Enlarging Your Capacity

Eight Ways to Rebuild Your Gaps

by Andy Wood on October 28, 2008

in Ability, Allocating Your Resources, Consumers, Enlarging Your Capacity, Insight, Life Currency, LV Alter-egos, LV Cycle, Money, Pleasers, Time

Here’s a little exercise we actually take worship service time to practice occasionally.  Follow the instructions carefully (yes, I mean I want you to actually do this):

  • Take a deep breath
  • Let out half of it.
  • Hold
  • Smile
  • Repeat the following out loud, in a calm soothing voice:

“No.”

Repeat this exercise regularly, just for practice, and as needed in live game situations.

Not, “No because…”

Not, “Maybe later…”

Not, “Let me pray about it…”

Certainly not, “See if you can find somebody else, and if you can’t, I’ll see what I can do.”

Learning to graciously, kindly refuse is one of eight steps to building or rebuilding margin in your life.  Margin has to do with creating gaps – cushions of time, money, energy, or spiritual strength that act as living shock absorbers for those who have them.

Imagine how it could revolutionize your attitude, relationships, productivity, and health if the next time somebody says, “Got a minute?” you actually do! [click to continue…]

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The Day of Small Things (and People)

by Andy Wood on October 20, 2008

in Ability, Enlarging Your Capacity, Five LV Laws, Life Currency, LV Cycle, Principle of Increase, Uncategorized

You were born little, with bigness in your DNA.

You were born naked, longing to be warmed and dressed.

You were born penniless, and learned fairly quickly that this was not good.

Even of you’re a twin or other multiple, you were born completely alone, but wired to be relational.

You were born on purpose.  And your purpose may still lie in front of you.  (What DO you want to be when you grow up?)

To get from here to there, you will most likely pass through a series of completely lame, boring, and maddeningly time-consuming stages.  Yes, you’ll experience a few leaps.  For the rest, you’d better get used to celebrating some baby steps.

God called it the Day of Small Things.

The Day of Small Things is the crawl that comes before the walk.  The work that comes before the reward.  The doing-something-anything that comes before doing something awesome.  It’s boot camp and kindergarten, school and internships, and progress-before-perfection. [click to continue…]

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First-hand Smoke

by Andy Wood on October 8, 2008

in Enlarging Your Capacity, LV Cycle

Sometimes people do profound, powerful, healing things because they see the light.  Sometimes they do it because they feel the heat.

Imagine for a minute that you’re part of a crew of thousands, sent by no less than the king of a global power, to do the most important assignment of your life.  Your job is to rebuild the temple of God.

For seventy years your people have languished.  All your life, you’ve heard the stories. 

The land.

The promise.

The covenants.

The city.  Oh, the city!

And there on a mount called Moriah, you’ve heard about the most splendid, most glorious instrument of the worship of God.  Envisioned by the Sweet Psalmist of Israel, and built by his son, the wisest of kings ever to occupy the planet, this masterpiece was destroyed.

Your fathers came clean with you.  They owned up:  they’d screwed up miserably.  And there was nobody to blame but themselves.

But today’s a new day, [click to continue…]

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The Hidden Battles of a Man (or Woman) of God

by Andy Wood on September 29, 2008

in Enlarging Your Capacity, LV Cycle

Job sites can be noisy places.  The clanging of tools, the heaving groans of loud masculine voices, and the hacking or high-pitched grinding of cutting instruments all suggest that something is being built with earnest.

There is another kind of construction, however, that makes precious little noise.  But the effects are powerful and completely necessary.  In the Day of the Second House, none of us can move forward without it.  I’m talking about the inner construction – the molding and shaping of character and spiritual power.

It does no good to rebuild the outward structures without taking a tough look at the inner priorities and attitudes of the heart.  That’s what’s so ridiculous about somebody facing a crisis (remember the Sunday after September 11, 2001?) by scurrying off to a church building they haven’t darkened in months.  The building or setting is meaningless unless it’s occupied by a transformed heart.

