Tag Archive - new work

5 Steps to Reach Our Goals and Stop Making Excuses

January 21, 2012 in Confessions of a Preacher's Wife, Leadership with 9 Comments

Since I posted 3 Excuses for Failure to Meet Our Goals earlier and now the excuses are out of the way, I thought it a great time to plan steps to reach our goals. If you want to add excuses or view them in the post and comments, click the link above. There is some comfort in knowing others struggle with our same excuses. But for those who are ready to get on with it. Let’s go for it.

Go For It

Stop Studying and Talking, Start Doing

It’s time to stop studying it, reading about it and talking about it and just go do it! We can overcome our excuses and skip to our goal if we put into practice steps similar to these.

5 Steps to Reach Your Goals

1. Verbalize the goal in specifics.

Where are you going? How are you going to get there? What does it look like when you’ve finished? What has to be done before that can happen? Identify all the aspects of the goal. The paper is blank until we put down our ideas. Get as specific as you can. Just like the assigned paper is blank until the student identifies the ideas that will formulate. Then with hard work it is finished.

2. Visualize yourself taking small steps towards the goal.

What needs to be cut, streamlined and categorized in order to make a step-by-step plan from where you are today to completion? Break the plan down into even smaller steps and identify the first one. Following these baby steps makes the dream goal a reality. Without the discipline to work it, you’ll go nowhere.

“Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.” Thomas Edison

So I like the motivation I get from Thomas Edison. Maybe he’d be a good one to pall around with to learn to get things done. He sure did a lot.

3. Find a group of people attempting similar tasks.

Surrounding yourself with other motivated people gives you the regular motivation and accountability you need. A mentor can be awesome, and blessed is the one who finds one, but a regular band of fellows can be as effective. As iron sharpens iron, you become better as ideas and best practices of dedicated people rub off on you.

4. Practice the skills needed without fear of failure.

Perfection isn’t automatic. We have to guess. Do trial runs. Practice. Make decisions. Some will be bad ones. Failure comes with any challenge. It is a sure thing. Success is working through each setback, learning each step of the way.

“Many of life’s failures are men who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” Thomas Edison

Keep practicing and moving forward with the next step in the plan. Adjust the plan if needed, but keep going.

5. Consider each accomplishment your validation.

Every small step finished is a huge accomplishment. Most people are talkers and not doers. Celebrate. You’ve started doing the hard things that make you successful. Focus and allow your accomplishment to fuel you to do another step towards the goal.

As some have said, “You can’t eat an elephant in one bite.” Let’s start chewing on the bite we have.

 What have you got to chew on? What other steps do you used to get things done? How do you celebrate when you complete a small step?

Our “someday” will arrive before we know it!

This post is part of the Insights into Ministry & Leadership Series. If you enjoyed it you may also like the Living and Working on Mission Blog Series, the Spiritual Journey’s Gentle Nudges Series or the other Blog Series.

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*picture from wealthmouli on mylot

Work for Orphans

August 5, 2011 in Confessions of a Preacher's Wife, Leadership, Ministry to Women with 0 Comments

The first day of work for the orphanage meant unpacking all those trunks from the generous people in America. We woke up on Africa time, with everything sort of laid back and no strict time schedule. I love this way of living. It reflects the way I homeschool and operate with my writing. I must be Ugandan. Chuck is having a terrible time with this laid back lifestyle. He thinks that when someone makes plans to do something at 1:00 p.m. then 1:59 is too late. But in Ugandan time, that is still 1:00 p.m. Time is more of a guideline not an appointment. Chuck even tweeted that he wanted to send all of Uganda to the Steven Covey course on time management.

We had the best breakfast ever. Scrambled eggs with minced pepper, onion, carrots and cheese. We also had African tea, fresh squeezed papaya juice and this unique wonderful toast. They use a lot of ginger and cloves in cooking.

Unpacking Trunks

Trunks for the Orphans

Trunks for the Orphans

We unpacked the trunks and sorted all morning. We have so many wonderful sheets and socks for the children. Balls, school supplies, etc.

After the morning’s work we had lunch and a real ginger ale made with real ginger and real sugar cane. Have I told you that the food here is real? The taste is out of this world.

During lunch a huge rain storm blew in. We waited until it was over to go to the kids house. We loaded up in the van and drove to the orphanage, the kid’s house. I cried when I saw it. But in another way, I was so encouraged. The children’s way of life is so much better than if they were on the streets and being taken advantage of, raped, murdered or stolen.

