I know this is a stretch for many of you because we so often think of humanity as the problem. But what if being human is not the problem but the goal.

We strive to be less human and more divine. But what if the quest to become human was in our eyes (and in God’s) a very good thing. After all, God embedded His divine image upon the human. He declared his creative act of adding humanity to the whole of creation as “very good”. Humanity is not something good. It is very good. For the ultimate expression of this remember Jesus.

When Jesus calmed the winds and the waves, the disciples asked, “What kind of man is this?”

Now be honest, how many of us, at one point or another, have spoken to nature? I don’t know about you, but I speak to nature and usually nothing happens.

So, we turn to an episode like the one in which Jesus speaks to the winds and they obey him and tend to say something like, “Well, he’s the kind of man who is God.” For us, this explains why the wind obeys him.

But what if Jesus converses with the winds because he is human, like we are designed to become?

The Genesis story tells us that humankind is an embedded part of the natural world. We are created in God’s image to oversee this world of which we are a part. This function is what being made in the Image of God is for, according to the story.

Humans are a part of nature and designed to be a force of nature on behalf of God. The way Luke, one of the gospel writers, tells the story of Jesus, Jesus was a human characterized by an ultimate and intimate communication with God. He was the one upon whom the creative spirit rested and through whom the creative spirit works.

Jesus was not “only” human, he was The Human. In him we see what we were designed to be and what we will be: creatures living in intimate communication with God.

It’s not true of you that you are “only” human. That’s nonsensical like saying you are “only an ultimate mystery”. You are human — a creature capable of contact and communication with God, the creative force behind the universe.

So speak with the winds.
Anticipate what it is that in Christ we are becoming.

Are we becoming more like God?
Are we becoming human?
And, are these two questions ways of asking the same thing?

What do you think?

See you in the mystic…

Erwin’s reply is basically: focus on the things you are good at doing and which make the world a better place; also, the things you are good at that make you a better person: and, the focus on the things that you are passionate about.

We’re continuing our exploration of how those of us who are in traditional churches and denominations – and are becoming more missionally centred – can prosper and flourish. Last time I shared why I have chosen: not to leave the denomination; not to stay and expect less; and, not to try and live in two worlds (church and world). I choose something more than all of these, something yet to be given shape and form.

I quoted Len Sweet, who writes at the end of his book So Beautiful:

We were made to be more than men and women. Through the Spirit, we can become a force of nature.

Through the lens of Elijah’s mountain-top experience, I suggested that we are meant to be “thin-silence” people: living in proximity to humans wherever they are, in the way that God came close to Elijah. We perhaps want to be fire-people, or earthquake-people, or wind-people, but it was in the thin-silence that God broke into Elijah’s life.

I don’t think the question is: How do we become missional leaders? – as if there’s some stereotype. The question is: How do we become more missional? – the degree to which this happens in our lives will determine whether we become leaders of anyone or anything.

You must find the freedom to be you and I must find the freedom to be me. Your life is a result of the missional activity of God, who sought to give himself in creation. God is missional. Jesus is missional. The Holy Spirit is missional. And we who bear the image of God, we too are missional. Part of what it means to be human, then, is to be missional: to reach beyond our lives to bless the lives of others, so they too can reach out to others, to be fully alive. Then, the more we live out the possibilities to give God has created us for, the more missional we become.

Steven Hawthorne anchors this freedom well when he writes:

Passion is the heart set free to pursue that which is truly worthy. Those who set their hearts on that which is most worthy – the glory of God – live with joy-filled abandon. (Perspectives)

If God’s glory is seen as one side of a coin, the flip-side is our fully-realised humanity. I sometimes ask people: What is the purpose God has made you for within his creation-mission, which you will pursue for the rest of your life?

I think that maybe twenty percent of people know sooner-rather-than-later what do with their lives. There are lots of reasons why this might be: their particular talents and abilities; their environment and experiences; and how they have connected these up in order to move towards their future. It’s really more of a spectrum than a sharp 20/80 thing, but the important thing is that every person can take an intentional way; I know because I have been walking it for more than ten years. (And it’s the best; I have been more alive on this way then at any other time in my life. I really do believe the best is in front of us.)

