final days forum

Will the recession steal your creativity?

This recession is sneaky.

Not content to rob the country financially, this recession aims to nab our creativity. The gift of our ingenuity is the real prize this recession season seeks. The media reports about the lingering misery of the nation's financial loss, but the news shrouds the most lethal weapon -- the underlying lie that we can't get beyond this recession.

Chaos always attempts to trample the resilient order within human beings, that part of us that says: "Wait a minute! The last time I faced this, it actually turned out OK..." or "Whoa! Remember how I actually achieved more after I lost so much?"

When we give up, when we freeze in place because of chronic problems and overwhelming odds, chaos wins.

If you're out of work, you have time to think. If you want to quit a job you're clinging to because it keeps the lights on and that's about it, take time to think. Great minds seize the freedom to conceive dreams and visions and hopes even when their lives are constrained.  Nobel Prize winner Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich  about a Soviet labor camp touched me when I read it in high school because of the gritty survival it depicted. And I'm still amazed by Paul, who wrote inspired words to his friends in Philippi while under what traditional scholarship says was captivity in Rome.

I have not faced a Soviet labor camp or house arrest, but stories like these and the recession itself have taught me this: Chaos may limit circumstances, but chaos can't capture my spirit unless I submit to it.

Because of this recession, much has been lost, but much more is to be gained. The American Express card may be gone, but because of creative thinking during this recession, you may reach the Dave Ramsey sweet spot where you resist all plastic. The house may be gone, but its loss may drive you to build a business that builds you a new one, not to mention houses for others.

What we do now, what we create when we fight worry with work, what we reinvent ourselves to be despite the financial ashes -- will determine how luminously we emerge when this sly recession passes.

Judy Howard Ellis

Photo: Russian writer and Nobel prize winner Alexander Solzhenitsyn looks out from a train, in Vladivostok, summer 1994, before departing on a journey across Russia. Solzhenitsyn returned to Russia after nearly 20 years in exile. Photo by Mikhail Evstafiev

Obama is not the messiah, but...

So far, President Obama's ability to communicate galvanizes people, particularly the young. Many young people crave inspirational leadership because they long for a compass that directs them to reach above their circumstances instead of being swallowed by them.

Obama's power to influence this generation may be the most annoying trait for critics; this may be why the accusation of "messianic"  is pasted to him with an apocalyptic wink.

Such criticism forgets that men and women throughout the ages were gifted with voices that spoke to their generation. Sometimes those voices fueled changes that  led to massive empowerment. At other times, those voices generated despair and sowed destruction. 

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We may all be better served if we study the responses of people to Obama -- consider the crowds in Strasbourg, France today -- and learn something about the hunger for inspirational leadership. It may inform us of the core shift not only in America, but in the world. It may reveal to us our place of crossroads, a term which the city of Strasbourg has as part of its name.

Inspirational leadership in every sector of life is key. The dour news today about the unemployment rate makes me think about the economy. Banks that refuse credit lines to small businesses because they fear going under should revisit their commitment to being "community leaders." Businesses that lay off because of grim economic forecasts should return to their profit-and-loss sheets and choose not to be economic pundits, but human beings who understand they can say nothing when their epitaphs are written. Think of this tombstone message: AS CEO, I KEPT MY ENORMOUS SALARY WHILE MY FORMER WORKERS STRUGGLED TO LIVE.

The progress inspirational leadership brings advances slowly, painfully, and sometimes unseen. It makes this type of leadership problematic for some. But for me, that is what makes inspirational leadership fascinating to watch. The fruit may not blossom for long periods of time, but the words of the leader either feed anger or motivate people to recover. I prefer the power of the latter. As Proverbs says, there are words that can be "fitly spoken."

Obama is flawed like everyone else. History will record his every mistake and misstep. But perhaps something else is at work during the Obama era, if we could but grasp it. Maybe now is an opportunity to point people to the true Messiah, the greatest inspirational leader of them all.

When that inspirational leader saw a man trapped in his circumstances, it was the leader's words that motivated the man to catch a vision of what could be. That inspirational leader said: "Do you want to get well?"

The man gave his reasons why he was still sick. Certainly they were acceptable conclusions for he was plagued with a 38-year condition. But the inspirational leader was after something else, something deep within. With a forceful, healing love I can only imagine, this inspirational and transformational leader said: "Get up! Pick up your mat and walk."

All of us must be inspired to look deep within -- past our frightfully limiting circumstances. All of us must decide now whether we will walk or sit.

Judy Howard Ellis

Links courtesy of msnbc.com, wikipedia.com, cnn,com, biblos.com, studylight.org

A bad economy offers a second chance

Doors, originally uploaded by BinaryApe.

With free-falls on the stock market and American families shifting into financial lockdown, an incredible understanding may emerge from this economic thunderstorm.

It's not a matter of who is at fault or where we can dump our rage about greedy CEOs, predatory banks, inept politicians, and careless homeowners. The profound impact of this crisis is that it may actually swing open the doors to a second chance.