Orphanage Fence and Guarded Gate

Orphanage Fence and Guarded Gate

Orphanage Fence and Guarded Gate

The house felt more like a compound where the kids were trapped. Look at the fence they are in. The razor wire on top is facing outward to keep people from getting in. They are locked up in side unless they are at school or escorted safely to different places. A patron and two matrons live with the children to give them protection, guard the gate, and do the cooking. They are very thankful for protection from the streets and place to sleep and eat where they were cared for. These children were so respectful, grateful and glad to have us for a visit.

Girls Wing of Compound

Girls wing of the Compound

Girls wing of the Compound

The rain left the kids courtyard a mud/water hole. The bedroom doors enter this courtyard and each small room sleeps 6 to 10 in bunk beds. Susan gave us a tour and Cameron videoed. After a tour of the house, we visited and then handed letters to the children that were written in San Antonio, TX. The kids were excited to get a letter. I don’t know how the letter writing was done, but the look on the children’s faces when we ran out of envelopes and had not called their name was crushing.

Then we separated into groups to teach a short Bible lesson and get further acquainted. I took the older girls back into the girls wing of the house and they took me into one of their rooms. They all took off their muddy sandals, went in and sat on the concrete floor. The room was dark without light except for what the sun allowed into the door. No windows. I stepped just inside the door and sat on the floor with them. We opened the Bible and talked about having a personal prayer relationship with God and the importance of hearing him speak and obeying. These girls are so teachable, quiet and respective. Education is highly valued and they want to learn at all times.

Afterward we played a little with them and walked back home with Ken. It’s like we are on parade as we walk through the village. People wave and the children laugh. This lady walked with us for a while.

Woman on the Street of Iganga

Woman on the Street of Iganga

More pictures are uploaded on Facebook. Check them out.

Please pray for the mission. You can sign up to be a partner in prayer. And for updates while on location you can subscribe to feed here.

Please comment below. I’d love to hear your reaction to the amount of respect the children show, or the gratefulness they display in our coming to them.

This post is part of the Living and Working on Mission Blog Series and you can read more about our trip in the previous Uganda posts. If you enjoyed it you may also like the Insights into Ministry & Leadership Series, the Spiritual Journey’s Gentle Nudges Series or the otherBlog Series.

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Working and Living On Mission

July 13, 2011 in Confessions of a Preacher's Wife, Leadership, Ministry to Women, series with 0 Comments

Mission Wordle

I want my life to count for something. We all somehow, some way, through what we do, want to make a difference. This is a series of posts that includes information on how to get involved with an effort that will help you do just that. These posts deliver inspiration and encouragement for living on purpose, on mission as well as some outlets so you can get involved

My goal is to offer as many opportunities as I can. If you have any suggestions of ways to make a difference and be proactive make a comment below and I will try to cover it with a post.

Here are some of the mission and opportunity posts:

  1. Christmas Eve Gift
  2. The Best Christmas Heifer!
  3. Little Made Much
  4. One Way to Move from the Chair to Uganda
  5. Obstacles to the Mission
  6. Flight to Uganda
  7. Entebbe Night and Morning
  8. Entebbe Road and Ugandan Fast Food
  9. Arrival into Iganga
  10. Work for Orphans
  11. Orphan Ministry and Burial
  12. Orphan Laundry and Service
  13. A Little Work and Monkey Business in Uganda
  14. Uganda Caning on the Blindside
  15. Sunday Worship, Dinner and Gifts (video)
  16. Travel to Romantic Sipi Falls for Rest
  17. Riding Around Africa
  18. Last Orphanage Walk (video)
  19. Uganda Orphans
  20. Russia Orphans
  21. Vickie’s Heart
  22. continued . . .

As always, if you have a topic or suggestion you would like to discuss please contact me here or make a comment on this post!

This is the Living and Working on Mission Series. If you liked it you might also enjoy the Insights into Ministry & Leadership Series, the Spiritual Journey’s Gentle Nudges Series. Click over to the table of contents for all the Blog Series.

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12 Leadership Checks for Making a Kingdom Difference

January 14, 2011 in Confessions of a Preacher's Wife, Leadership with 4 Comments

While praying about multiplying our small group and the possibility of planting a church, I began reading and studying every related resource I could find. Many cite leadership as a key element to starting and/or maintaining a ministry.

Leaders teach Bible studies, organize and administrate offices and households, train children, balance budgets and bills then decide what’s for dinner. Leaders are everywhere, and I’m sure you’re one of them.

Leader.DucksinaRow
Leaders can lead large groups, but they must lead one: themselves. Leadership is pioneer work: heading out where no one goes but God. There are many challenges and it is easy to slip into NOT leading. In Exponential: How You and Your Friends Can Start a Missional Church Movement by Dave and Jon Ferguson, I found a cool check list for leaders to monitor themselves and make sure they lead well.

