Reflection Roundup: Gratitude Shines its Light

Each week we gather news stories, notable pieces, and other important items for Christian leaders today. As always, listening broadly draws together differing perspectives from which we can learn but may not concur. Here are 10 things worth sharing this week.

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A Grateful Haiku:
Gratitude unties
resentment’s tangle leaving
fresh eyes for God’s gifts.

1. The Carey Nieuwhof Leadership Podcast offers “Beth and Jeff McCord on how to Handle the Tricky Side (i.e. People Side) of Team Leadership, Using the Enneagram to Diffuse Tension and Get the Best From Your Leaders.” If you’re still getting your feet wet in thinking about the perspective the Enneagram offers, this podcast summarizes well while emphasizing that this tool helps us understand the motivation behind what we and others do. If you find yourself constantly frustrated with people who do things in ways you don’t understand, check this out. In the final eight minutes of the podcast, Neiuwhof offers a segment called “What I’m Thinking About,” which is worth listening to on its own. Here, he explores the effects of prolonged exhaustion on leadership and the leader’s ability to make good choices. We are folks who make a healthy smoothie with spinach and all the goodies in the morning and then camp down on the couch with our bag of Doritos at night – case in point for the effect tiredness has on our resilience and decision-making.

2. Writing for Christianity Today’s Better Samaritan blog, Monty Lynn of ACU shares “Knowing the History of Christian Charity Can Save Our Ministries Today.” He writes because he had a query by which he was driven to research and write Christian Compassion: A Charitable History and from which he represents how a “brisk stroll through the past would benefit those laboring in the present.” Lynn writes from the unique perspective of a business professor who has spent time in both international development and social work. Through Lynn’s depth of vision, the tandem movements of both the hand of God and the workings of history inform present challenges.

3. Daniel Darling writes “What Happens When Apps Replace the Offering Plate?” for Christianity Today, reflecting on giving as a worshipful response. Over the course of many adults’ lives, this discipline has changed a great deal. Darling remembers wooden offering bowls lined with felt to dampen the clink of change dropping in. Yet this act did make a sound, as did the checks tearing from books as the plate made its way through the rows of the church, one at a time. Darling relates his processing of the evolution of giving to the many online options Christians have today. It’s different, and some of the nostalgia of the old ways is missed, yet the command to offer “first fruits” may be more reflected within modern bank draft practices. Darling offers a wealth to think about as our habits change yet continually embody the spirit of that which has been experienced by the people of God for millenia.

4. “Men and women, together, have been given the gift of mission.” How does this look in our daily lives and ministerial vocations? How do we acknowledge the fallen state of humanity while leading, not with fear but with a commitment to the fullness of what God intended as God’s expression of the diverse aspects of life represented in both men and women? After years in ministry partnership, Jim Herrington and Trisha Taylor open the conversation on the My Faithwalking Journey Podcast, episode 9, “What is God’s Design for Men and Women as They Work Together?” Listen in for an excellent dialogue on the ways in which we read Scripture. Explore episodes 10-13 for deeper dives into particular questions raised by the topic.

5. For the Gratefulness blog, Laura Grace Weldon writes “Gratitude via Mental Subtraction.” Remember George Bailey in the movie It’s a Wonderful Life? Clarence, the second class angel, comes to him and shows him several scenarios depicting how life would have been had he not come into the world and been himself. Bailey made an impact for which many were grateful, including Bailey. Weldon invites the reader not into the idea that we should be grateful, but into imagination. How would life be different without this blessing, or even this seeming momentary inconvenience?

6. Also for Gratefulness, Kerry Howells shares “Moving Past Resentment to Grateful Living,” reflecting on gratitude in relationships. Stubbornness and self-centered perspectives block our way toward gratitude. Reflecting in community shines light on where we’ve erected these roadblocks. Spaces of resentment can break loose and flow in streams of gratitude with very few words, as this writer testifies. For Howells, it began with uptaking an assignment she’d given her students.

7. Not to be pushy, but … Gratefulness makes it super easy and aesthetically appealing to step right on in to the practices they suggest! On the site, there is an option to send a variety of beautiful e-cards at absolutely no cost. Maybe write a haiku poem inside, three brief lines of five, then seven, then five syllables each. Just send one, but prepare to have your entire afternoon derailed by sending them to your entire family. Expect tears on both ends, sending and receiving. You’re welcome.

8. Transition is the name of the game right now in vocational ministry. In many other aspects of life, we’re living in the liminal space of “not yet.” Following a four-podcast series on determining what might be next, Zane Witcher’s Onto Somethin’ Pod offers bonus episode “But What If I’m Not Sure?” Here, podcast editor Carolina Witcher offers four tips for what can be an important reframing time.

9. For the Christian Century, Amy Frykholm writes “The five spiritual senses,” sharing “lessons from Maximus the Confessor and my dog.” She explains how changing her dog’s physical experience of the world has restored the animal’s delight in everything, including himself. This parallel sent Frykholm exploring the philosophy of Maximus the Confessor, with the aid of ACU’s philosophy professor Fred Aquino. Maximus believed that Jesus possessed both a human will and a divine will. His human will, like ours, had to be molded to the divine. Unifying these two alongside rational thinking brings people closer to embodying the mind of Christ and living as their most fully expressed, divinely empowered selves. This is what Frykholm discovered through simply meeting the most basic needs of her dog on a consistent basis. Frykholm’s piece leads the reader to consider nurturing discipleship within our congregations in ways possibly non-traditional to our fellowship.

10. “So then, a sabbath rest still remains for the people of God; for those who enter God’s rest also cease from their labors as God did from his. Let us therefore make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one may fall through such disobedience as theirs” (Heb. 4:9-11). How to? The current season of Ruth Haley Barton’s Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership podcast is all about “Invitations from God” and features Adele Calhoun. In the “Invitations to Rest” episode, Barton and Calhoun’s conversation surrounds the contemporary sabbath, the rhythms COVID adjusted, and having a heart submissive to God regarding this command. Additionally, Barton is offering this four-week “guided online journey” delivered to your inbox each Saturday morning, beginning this week.