We are being awarded a "do-over" as we plunge to depths of financial problems we could have never imagined. A "reset" button has been pushed, and from the bottom we can build again. We can recover our sense of purpose and shift our cultural diet from the celebrity-weirdness galaxy. We can encourage innovation in areas such as energy, housing, and education. We can honor steadfastness of character and celebrate simplicity of living.

When we embrace a second chance, our empathy heightens because everyone experiences loss. Poverty is real and within reach instead of being viewed as an isolated problem facing "those people" who troll downtown streets or who cram their families into battered motels because they can't afford an apartment or a house.

Excessive luxuries don't matter as much when we retrench. Clarity becomes an essential nutrient for life. We reexamine purpose and summon our desire to survive. And if there is emotional health, we also manage relationships with care so as not to let them become the brunt of our fears.

As we struggle to pay food bills, battle fear as home values drop, stretch dwindling take-home pay, worry that our business can't make payroll, moan day-care costs, and mourn blasted retirement savings, we can discover newfound resilience. The financial bedlam, the turbulent valley, incredibly become huge doors of hope.

Judy Howard Ellis

Link to Hosea 2:14,15 courtesy of studylight.org

The passing of the past

Round the bend, originally uploaded by nugib.

When a girl I liked moved away from our neighborhood in East St. Louis, it was an early lesson about letting go. The girl was fun and sweet and from my viewpoint as a child, 24th Street seemed dimmer after she left. I couldn't stop her passing through my life and neither could she or our other neighborhood friend, who also did not want to see her go.

In life, there are many passings. And we mourn them. When both of my grandmothers died during the same summer after my college graduation, my family walked away from a life we once knew when we left Sunset Cemetery. We will see them again one day, but their time with us in the old way had passed.

When I once lost love, I had to re-orientate my sights to new dreams. When I changed jobs or relocated to other cities, I found my footing in new places. When new opportunities meant exchanging abundance for fewer material things, I learned simplicity. This is the captivating nature of letting go. New understanding is gained; freshly minted maturity is experienced; more profound empathy is shown.

One of the essentially paradoxical things about God is that he does not change in character, perspective, and ability, but his kingdom is anchored in constant change. He's always building, rebuilding, structuring, and restructuring. He's always loosening our moorings.

And we must not be offended by the King of Kings because he maneuvers in our lives this way. It's "craven fear" to do so. While writing this post I am reminded of the character in Hannah Hurnard's beloved book, Hind's Feet for High Places. Even the onery Craven Fear in Hurnard's story was transformed. May we allow God to lovingly guide us through these changes in life, no matter how painful, so that we also can be transformed.

Right now, America is experiencing a great passing of the past. That passing is more than acknowledging that a 720 FICO score and a decent down payment does not guarantee you a house. This passing of the past also is about more than who will occupy the White House in January. These are shadows reflecting the intense movements of heaven. Isaiah 43:19 is cited so often it sometimes seems cliche, but it is fitting here: Behold, God is doing a new thing. Will we not know it?

During this Jewish New Year, 5769, what we can't see is the extensive work of God. He's adjusting the perception of everyone to catch the expansive dream of the kingdom. He wants everyone to realize that kingdom-building  manifests in more ways  than overflowing church parking lots and television programs drawing millions of viewers. Indeed, the Father wants a great company, but they will likely resemble David's men, unlikely recruits who know their God and the demonstration of his power. 

These kingdom-seers display God's glory in the checkout line in the grocery store, and in the neighborhood business that gains a reputation for hiring as many people as possible instead of laying off workers to boost its bottom line. They are the small coterie of saints whose work among the incarcerated restores dozens upon dozens of families. Their labor is identified by miracles, not self-righteousness.

They don't fluctuate like the stock market when God carries them through one season and then the next with rapidity.  They travel his breakneck highways with joy.

Judy Howard Ellis
 

Link to Hannah Hurnard's book, courtesy of books.google.com; link to Isaiah passage courtesy of biblos.com; link to information about the Jewish New Year courtesy of http://joyofthetorah.org
link to David's men in 1 Samuel, courtesy of studylight.com

Wanted: 'godly apps' for a troubled economy

Wall Street subway station, originally uploaded by epicharmus.

If ever there was a time for adherents of marketplace ministry to flex their strength, it is now. We need business leaders who have absorbed the wisdom of Proverbs, who have watched God's discernment purify their business practices and elevate their level of productivity. Change agents clothed with humility, they are not bound by money or politics.

All help can't come from the corridors of Washington, whether that help is a bipartisan bailout or not. We need leaders on the ground who know that they must look to God for answers. These leaders are the carriers of "godly apps" that can problem-solve and inspire the nation through the current financial turbulence. Just as a "killer app" refers to computer software that provides a core value, as Wikipedia explains, this country needs a multitude of godly apps that will steer our country into a more stable and productive direction.