Twelve indicators that leadership is lacking
1. I wait for someone to tell me what to do rather than taking the initiative myself.
2. I spend too much time talking about how things should be different.
3. I blame the context, surroundings, or other people for my current situation.
4. I am more concerned about being cool or accepted than doing the right thing.
5. I seek consensus rather than casting vision for a preferable future.
6. I am not taking any significant risks.
7. I accept the status quo as the way it’s always been and always will be.
8. I start protecting my reputation instead of opening myself up to opposition.
9. I procrastinate to avoid making a tough call.
10. I talk to others about the problem rather than taking it to the person responsible.
11. I don’t feel like my butt is on the line for anything significant.
12. I ask for way too many opinions before taking action.

The list made me uncomfortable. Yet I’m not called to be comfortable. I am to serve even when it hurts. Fear immobilizes me and I’m guilty of allowing it to keep me from leading. This list inspired me to take a risk, to step up and really lead as God directs.

How about you? Where has God been leading that makes you uncomfortable, or like your neck is stuck out? How do you put fear aside and adventure forward with God? Please answer in the comment section.

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This post is part of the Insights into Ministry & Leadership Series. If you enjoyed it you may also like the Living and Working on Mission Blog Series, the Spiritual Journey’s Gentle Nudges Series or the other Blog Series.
(Images courtesy of sxc.hu)

Spring Worm Wins Teeth

March 16, 2010 in Confessions of a Preacher's Wife with 0 Comments

Spring has come…along with a few other uprisings. The skies are blue with scattered puffiness. The air is crisp with fragrant smells. And the temperature is pleasant, inviting outdoor activity. I can’t bear to be under a roof when lying in the sun beckons. It’s like my skin begs, “More vitamin D, please.” Vitamin D and sun on skin are related somehow. Spring is healthy and makes me feel good, until it happens.

Along with spring, come the menaces—the bugs, bees and weeds. Then from out of nowhere pops my bulging disc. Somewhere between L4 and L5 (lumbar vertebrae) I hear a scream, “Stop pulling weeds!” I admit it. I’m kind of soft, very much like a worm. It looks like the weeds win.

But God has a promise for us worms. “Don’t be afraid. I am here to help you. Though you are a lowly worm, . . . You will be a new threshing instrument with many sharp teeth” (Isa. 41:13-15).

Whew. I needed help, but I got more than that. I got TEETH. Ever seen a worm growl? “Grrrr.” God is making me new and powerful. Move on over weed, the whole hillside too, if I choose.
God tells us to, “Forget all . . .for I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun!” (Isa. 43:18-19). He goes on to say he is making pathways clear, deserts full of water and wild things thankful. Why is God doing this?

He’s doing it for me, the lowly worm, “so my chosen people can be refreshed” (v. 20). God promises to pour out his Spirit and his blessing (Isa. 44:3), so we can proudly claim, “I belong to the Lord.” And we “will write on [our] hand, ‘The Lord’s’ (v. 5).
That’s right, God’s making me new and powerful like a new plow. Picture a shiny, new John Deere on a field of weeds. I might smell like a worm but I’ve got new teeth, a refreshed growl and “The Lord’s” painted in yellow and green on my hand. Menaces beware.

(I hope my spine reads this blog.)

So how’s your spring? Send a comment, share your spring experience.
May you find time to be in the sun, to growl at the menaces and to brand “The Lord’s” on your hand. Be blessed.

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Where is your brother?

September 24, 2009 in Confessions of a Preacher's Wife with 0 Comments

Yesterday’s entry in Streams in the Desert had a stirring poem by Archbishop William Alexander. The poem moved me as it spoke to my heart’s passion. Listen to this…

“If I have eaten my morsel alone,”
The patriarch spoke with scorn;
What would he think of the Church were he shown
Heathendom—huge, forlorn,
Godless, Christless, with soul unfed,
While the Church’s ailment is fullness of bread,
Eating her morsel alone?

“Freely you have received, so give,”
He says, who has given us all.
How will the soul in us longer live
Deaf to their starving call,
For whom the blood of the Lord was shed,
And His body broken to give them bread,
If we eat our morsel alone!

Bread Image

Oh Church, I confess to being a glutton, but I can no longer fully enjoy our feasts, the meetings of shared faith. My heart longs to take the abundance of life to those who hunger, those who cry out, those who have no hope.

