Lynn Green

Author: Lynn Green

  • Leader, Know Thyself!   

    Leader, Know Thyself!   

    **This is a personal website and reflects my thoughts and convictions. It does not represent any official position held by Youth With A Mission.**

    How well to you know yourself?  You may say “Very well; I live in here”.

    Actually we are all aware that getting to know who we are, what strengths we have, the skills we should develop and what weaknesses we have, is a process;  one that is sometimes fulfilling and exciting, and sometimes discouraging and painful.  It happens intensely for most people during their twenties, with quite a lot of that intensity carrying on into their thirties.  By mid-forties most people should have a pretty good idea of their strengths, weaknesses, abilities and their spiritual gifts.

    Wise people and teams have written numerous books on the importance of discovering what you are good at, and then developing your strengths and gifts until you become highly skilled.  The converse of that is to know your weaknesses, and recognise that you will need others alongside you who have strengths where you are weak.  It was a great help to me when, a few years ago, someone pointed out a serious flaw in our society, and especially our educational processes, which tend to highlight our weaknesses; then we are encouraged to work on improving where we are weakest.

    I was never much good at art.  I just don’t have the fine motor skills to draw paint or sculpt.  No matter how hard I worked at school, I was never going to be an A student in art.  (When Tracey Emin’s “Bed” became famous, I thought I could do that, so perhaps I could be an artist after all.  But that is another subject.)

    I don’t need to be good at art, because other people are and I am designed to work in teams, adding my strengths to the strengths of others and overcoming our weaknesses in the process.  When I need a webpage design I can get someone else to provide it!

    So, none of us can “do it all”, even though some people give the appearance that they can.  We can each focus on our strengths.

    But what happens when a person is sure they have particular strengths, but really they don’t?  Or perhaps they are ambitious to develop skills where they just don’t have the strengths to do that.  I worked with a person who was an outstanding organiser.  She was especially good at managing large events.  She made very difficult tasks seem easy, but she, for some reason, seemed to despise those abilities and rather wanted to be the person up front.  In the end, this outstanding organiser became the senior leader of a small group of people, which gradually declined until nothing was left.

    What do you do when you are convinced you can do something well, or can at least learn to do it well, but others see you don’t have the aptitude, or strengths to do that role well?  This is such a difficult question!

    On the one hand, it is possible that for one reason or other those others don’t like us, or have some prejudice against us, and with malicious intent they seek to tear us down.  Perhaps they are ambitious, and we are seen as a competitor.

    On the other hand, there aren’t many people like that, and we are likely to have others who will speak to us honestly and truthfully. So we should be eager to listen to those who know us and can give us helpful advice about our strengths and weaknesses.

    However, even when good feedback is available there are a few people who just don’t know themselves.  Their own opinion of themselves is seriously at variance with who they really are.  I won’t attempt to analyse why it happens, because I think there are a great many reasons why a person may try to develop in a direction for which they are not equipped.  When it happens, that person can waste years of their life, and end up having failure after failure.   Or at best they will keep working at a role, especially in leadership, that doesn’t suit their strengths.

    Here are some signs that a person might be ambitious in the wrong direction:

    1. You find yourself under tremendous stress, and consistently wondering if you are doing OK.
    2. Quite a number of reasonably trustworthy people try to point you in another direction, or perhaps you sense that they are not fully satisfied with your performance.
    3. If you have reviews, they are not encouraging.
    4. You find yourself fending off those negative reviews or criticisms by attempting to discredit those who produce them.
    5. You find your life is not going in the direction you want, but you genuinely feel it is other people’s fault.
    6. You begin to wonder why it seems that everyone is prejudiced against you.

    Joy Dawson, one of the people who helped lay the foundations of Youth With a Mission, once said that;

    “humility is being willing to be known for who you are”. 

    I believe that; but we often know things about ourselves only as we see then through the eyes of others.  We were actually designed to live in open and honest families and communities.  However, it takes a deep humility to hear and believe others when what they are saying is different than we want to hear.

    The really excellent news is that each of us is designed wonderfully with unique strengths.  As we discover those, sometimes by trusting the eyes of others, we can live joy-filled, productive lives.  We were created for harmonious relationships and when we unselfishly work in our strengths to help others and they compensate for our weaknesses, we function like a healthy body.  And that is the way it is meant to be!

  • ARE MUSLIMS THEIR OWN WORST ENEMIES?

    ARE MUSLIMS THEIR OWN WORST ENEMIES?

     

    **This is a personal website and reflects my thoughts and convictions. It does not represent any official position held by Youth With A Mission.**

    Okay, so I am writing on a subject that has been written on by journalists and academics all over the world.  Still, I think I have some helpful things to say.

    Anyone who knows me knows that I have Muslim friends, have advocated on their behalf, have apologised to Muslims for the atrocities of the Crusades and the way Christianity has misrepresented Jesus, and have pointed out that the extremists do not represent the majority or even a statistically significant minority.  I do not believe that they are a true representation of Islam today.

    However, the Muslim community does have a problem.  They are being represented by that very small minority; at least partly because our press trains the cameras on them and holds the microphones to their mouths.  But it is not all the fault of our press; Muslims have also failed to understand and implement their most important priority in this time of great danger.

