180804 ALR Prep Fodder for Grad Resources Plenary Address

· For the past 35 years, I have been providing crossover communications and consultation at the intersection of faith and culture, representing individuals and ministries and telling their stories to and through the media in the context of traditional news values.

· Much of my time has been holding up the arms of men (and women) of “God and good will,” helping to increase their influence and the impact of their organizations for the Kingdom. For 33 years, I was privileged to serve as spokesperson for Dr. Billy Graham.

· In December 2015, my life changed drastically, when Dr. Ben Carson asked me to serve as Communications Director for his Presidential campaign.

· That was brought home to me last Wednesday evening, in a conversation with Os Guinness in Washington prior to The National Prayer Breakfast in Washington the following morning. He asked me if I recalled what Moses said to the Israelites on the night they before they entered the Promised Land after years of captivity and wandering in the wilderness for 40 years.

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· One would think the great leader would have talked about Freedom and opportunity. Instead, he spoke about children, education and the future.

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· After leading the Israelites out of Egypt, Moses teaches them the Shema prayer, which they are to recite every day:

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· 4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house..”

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· God inspired Moses to direct the nation of Israel in this way, because he knew that intentionally educating future generations was the key to standing on their identity in the midst of the pagan cultures by which they would be influenced. The Lord impressed upon the nation of Israel the importance of knowing Whose they are, knowing who they are and not assimilating to or segregating from the culture.

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Former Senate Chaplain, Dick Halverson put it this way:

“You’ve got to treat yourself as a zero. If you stretch out many zeros in a row, you still have zero. But, if you put a one in front of it, there is no limit to what you can have – one million, one billion, and one trillion. Jesus Christ is the one. He can multiply your power and efficiencies many times. He can give us meaning to the zero of our lives.”

Never loses sight of the individual – personal not mass evangelism Man of vision Never answers critics – doesn’t defend himself (leaves that to God) Promotes unity – emphasizes what groups/individuals have in common rather than what divides Sensitive to non-believers – doesn’t condemn, but doesn’t compromise Focused – single-minded in purpose Not afraid to say, “I don’t know”

I present these 13 character traits of Billy Graham – not to pay tribute to a man or a ministry but to glorify God. These are characteristics that God has allowed me to see in one of his choice servants that are benchmarks for all of us as Christians.

· According to consultant Eric Locksmore, today “we are actually in a pre-Christian, rather than a Post-Christian America. But that small change changes everything…we begin to see everything as an opportunity, not as opposition. We run to others not from others. We start creating and stop criticizing.”

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· In that context, Christian institutions have an opportunity to function more like the First Century Church that introduced Christianity to the world, finding common ground with the generation looking to deal with and restore things that are broken.

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· Several years ago “Time” magazine had a back page essay by Roger Rosenblatt entitled, “What Should We Lead With?”:

“Journalists put the question in practical terms: What should we lead with? The rest of the population asks more generally: What matters most? They come to the same puzzle: Survey events in a given period of time and try to come up with the single moment, the headline, by which the world may be characterized, stopped in its spin. What should we lead with? What matters most?

What we confront in making such choices is not the events alone, but ourselves; and it is ourselves we are not able to place in order. The question is not what the press decrees is this week’s news. The question is us. What should we lead with, what matters most?”

· What matters most? For me, that was a difficult question that has been a lifelong struggle. I have had a performance orientation all of my life, often feeling valued for what I did, rather than who I was.

Early in my career, I was striving for significance, often measured by either the events in which I was involved, the resulting impact or extent to which we were able to influence public opinion.

As I shifted into the ministry arena, I became intense, doing everything I could to help clients use every media opportunity to make positive points for the Gospel.

· I was addicted to caffeine and adrenalin, the positive stress and exhilaration of my job and the nobleness of my calling -- I wasn’t using my time and expertise to merely sell soap, our product was now changed lives.

· I went on the sheer stamina of youth, pushing myself to the limit. I was the classic workaholic, with no balance in my life. If I had been working 100 hours a week selling vacuum cleaners people would have said, “You’re crazy.” Instead, because it was for ministry and people were coming to Christ, they said, “Praise God.”

· I became known not for who I was, but for what I did. “He’s Billy Graham’s P.R. man – tell us, what is Billy really like?”

· I was working with the White House, leaders in business and government, virtually every major media outlet in the U.S. and many overseas, traveling and setting up press operations all over the world (in 180 countries.)

· I was involved in challenging, varied and creative projects, getting incredible experience and seeing tremendous results. But, I had no balance to my life. I was living the imposter syndrome. I was miserable.

· I HAD A DRIVE, BUT NO PURPOSE!

· I wasn’t doing God’s will, as Mike Warnke used to say, I was doing my will in His name.