So while our friend Zerubbabel was busy governing and building a temple, his partner, Joshua, was facing some building of his own.  But this high priest was facing down his own broken walls, burned gates, and impossible mission.  Joshua was engaged in a battle for his heart, and for the soul of his nation.  Here’s how the prophet Zechariah described this internal battle:

Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. The Lord said to Satan, “ The Lord rebuke you, Satan! Indeed, the Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is this not a brand plucked from the fire?” Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments and standing before the angel. He spoke and said to those who were standing before him, saying, ” Remove the filthy garments from him.” Again he said to him, “See, I have taken your iniquity away from you and will clothe you with festal robes.” Then I said, “Let them put a clean turban on his head.” So they put a clean turban on his head and clothed him with garments, while the angel of the Lord was standing by. (Zechariah 3:1-5)

Every man or woman who is serious about spiritual life and victory faces similar battles.  Our destinies, as well as the destinies of others, hang in the balance.  Here are five inner battle zones: [click to continue…]

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Between the Ranting and the Receiving

by Andy Wood on September 22, 2008

in Enlarging Your Capacity, Five LV Laws, LV Cycle, Principle of Abundance, Principle of Increase

(How to Restore Your Losses, Part 2)

Ground Zero Construction Site, New York

Ground Zero Construction Site, New York

In the previous post I talked about the fact that at the end of Job’s saga, the Lord restored his losses.  For most of this righteous man’s painful episode, the end of the story was yet to be told about him… an important thing to remember when we encounter seasons of great loss.

One thing I left hanging was that Job was required to participate the process.  Make no mistake about it: this was a man who was intimate enough with God to be honest with Him about his feelings and pain.  But something changed between the ranting and the receiving.  I have a feeling the same may be true of you and me, too, if we want to see our losses restored.

1.  Recognize God as a God of purpose.
“I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted,” Job said (Job 42:2, ESV).  Job acknowledged not just that God had a plan, but that His intentions and purposes are good.  He also submitted to that purpose – even when he didn’t have answers. [click to continue…]

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The Popcorn Tree

by Andy Wood on September 5, 2008

in Enlarging Your Capacity, LV Cycle, Turning Points

The LifeVesting Cycle

1. Allocate your resources.
2. Explore the possibilities.
3. Follow your passion
4. Execute your plan.
5. Protect your investment.

6. Enlarge your capacity

When I was still a kid, my dad built a flower box for my mom. We got some nice, rich soil from a place behind our house where we had a lot of mulch and trees. She planted some flowers in the box, and we were excited to see what would come out.

What came out was something that at first looked like a weed. But this was no weed. It was a tree. A popcorn tree, my dad said.

I was entranced. It was my first sense of fatherhood and stewardship, all rolled into one.

If you aren’t familiar with them, popcorn trees, or Chinese tallows, grow in moist climates. They grow rapidly, and can get pretty big. They make great shade and ornamental trees, and in the fall, their seeds split open to appear like popcorn.

I watched this little tree take off, and soon we transplanted it from the flower box to the front yard. We got more and more into trees, and soon found four more popcorn trees – then some redbuds and dogwoods. I had this sense of pride and ownership in all of them, but none more than the original – the queen of the yard – as she quickly grew taller than the eaves of our house.

Then one day the unthinkable happened. I came up the street to my house, and found the most horrific sight. Someone (my dad) had taken shears and whacked my tree off at about six feet. The queen of the yard now had a crew cut.

It was ugly.

Shameful.

Hideous.

“Pruning,” he called it.

“Disaster” was what I called it.

Of course, my dad knew a whole lot more about trees and all things agricultural than I ever will. (I once asked him, “How’d you get so smart?” He said, “I keep my ears open and my mouth shut.”)

Anyway, the queen began to reshape. To spread. To grow, not just taller, but shapelier, even more beautiful.

This life lesson became even more applicable to me as I grew spiritually. [click to continue…]

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16001 Crosses

by Andy Wood on August 14, 2008

in Enlarging Your Capacity, LV Cycle, LV Stories

Neville Davidson

Neville Davidson

Somewhere, sometime, somebody left a simple, small, cedar cross as an anonymous gift for someone they’d never meet.

Sometime later, on a spiritual retreat, a broken, blind, and deeply depressed man received that cross, and his life was changed.  Now mine has been, too, because of how that man chose to rise from the depths of his pain.  I’d like to share his story; Neville Davidson is a LifeVestor.

If you see the glass as half-empty, Neville has gotten a raw deal.  Born in Warrenton, a small town between Liverpool and Manchester in the UK, his childhood memories are dotted with the sound of German bombs, forced relocation of himself and his siblings for their safety, and unceasing danger during World War II.  Later, at age 26, Neville was told his wife had terminal bronchial pneumonia, and would have to move to a warm, dry climate.  He considered an offer to move to Australia.  But his sister had married an American GI, and moved to Lubbock, Texas.  Neville chose family, and literally had to uproot his own household and start his life over in a place where he knew virtually no one.  A few years later, his marriage dissolved.

