all hands on deck

I remember the day I took this picture from a helicopter. I remember crossing the river with a team of friends, just beyond this location, out of view below the first wave of trees. I remember the quad pulling the boat through the grasses, up and down hills. I remember the mud of the Chinchaga riverbed sucking off my boot. I remember walking for miles back and forth, from our compressor to 12 of 11 wellhead. I remember staring at gauges and speaking through radios as needles moved and pressures changed. I remember changing filters and assessing compression; loudest machine I've ever heard.

Hands on, I was learning as I was doing; I was in school with a good teacher. Sometimes you just have to roll up your sleeves and get at it, and not give up till it's done!

Those who know me well, know I don't do much of anything half-hearted. I run well at a certain RPM, a frequency, a vibration (beyond the coffee induced type)... I get a hum going, and it's like I'm flying; if I can find that groove and stay with it. In that kind of environment, it's hard to get the smile off my face. Making ten decisions with a team in one minute is a lot of fun, especially when you pack all the minutes of the day full of such endeavor. Then, at the end of the day, I crash into bed, exhausted in such a good way.

At the same time, I cherish my alone time. I spend a lot of time on my own... it's what recharges me. To be climbing a mountain, walking a stream.... sitting in a grassy field listening to the breeze blow through.

I was a pastor for a number of years... at least that's what they called me. But, sometimes it was a bit like pulling a heavy train on my back. Things moved at a certain plodding pace... I could barely stand it, so I took everyone with me to the streets and alleys where the action was.

It was the same in factory work, welding at one place, and building trucks in another... there was never a dull moment. My momentum in those environments came from the endless conversations I had with people who were asking loads of questions about Jesus. There's nothing quite like sharing the teachings of Jesus to open ears and hearts.

The enigma bit of me is that I love learning completely new things, speaking with lawyers, raising money, dealing with questioning vendors, developing teams, overseeing budgets and operations... But to be real honest, I'd rather break a sweat preaching about Jesus all day long 'till my voice goes numb. I can talk about Jesus Christ all day long! There's a bit of Wesley and Whitfield in me...

What I really love is preaching the beauty of Jesus. I preach him as he is. I preach him until he shows up for himself, honestly... you should see what happens to everyone when he shows up. I love to preach him so much that I don't have to preach him at all because he's with me whether I speak up for him or not. I really truly believe he is with me. And I can go years between sermons; I've actually done that! It's part of the training...

I think the most active saints among us wear out all the angels... They have to tag team with us sometimes, take shifts.

There is a pace and flow to the Spirit-fueled! It's easy and light... It's not always relentless and bone-jarring. But, if I was burying bodies in Haiti with one hand, and singing with an orphaned child holding the other, it would be both/and, not either/or; a hoping kind of pain.

It's all easy and light and relentless and bone-jarring; I'm getting used to living with it all!

Abbeys and Bankers

A couple of years ago, I took this picture of my friends in Ye Olde Cock Tavern, London. I mention that day on Fleet Street in Clairvaux Manifesto.

Over the first few days of 2010, I've received a number of fascinating emails:

Since we spoke on the phone New Year's Eve, one friend is quickly rediscovering his family tree. Three generations back, his grandfather planted and built an important landmark church in Upper Canada. Four generation back, his grandfather was a well known Toronto philanthropist, politician, and banker who cared deeply for the poor.

Also over the past few days, another friend, who's grandfather was a banker in England, emailed me the green light to dream and scheme the potential realigning and rebuilding of his global business and philanthropic endeavors.

And just today, as I was praying for that friend, I was emailed by a reader of Clairvaux Manifesto in England (whom I've never met) who works in (of all things) finance.

There's a reason why a Hong Kong banker endorsed Clairvaux Manifesto. It might have something to do with why I wrote the first two paragraphs of page 295 this way:

The vision is this:

Continue to proclaim the Word of God and growing vision of your heart. Work with funders and investors who are like-hearted and innovative. Recruit directors from various fields of discipline who are lovers of God and people and sit them around a common table. Develop a team of friends around values like humility, mutual reciprocity, and interdependence. Establish circles of quiet around 10,000 young kingdom leaders, master cadets; discover them internationally; develop them locally; and deploy them globally, together building abbeys of prayer and work.

Unite public and private companies that will collaborate together in building abbeys of prayer and work. Launch a bank and venture capital group that will treasure the pennies, nickels, and dimes of people who will partner in the building and maintaining of these abbeys. Make this consortium of prayer and work so stable and attractive that financial advisors could offer it as a product.

It's curious to me, that in a few days, Abbey Bank in the UK changes its name to Santander!

I've always liked the name Abbey for a bank...