· I was finding significance and self-worth in a job where I was:

- only as good as my last press conference

- only as capable as the coverage we received of our last crusade

- only as important as what I could deliver on the next project

· I was the guy the prophet Isaiah spoke about in Chapter 50:

“Look, all you who kindle a fire,

Who encircle yourselves with sparks:

Walk in the light of your fire and in the sparks you have kindled –

This you shall have from My hand:

You shall lay down in torment.”

· I was walking in the light of my own fire. I was carrying my own torch and riding in on my white horse and just hoped God realized how lucky he was to have such a conscientious, hard-working guy on his team.

· But God had a different idea. He wanted to put out my torch and shoot that horse out from under me and get me to trust again in him, and him alone, and put some margins – with Him in them – back into my life:

- He wasn’t impressed with my ability, He was concerned about my lack of availability.

- He wasn’t moved by my time in ministry, but by my lack of time for Him

- He didn’t care about how much I was trying, but how little I was trusting

- God says in His Word, “Be holy, because I am holy,” not, “Act holy so that others may come to Christ.”

· And so, five years ago next month, I had to take myself out of commission for while and restructure my priorities. I turned myself in for work addiction and went away for five weeks to learn how to feel and to live in the moment again.

· (When I started that process, I was “the Wizard of Oz” – the man behind the curtain, working the smoke and mirrors. I was an imposter, running scared.. I sought clarity through intellectualization for the sake of control to give myself the illusion of security.

· But I got to the point where I couldn’t do it anymore. After working through my stuff (continuing in that Oz metaphor), I became the Tin Man -- who was able to think and feel with his heart. I learned to accept life as an unfolding series of gifts we cannot control, rather than a challenge to be met and manipulated.)

· God’s Word speaks a lot about rest, balance and priorities. But I was more of a “human doing” rather than a human being. But I had gotten to the point where I was so busy being caught up in what I was doing for the Lord, that I missed out on His blessing for my life.

· How about you? What matters most in your life – as a person, as a student, a professor or a professional?

· Are you so overwhelmed by the pressures of school or maybe making enough money to pay for it you are not seizing the opportunity to trust Him?

What matters most to you – is it something temporal, or something that will never change?

Are you motivated by the opportunity we have to influence a hurting world with issues of eternal significance, especially in the recent cultural shift of the past three weeks, when people are searching for answers, considering their own morality and more open to the Gospel than ever before?

· Former Senate Chaplain, Dick Halverson put it this way,

“You’ve got to treat yourself as a zero. If you stretch out many zeros in a row, you still have zero. But, if you put a one in front of it, there is no limit to what you can have – one million, one billion, one trillion. Jesus Christ is the one. He can multiply your power and efficiencies many times. He can give us meaning to the zero of our lives.”

I am just learning about who God is, and in the process, He has shown me that every day is a gift from Him, and we were all reminded of that gift so vividly three weeks ago.

Michael Irvin recently challenged us with the question, “Who Names You?” which has become a theme for Wingmen gatherings this year.

Like Michael, many of us are letting others name or define us, based on performance, intellect or other standards. A growing discipline in my line of work is called “Reputation Management,” which says that a person’s reputation is one of his most valuable possessions, which needs to be managed and maintained.

· WHO’S NAMING YOU?

· WHAT DO YOU KNOW FOR SURE?

· WHAT MATTERS MOST?

· WHATEVER HAPPENED TO WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU?

It may be time to rekindle that love for God or allow Him to bring about renewal in your life. God Bless you on that journey as he honors your faithfulness because each of you has chosen to come home in your hearts, back to God and back to His purpose and will for your lives.

(What Do You Know for Sure?)

Now that you have finished the course I can share with you a little ditty that still doesn’t make sense to me today:

The more we study the more we know.

The more we know, the more we forget.

The more we forget, the less we know.

So, why study?

Becky, the wife of a colleague of mine, recently told me that over the past few months, talk show host Oprah Winfrey has been asking all of her guests the same question, “What do you know for sure?”

I reflected on the many timeless Truths outlined for us in God’s Word, and I quickly tried to distill them into a sound bite if that question were posed to me. When I asked Becky how she would respond, she replied, “What I know for sure is that God is never going to send you where He can’t use you.”

As I pondered that statement in the days following, I realized how much that was true of my life and career that has unfolded over the nearly 33 years since I graduated from high school.

Like perhaps many of you, I was clueless about what I wanted to do with my life. I had been accepted to Wheaton College, but I couldn’t even figure out what I wanted to major in until my senior year.

When asked, “How do you know God’s will for your life?” Elizabeth Elliot replied, “Just do the next thing.” And that is what I did. Without a long-range plan, my mantra became, “Suit up and Show up,” and God took care of the rest.

Though I did end up with a double major in Biology and Economics, I used neither. I have never actually applied for any job I have ever had – they have just hit me in the head. And it has been a wild ride, allowing me to have a front row seat to what God is doing through some of his great servants and ministries.

A client of mine told me recently, “You live life forwards, but you learn life backwards.” On two occasions over the years, God has provided me with watershed experiencesthat have reminded me of his faithfulness in my life, even though undeserved.