What I am describing is a grass-roots effort, a neighborhood-by-neighborhood, city-by-city, board room-by-board room, sales call-by-sales call movement led by business leaders who don't think the way to lead the world to God is by pointing a finger and yelling, "JESUS LOVES YOU!"  They understand evangelism, but they operate in heavenly subtlety. These leaders are gifted to rethink our energy resources, restructure our financial systems, create reasoned plans that can rebuild an aging infrastructure, and pump resources into our cities and schools. Without broadcasting it, they know that their practical contributions display eternal power.

I've written about this before in "Where is Joseph?" and "A recession? Maybe it's a holy opportunity," but it needs to be said again. God wants to innovate our world for his purposes and he wants to do it through his people. Please step up, man or woman of God who interpret the reports of the Wall Street Journal and CNBC through the ancient, yet still relevant wisdom of Scripture.

Please don't restrain your skills because you fear inadvertently underwriting sin or perpetuating a system that loves mammon. Ask God for understanding and he will guide you through love. Paul wrote this to the church at Philippi and it still applies today: "And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best..."

Judy Howard Ellis

Links courtesy of www.nytimes.com, www.wikipedia.com, www.blackaby.org, www.online.wsj.com, www.cnbc.com , www.studylight.org

 

The benefits of hardship

I remember being a kid and looking through Miss Pinkie's basic white refrigerator. Not much seemed to be there. Maybe some meat, milk, and eggs. Probably some fruit, turnip greens, and other vegetables. As a kid, I wasn't always keen to explore the freezer. That didn't interest me. It was always the stuff that was ready to eat that called my name. Maybe I hoped a McDonald's Filet-O-Fish would appear. Of course, one never did!

Miss Pinkie, as her neighbors and friends called her, was my grandmother. Although she has been gone for more than two decades, I still remember that sitting at her table meant savoring a feast. She whipped up meals like liver and onions and spaghetti and fish and I wondered how when it seemed like she had so little. She also often had a tin of my favorite candy, Kathryn Beich's Katydids.

My grandmother tutored me to be gratified by simplicity. An intrepid entrepreneur and a woman with a sense of style, my grandmother is an enormously powerful example for my family and others. Our nation grapples with many problems simultaneously, but the way to cope is not to mimic the Joneses or to bind ourselves to stress, the unforgiving slave master. We must return to the best we've learned from elders like my grandmother: 

• Love of family is not just spoken, it's demonstrated.
• Diligence in work yields benefits for your life and the generations after you.
• Your life imprint should be stamped on your family and your community.
• Teaching children to be responsible for household chores and helping out with the family business helps them grow.
• Vision -- like encouraging children to attend college, start a business, or try something new --  is a gift of a lifetime.
• Generosity is a characteristic you nurture, whether times are good or bad.

My grandmother did not live to experience the conveniences and opportunities we now enjoy. But she taught her grandchildren to dream and push forward -- even in hardship. That's God's word for us right now, I believe. Hardship burns off excess. Hardship clears a clouded eye, exposes greed and bares pride. It's a weird principle to humans because we prefer comfortable places, but it is an eternally true one, nonetheless -- in difficulty there is magnificent blessing.

Judy Howard Ellis

"In Every Dream Home..." photo courtesy of  Fast Eddie42 on Flickr,com

A recession? Maybe it’s a holy opportunity

With all the talk about whether the U.S. is already in a recession or falling headlong into one, it's a great time for church communities to serve the nation.

Churches could step up their Crown Financial Ministries classes to teach good money use, host Q&A sessions with savvy financial experts within their congregations, survey and then address the financial needs of their members, increase benevolence funds, encourage members to collaborate with each other and partner with reliable mortgage lenders, bankers, realtors and businesses to help those snared in the housing crunch.

Ministries with enormous platforms on TV and the Internet could talk more about surviving and thriving when the economy goes south. They could specifically address handling finances and give a mike to those who don't mind describing their former money struggles and how God revealed powerful lessons for success.

Charlatan-led prosperity gimmicks should die off like parasites. Whether the gimmick is peddled by unsavory ministers or business people who deal with a sleight of hand, every financial idea should be tested by whether its ambition is to please the heart of God. Only the lasting financial, spiritual, physical and emotional wholeness that God offers should be sought, for He is not only the Giver of provision, He is Provision.

Now is not the time for Christians to allow a bunker mentality. We must talk about money. We must take care of our own homes and reach out to those within and outside our churches.  Those who are a whiz at coupon-saving, trading stocks, maintaining cars, shopping, explaining insurance, balancing checkbooks, running businesses, investing in real estate and scores of other skills should not hoard their gifts. Share them and refuse to judge the people you help. And for those who are on the receiving end, be humble enough to be taught.

Despite the hardships of the current economy, I believe fresh opportunities are on the horizon. Though stocks may plunge and the credit crisis worsens, those who know their God can and will do mighty exploits for Him.