Thin-silence people are true to who God has made them to be. Who they are emerges out of a conversation that they are engaged in with God. (It also emerges out of the conversations they have with others – we seriously miss the point of this in traditional churches and denominations, in which we mirror the individualistic culture of which we are a part.) Out of these conversations there emerge dreams. They do not know if the dreams have come from them or from God, and it doesn’t really matter because thin-silence people find themselves talking to God about these dreams, and God is asking questions and encouraging them to begin trying out the things they are passionate about, and he tells them he likes what they are dreaming and doing.

FOUR ELEMENTS AND A MYSTERIOUS COMPANY OF TEN
Here are four elements which have really helped me explore the missional life: Self-Awareness, Ingenuity (Creativity), Love, and Heroism. I see these four elements as being key to prospering as missional people in traditional churches and denominations.

A missional company of ten began living out these four elements some 350 years ago. Within a decade this small band had journeyed to four continents.

A growing self-awareness had allowed them to be honest and confident in what they could and could not do, what they were passionate about, and how they connected with God.

Knowing what they were meant to do with their lives allowed them to move quickly and creatively – they would say “Live with one foot raised.”

As they reached out to others with the love of God, they saw the image of God in the different peoples they met and they loved them thoroughly. This extension of love saw amazing creativity being released in different peoples, and they also expressed an openness to learn from them.

This way of living saw them on an odyssey of discovery and giving. It saw them living their lives in heroic ways for others.

Self-Awareness – Ingenuity – Love – Heroism: these mark our journey of becoming a force of nature for God. There are no shortcuts.

What do you think?

Next time I’ll begin to unpack some of this.

I don’t know if there is a name for that space of time between deciding to act and the actual action but there should be.  My best suggestion is the “post decision pre-action buffer” and though that is descriptive it surely isn’t concise.

Many of us, even if we can’t name it, know all about that space of time.  It is the deep breath before the plunge and the moment of silence before the battle.  But not everybody knows about it.  There are those who skip that moment altogether.

A few weeks ago I was watching Die Hard with Bruce Willis again.  I’ve seen it many times but the character played by Willis, John McClane, always intrigues me.  I think what intrigues me most is how uniquely qualified he is for the situation in which he finds himself.  A quick thumbnail of the plot shows he is the lone police officer in a high rise office building that is being taken over by terrorists.  Alone he takes on this small force and secures the release of their hostages though it wasn’t an easy task.  What made him uniquely qualified was the lack of time between his decisions to act and his actions.  It almost appears as if his decision to act was the trigger that initiated action.

One scene really brings this to mind for me.  McClane was being pinned down by automatic gunfire from two of the terrorists.  In the process, broken glass from the nearby offices was strewn all over the ground.  McClane knew he had to get out of that area if he was to survive.  One problem was that sometime earlier he had lost his shoes.  This meant that his run to safety would be in bare feet across a minefield of shattered shards of glass.  But, he didn’t pause.  He got up and ran.  In fact, a pause there might have meant his life even if the purpose for the pause was to try to preserve his feet.  Decision to act followed by immediate action.  That was John McClane.

I think this quality in somebody is succinctly stated by the Human Torch in the movie, The Fantastic Four.  As he was learning to use his new found powers he started to suspect that the ability to burst into flames would also give him the ability to fly.  To test this theory he went to a balcony dozens of stories above the ground and planned on jumping off.  His sister, wanting him to pause to reconsider his choice yelled out to him “Don’t even think about it!!”.  Over his shoulder, as he jumped from the balcony, the Human Torch answered back with a smile, “I never do!”.  Decision to act and then action.

The Gallup StrenthsFinder labels this talent Activator.  For those of us who decide to act, then pause to collect our thoughts, and then act this may not make much sense.  For us the learning is in the preparation and the thinking.  For Activators learning is in the doing.

