pretty sure those are the kind of times we're in right now! *But actually, the cool thing Andy pointed out is that = "UNCERTAINTY IS PERMANENT." No doubt it will always be around!

**"Uncertainty is why we need leaders. If things were certain, we'd just need peeps to manage the certainty." - haha, great quote. so true.
- Good reminder = the higher up i go in an org. the uncertainty grows exponentially.
- Great leaders step out into the uncertainty & then peeps follow them.

2 things we need in Uncertainty = CLARITY & FLEXIBIITY
1 Clarity - "As leaders we can be uncertain, but we can't afford to be unclear!" (i just need to remember & go back to the vision God gave me & rest there.)
*Be CLEAR about all I know... I can be uncertain about the rest (the how, where, when, etc...) = just say "I don't know, but I am CLEAR on this thing God called us to do in the first place."
- at this point Andy told a few stories that got everyone laughing... about Joshua leading the peeps to cross the Jordan. funny little reenactment. and another thing that got our row of staff & leaders laughing because it was specific to the world of load-in church, but I'll spare you...
**So the Q YOU gotta answer is "what is this vision for YOU?"

2 Flexibility - "Plans change. Visions stay the same." [that quote is straight out of Visioneering that I read a while back and have blogged about MANY times.]
- BUT peeps connect the vision to the plan! they don't separate the 2, so I have to remind them = we might have to abandon the plan, but NOT the vision!
- "It's very dangerous to attach God's name to YOUR plan." oooooh. because if GOD told you to do the plan & then the plan changes... what's up now? But, I have no problem attaching God's name to my God-ordained vision... never the plan though. The crazy successful leader, Sam Walton said, "no decision was ever sacred."
- "Only die on the hill of my vision, not my plans!" - man! every freakin' church leader needs to hear that one... & live by it.
- EVERYBODY is simply more flexible during uncertainty. it's just natural. this took Andy into a pretty hilarious exchange about NOW is the time to cut all the stupid programs your church is doing & then just blame it on the economy... haha. nice. I'd love to see if it works. Because you seriously CAN blame EVERYTHING on the economy.
- "Figure out how to leverage uncertainty for the vision."

- This was so right on for me = "prayer recenters me." it was in context of something bigger & so huge for me to be reminded of tonight.
- Andy is so awesome and really knows how to connect with each individual in the audience. He reminded us all of when we were 1st called to this gig. we signed on when we had NOTHING. so remember that! when we lose ground now, we're still so far ahead of where we were originally. it's all good. don't lose the vision. "Extraordinary clarity comes from letting God take me back to those early days when He 1st gave me the vision." yup.
(Drive '09 rehearsal pic)

*We celebrated communion together at the end. crazy powerful moments... celebrating Jesus dying & coming back to life. pimp.
**I met one of the Global X (cross cultural missions) directors @ North Point tonight. We're hooking up for lunch tomorrow and chillin' in his office. Gonna talk about some of my future in spreading God's fame in the unreached parts of Africa. pretty freakin' stoked about that.

tomorrow is gonna be a good day.

OH! & i almost forgot the QUOTE OF THE NIGHT = "All God's leaders are MAC people!" - Andy Stanley :)