The Secret to Bringing it Every Day
My youngest son, Christian, played football at Wheaton College, which is an evangelical Christian school. Though Christian was recruited to play quarterback by several elite secular universities, he felt called to study theology and philosophy at Wheaton and to explore a call to vocational ministry.
I probably shouldn't admit this but I was surprised to learn that this Christian college has a powerhouse football program that competes for the national championship in NCAA D3 year after year. Why was I surprised?
In Christian circles, we often set the bar too low. What’s the secret to setting an expectation and “bringing it” every day?
See, our familial experience with high school football and then watching our oldest son Caleb play tight end at Yale University, was that most – if not every – coach we had encountered was terribly profane in their attempts to motivate their teams and absolutely merciless in seeming to do whatever it took to win on the gridiron.
The coaches at Wheaton were hosting chapels, and prayer times, and Bible study groups. These were not the methods I had seen employed in previous football experiences.
How would this group of loving Christian coaches at Wheaton motivate a group of nice Christian kids to excel in such an emotional and violent game?
When it came to the coaches at Wheaton, the key was to expect excellence. Their message was essentially:
“We love you, but if you want to play here you have to work out hard, practice harder, commit, learn and bring your all every day. We recruited you to produce. We expect to win. If you want to be a part of our winning tradition you better show up ready to play."
Being a group of nice Christian coaches didn't change the expectation that every player was on the team to play a specific role and was expected to play it at the highest level. They had to produce and if they didn't, they weren’t going to see the field.
Why do so many Christians and Christian-led organizations seem to be plagued with low performance expectations? Like we are such nice Christians we really don't expect much from ourselves or each other.
Maybe it's a misunderstanding of grace? Yes, we are saved by grace but we are saved to do the good works we were created to do. (Ephesians 2:8 – 10)
Or maybe we misunderstand love. Yes, we are loved unconditionally but Jesus said that if we love Him back we would do what He asks us to do… which in part is to produce exceptional results. (John 15:9 – 16)
In recent articles I have been trying to make the point that each of us has an indispensable role to play in God's life and God's world but that we must “bring it” every day in order to actually live out our indispensability.
“We simply must show up and play the role we were made to play, and play it well. The world cannot be all that it was meant to be without each of us being who we were made to be and doing what we were made to do. ”
Let me suggest two, of many ways, to live out our indispensability.
1. Live heartfully.
It probably won't surprise you that I view King David as a model of indispensability. God chose David to play an indispensable role in His story. He did it and he did it well. God chose David because He knew that David would play his appointed role because of what was in his heart. “God testified concerning him: ‘I have found David… a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.’” (Acts 13:22 NIV)
Something about David's heart made him chooseable.
You might remember that God sent Samuel to David’s house to anoint a new King among the sons. The obvious choice was the eldest brother, Eliab, who was evidently tall and handsome and well-qualified in much more important ways. But God said “the Lord does not look at the things human beings look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." (1 Samuel 16:7 NIV) This didn't mean David was unattractive, for we are told “he was glowing with health and had a fine appearance and handsome features." (1 Samuel 16:12 NIV) It just meant that the thing that made him chooseable was what was in his heart.
What was in David’s heart was a willingness to do everything God wanted him to. God knew he would “bring it.”
Let's face it, there are some people who have qualities that differentiate them from other people and these qualities are resident in the heart. I'm not sure exactly how to define these heart qualities – they are somewhat mysterious and inexplicable. But all of us can sense an after-God-I'll-do-whatever-God-planned-for-me-to-do depth in other people. Most importantly, God sees it and chooses it and employs it and rewards it.
I suggest that we each bring our heart to God every day and repeat David's famous prayer:
“Create in me a clean heart, O God and renew a right spirit within me." (Psalm 51:10 – 11 NIV)
We should pray that whatever God saw in David He will create in us. And if we pray with sincere faith He will answer that prayer. And then we need to bring that heart to every area of our life, be it our family, our workplace, our church, or our football team.
In order to play our indispensable role we must live heartfully.
2. Live artfully.
David developed the skills to actualize what was in his heart. I love the passage that says that David led the people with integrity of heart and with skillful hands. (Psalm 78:72 NIV)
He worked hard to be able to do everything God had made him to do: David cultivated the arts of slingshotting, advanced warfare, writing, musicianship, strategic planning, fundraising...most notably, the art of leading well.
We know if someone really has heart is if they live artfully.
I like what Seth Godin writes:
“Our society is struggling because during times of change, the very last people you need on your team are well-paid bureaucrats, note takers, literalists, manual readers, TGIF laborers, map followers, and fearful employees.
What we want, what we need, what we must have are indispensable human beings. We need original thinkers, provocateurs, and people who care. We need marketers who can lead, salespeople able to risk making a human connection, passionate changemakers willing to be shunned if it is necessary for them to make a point. Every organization needs a linchpin, the one person who can bring it together and make a difference. Some organizations haven't realized this yet, or haven’t articulated it, but we need artists.
Artists are people with a genius for finding a new answer, a new connection, or a new way of getting things done." (Linchpin, Seth Godin, page 7 - 8)
“Each of us are indispensable. But heart and art gets us from theoretical indispensability to lived indispensability.”
Check out other books that have inspired me recently.
We each need to say to God:
“I give you my heart, and to prove it I am going to invest in the full development of the skills I need for you to use me.”
We must strive to turn our passion into artistry. And then we must bring that same mentality to every area of our life where we believe we have an indispensable role to play. This is the secret to “bringing it” every day.
When we bring that mentality to our passions and calling, we are proclaiming our desperation to get in the game, our commitment to developing the skills necessary, and our dependability to “bring it.”