Neville married Jenny, his wife today, in 1971.  Just five years later, he developed a disease in one of his eyes, and lost his sight in that eye.  In 1984, he completely lost the sight in his other eye.  Neville’s world literally and figuratively became completely dark. [click to continue…]

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Connecting the Dots

by Andy Wood on July 22, 2008

in Enlarging Your Capacity, LV Cycle

Connect the Dots 2Yesterday God played “connect the dots” with me.  He used a series of apparently random or loosely-connected ideas to form a whole – a picture of what He’s up to or what He wants to communicate.  I’d like to share what I learned in the process.  So here are the “dots”:

Be Ready
Tim Challies told an amazing story about a crash landing that took place at the Toronto airport in August 2005 during a horrific storm.  The plane overshot the runway and came to a crashing halt.

Some fifteen to twenty seconds had elapsed from the time the aircraft left the runway. Amazingly, the fuselage was largely intact. But as the plane had crossed Convair Drive, fuel had begun to leak and had immediately caught fire. As the plane came to a halt the fire began to spread and to intensify.

Keep in mind that it had been 27 years since a similar incident had happened in Toronto.

For twenty-seven years the firefighters had trained to deal with a situation like this one. An entire generation of firefighters had come and gone without seeing a single incident. They could almost be excused for being under-prepared, slow to respond, slow to act.

They weren’t.  By the time the tower controller activated the airport’s crash alarm, 26 seconds after the flight left the runway, the firefighters were already in route.  They arrived only 52 seconds after the plain left the runway.

Despite twenty seven years without an incident, those firefighters were ready and they responded well in advance of the parameters dictated by safety regulations. In less than a minute they were on the scene and were assisting the passengers. It took less time for them to get to the crash site than it did for fully half of the passengers to leave it.

Fifty-two seconds!  After not having an incident in 27 years.  The key was training.  They had disciplined, trained, and practiced so much that when the crash occurred, they were ready.

[click to continue…]

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Empowerment – You Want Strawberry or Cinnamon?

by Andy Wood on July 16, 2008

in Enlarging Your Capacity, Leadership, Life Currency, LV Cycle, LV Stories

River Smith 3Hungry?  A couple of years ago a local institution here decided it was time for a second location.  River Smith’s Chicken and Catfish had been serving up good food since 1976, and built a second restaurant on the south side of Lubbock.

Even though I grew up on the Gulf Coast, seafood isn’t usually on the top of my culinary agenda.  In fact, I can count on one finger the number of times I craved seafood.  So you can imagine my wife’s surprise when I said, on a Friday no less, “Let’s get seafood.”  Then I remembered that River Smith’s had opened their new location, so I suggested we check it out.

I’m sure that wherever you live it’s probably the same way, but when a new restaurant opens in Lubbock, you may as well get ready for a wait.  But it was after 8:00, and I figured maybe the movie crowd would have left by then.

Wrong.  The place was packed.  But we were pretty leisurely, and decided to go ahead and brave it.  At River Smith’s, you order at the counter, and they give you a numbered buzzer that you place on a rack at your table so the server knows where to bring the order.  I should have known there might be a problem when the lady that took the order had run out of buzzers and grabbed one from a different register.  Nevertheless, we took our drinks and buzzer and somehow found a seat to wait.

And wait.

And wait some more.

Again, we weren’t in a hurry or even frustrated.  But I did catch a server passing by and asked her if she could check on our order.

Impress me #1:
[click to continue…]

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Together Has Power

by Andy Wood on July 9, 2008

in Enlarging Your Capacity, Leadership, Life Currency, LV Cycle

Lone RangerIt’s not enough to be a team player.  To get things done, to be a leader, you’ll have to be a team builder.  Together has great power, and an isolated Christian has a fool for a companion.

A Stanford Business School study bears that out.  Researchers examined the qualities that companies look for in promoting young managers toward senior executive positions. The study concluded that one of the most important qualities required for great success in leadership is the ability to put together a team and function as a good team player. Since all work is ultimately done by teams, and the managers’ output is the output of the team, the ability to select team members, set objectives, delegate responsibility and get the job done, was central to success in management.

That’s bad news for all the Lone Ranger types.  But hey, even he had Tonto!

Together has power in four dimensions:

1.  Synergy.
Synergy is the concept that one plus one equals three.  You can do the work of one, and so can I.  But together, we can do the work of many times more.  That flies in the face of conventional wisdom.  Maybe you can do it better by yourself in the immediate circumstances, but in the long run, it’s always more productive to go together.

You’re probably not going to hear this at church Sunday, so let me go ahead and tell you now:  [click to continue…]

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