This article is from the Super Powers Center Series on “Pop Culture Perspectives on Talent”. Be sure to listen to Alex McManus and Dale Swinburne on the Super Powers Center, Saturday evenings at 6PM (ET).

You may know her as “the bride”, or Beatrix Kiddo, or the Black Mamba. She was the central character of Kill Bill 1 and 2, a film by Quentin Tarantino, played by actress Uma Thurman. A core characteristic of the Black Mamba was that she was a keeper of lists. Specifically, death lists…but, lists none the less. Not only did she keep lists but we know that her death list had been revised at least 5 times. Macabre, though it was, she followed her lists, ticking items off one at a time upon completion, and driven to achieve what was next. She spent little time resting on her laurels but instead saw clearly what remained to be done. And get things done was what she did…emphasis on the done.

What does this have to do with you? Some of you share a talent that manifests the same qualities as the list-keeping Black Mamba’s. To make this point, let’s turn from the world of film and fiction to the real world and get another angle on this “drive to complete” and “to achieve”. National Geographic broadcast a special program titled King Lines that highlighted the world’s foremost rock climber, Chris Sharma.   Peers say that Sharma has pushed the sport farther and faster than anybody else in recent history. His genius on a rock face make him a true maestro.

What drives him forward? A desire to be the best? The ultimate thrill? Let me set the stage.

Always in search for the most challenging climb, a friend of Chris’, suggested a 70 foot limestone arch spanning across deep water located off of the coast of Mallorca, Spain. It had never been climbed before. One problem was that in the climb there was a 7 foot blank spot with no foot or hand holds. To get past that spot required a 7 foot leap to the next nearest hold. If he missed it he would plummet 35 feet to the water below, swim to the support boat, dry off, change clothes, repeat the approximately 25 moves to get back up to that difficult spot, and try again. Chris estimated that he fell at that spot 100 times. He invested 4 months of his life underneath that arch trying and trying and trying to beat it. When he did conquer the jump and complete the climb here is what he said.

“Climbing is this ever evolving thing, although it really is about the goal and succeeding and getting to the top, at the same time it’s a never ending cycle of finding something that you’re really motivated on, obsessing over it and then, once you get to the top, celebrating for a little while and then moving on to the next thing.”

“Obviously really I was ecstatic, really psyched. But climbing is this thing that happens in the process. Once you do it, you’re psyched, but that’s the end of the process. When you complete it, that’s great. But then it’s like, ‘What’s next?’”

What drives Chris? The same thing that drives the Black Mamba: The next item on the list.

That climb in Mallorca has never been repeated. The items on the Black Mamba’s list? She didn’t quit until she was finished. They share the attribute sometimes abbreviated as GTD, that is, Getting Things Done.

In the parlance of the Strengths Finder, the attributes of stamina, hard work, and ticking off completed items parallels the talent theme of Achiever.

Ok, let’s turn to you and your extraordinary powers. Do you suffer from GTD? Maybe you have a method for going through your list of “to-do’s”. Maybe your method is efficient and polished, or maybe your method is madness. If madness is your method you’ll forgive me if I don’t turn to you for help getting through my personal list of “to-do’s”. Instead, I’ll turn to those among us who shine. I’ll turn to those have a proven track record of accomplishing. We aren’t talking about accomplishing things in a certain arena. We are talking about someone who is so good at wiping out their “to-do” list that we’d go so far as to call them an achiever.

You ask an achiever if they’ve gotten anything done yet today and they’ll give you a list of exactly what accomplishments they’ve gotten under their belt. They will also be able to list what they have left to do. In fact, what they’ve done they don’t see half as brightly as what is yet to do. They are driven forward to the next item on the list. It drives them forward to achieve.

There are people all around us with this talent. Some of us, like the fictional assassin, the Black Mamba, or the real world rock climber, Chris Sharma, have nurtured it to the level of a strength. If you have this talent, so can you. So put it on your list.

Dale Swinburne
Senior IMN Operative
Baltimore, MD