To those who wait, “I don’t know how to get to you, but I’m coming. Hold on a little longer while I find my way and learn. I want to bring you a bite of hope, a bit of love and acceptance. I’m a coming. Don’t give up.”

To God, “Help me bring the answer to their cries. Show me how to do this. What is your way? Fill me with your amazing love and let it pour over them. Here am I.”

“Where is your brother Abel?” (Genesis 4:9)

Turbo – for Church Planters

February 19, 2009 in Scheduled Events with 0 Comments

At NorthWood Church in Keller, TX

Partnership with Wild Works, a division of Leadership Network.

http://www.glocal.net/turbo

Churchless, Homeless, and Super Bowl Party-less

January 31, 2009 in Confessions of a Preacher's Wife with 6 Comments

((sigh))   :0(

This has been a week of “Who am I?” Who really cares that I’m churchless, feeling homeless, and evidently Super Bowl Party-less?

                                      

Last Sunday night being our last at our great church, we left to answer God’s desire for us to start something new. While driving home, I felt a complete loneliness. Who will bring us chicken soup when we are all sick? Who will sit with us when we endure serious hospital stays? Who will call saying they miss us and love us? Who will care for us now?

What was I thinking? Why would God want this for us?

Isolated.

Alone.

Amongst herds of people, but lonely.

Like one living and working in New York surrounded by masses, but without community? Could this be . . .?
Is this how some people live?

 Not feeling loved. Not having anyone who really cares?

Is this the reason God wanted us to leave? To make a community where people will feel loved. Where through us, God will show love those who won’t go to church.

Within the last few weeks, Chuck and I made a “Not To Do” list, solidifying what we felt was God’s leading in our lives. We made a commitment to obey the call–go out of the church. Since he called us out of a great pastorate, it would defeat our obedience simply to join another. Even if we felt lonely or the need for fellowship, we were to keep to our task. We also listed that this was our call, and would allow our children to join any youth group’s activity of their choosing. (They have lots of friends in various groups, and have their Super Bowl Party invitation.) To a certain degree, we released them from supporting our call so they may follow God’s plan for their lives. This is all very strange and new territory to us.

God’s called us to live authentic Christ follower lives amongst those who need love the most. Maybe we needed to feel as those we are to reach.

A person without a home (feeling), without a community of genuine people who care, and without an invitation to a Super Bowl Party.

new work, Robin Bryce, iGETitLIFE

 

This week my song has been from an old sitcom, Cheers, where lonely people gathered, “I just wanna go where everybody knows my name . . .”

Where is the Super Bowl Party?
Where is our “Cheers”?

In the middle of this drifting feeling, I’m certain of God’s faithfulness and his promised gift–his love and presence. We have a home in him and really aren’t alone. He leads us and will help build our “Cheers” community.

This party will be a Super Party!
Do you wanna come . . . where everybody knows your name?
 

Should I STAY? Or Should I GO??

January 14, 2009 in Confessions of a Preacher's Wife with 12 Comments

Staying means comfort, risk-free, known terrain, but going …

Go, Robin BryceI hate change.
No I like change.
Uh-uh, change is disturbing.
No, it’s exciting. (there’s nothing like inner conflict!)
Gosh! I hate my life.
No, no. I really love my life, but these decisions are killing me.
Should I stay? Or Should I go?
 

While the beat of that song plays in your head, I’ll tell you we struggled. We struggled within ourselves. And we struggled with God. Then my husband and I finally came to the conclusion.

“Okay. We’ll go.” We’ll give it all up and follow God. (not like we weren’t totally given to ministry already!)

“It could never be better to stay once He [God] determines otherwise.” Streams in the Desert January 14th.

That may be right, but it doesn’t help the fear of the unknown, the uncertainty of the future, the misunderstanding of others placed on us.

“He [God] goes on ahead of [us]” John 10:4

That’s more comforting. God is leading the way, going in front of us, and showing us the way.

F. B. Meyer states, “All the tomorrows of our life have to pass through Him before they can get to us.”

Now that’s a shield in which I can get behind and forge ahead.

Maybe going is the best answer when God says, “Go.” (check Matt. 28:19-20)

So we find ourselves taking an Abrahamic call. My husband resigned a great pastorate of over eight years. We don’t know where we are going. We are unsure of what we’re doing. We simply answered the call to go.

We didn’t come to this decision lightly. The struggle took a while and we often switched places with one sensing the call stronger and the other not. We never struggled with each other. But were united in intense struggle to do only what God wanted. My security was challenged. His identity challenged. This was all so new, and well…challenging!

Our last Sunday is January 25th. Then . . .

I have no more to write. I don’t know anything more. Going . . . with eyes wide open!