    Muslims turned out in their hundreds of thousands in many nations to demonstrate against the cartoons of Charlie Hebdo. At the same time, in the week or so that elapsed between the massacre at the offices of the satirical newspaper and its next edition, a number of horrific and highly offensive events occurred:  Muslim extremists executed, by stoning, women accused of adultery—and videoed it for the world to see.  They threw two men accused of being homosexuals from the top of a building, with a baying crowd watching below.  They cold-heartedly executed more prisoners of the war they initiated and, in at least one case, the executioner was a child.  The Saudi Arabian authorities continued with the weekly instalments of lashes of a cane to the back of a man who dared to criticise Islam and the Saudi Royal Family.  His sentence was prison and 1,000 lashes!

    But there were no demonstrations against any of these acts of terror.

    So what incensed them so much against the cartoons of Charlie Hebdo and the Danish cartoons published a few years ago?  They have a very strong aversion to any depiction of Mohammed.  It is very similar to the Jews and the Old Testament commandment that they should make no image of God.  This is very important to them.  It is a sin as heinous as making an idol was to the Jews.

    I understand that as a Christian.  I was very offended quite a long time ago when play writes and film-makers seemed to be doing their best to offend Christians by depicting Jesus in various degrading ways.  At the time, we had blasphemy laws in the UK, but the “entertainers” seemed to know that they had powerful figures in the establishment on their side so they fought their indictments for blasphemy right up to the highest courts and had the result they had aimed for from the start—the blasphemy laws were struck down.

    I wrote letters, I contacted my elected representative, I signed petitions, but we lost.  Part of me is now okay with that because it is very hard for the law to define what language is acceptable and what is not.  When the law begins to describe what we can say and what we can’t, we are liable to lose important freedoms and to give more power to the state than we should.  Of course, there are some words and subjects that “the powers that be” have decided are currently off limits.

    For example, when I was a child we had a little saying when we were playing a game that needed someone to be “it”.  Eenie meanie, minie mo, catch a ni***r by the toe….  It was all very innocent and actually did not affect our attitudes towards African Americans in our school.  Notice that I can’t write that word now.  (I can write the F-word, which I could not write then, but I would rather not.)  Political correctness changes constantly because….well, that will have to be saved for another blog.

    So, should there be laws against depicting Mohammed?  If so, surely we should reinstate the blasphemy laws that applied to the Christian faith. But, with the benefit of hindsight, I would rather we did not have blasphemy laws, so I don’t want a law against depicting Mohammed.  In the effort to stop offensive speech, we can easily create laws that end up giving away precious freedoms.

    There are, however, many things that we are wise to avoid, even though they are legal.  I do not approve of this current issue of Charlie Hebdo, with its drawing of Mohammed.  It exacerbates already strained relations between Muslims and most citizens of Western nations.  In a civilized society, those who have the privilege of a public voice should not use it to intentionally offend a large segment of society that already feels marginalised.

    But, I said that Muslims have a problem.  Indeed, they do.  Though the majority deeply disapprove of the violence being done in the name of Islam, they have not managed to get their voice heard.  That is partly the fault of the press that we all read, listen to and watch.  But it seems to me that it is also a case of misplaced loyalty.  There is a deep sense of commitment that Muslims should stand with Muslims whenever there are accusations or attacks from outside the Ummah (the global Muslim community).

    But Truth trumps loyalty, at least it should do.  When we are loyal to those whom we know to be wrong, we become promoters of wickedness.

    My hope and prayer is that non-violent Muslims all over the world will face the fact that their failure to get their voice heard is not only too bad, but it is a great threat to them.  I deplore the idea that Western citizens should rise up against Muslims, but voices like mine can’t really accomplish very much.  We need to see hundreds of thousands of Muslims taking to the streets all over the world to demonstrate in condemnation of Islamic State, of Boko Haram, of Al Shabbab, Al Qaeda and all the other splinter groups whose violent depravity, expressed in the name of Allah is causing so much pain, loss and global anxiety.

    When they do, our press must cover it and make it high profile news!

  • Paris shooting – Contrast of Kingdoms

    Paris shooting – Contrast of Kingdoms

     

    **This is a personal website and reflects my thoughts and convictions. It does not represent any official position held by Youth With A Mission.**

    By the time you read this, perhaps the two gunmen who killed so many of the staff of a satirical newspaper in Paris will have been captured or killed.  But as I write, they are believed to be in a building that is surrounded by police.

    Will this event serve to light the fire of anti-Muslim violence in Europe?  Will it increase the willingness of our nations to use their superior military power to punish Muslim nations?  Will tens of thousands more Muslims die or be deported or suffer from hatred  in their home towns?  If so, what will you think and feel about that?

    Wait a minute!  Don’t stop reading because you think I am just another misinformed person claiming that “Islam is a religion of peace”.  That statement has been made ad nauseam by many of our public figures, beginning with George Bush not long after 9/11.  Islam is not a religion of peace.  If judged by history, neither is Christianity (nor Buddhism nor Hinduism for that matter).  All religions have been co-opted into men’s violent ambitions.  Violent ambition has only been adequately remedied once—by God’s incarnation and surrender to death at the hands of violently ambitious men.  But it was followed by resurrection!

    Does that help make my position clearer?

    If you know any Muslims, whether in Muslim-majority nations or in “Christian/secular” nations you will know how frightened and discouraged the vast majority are.  They feel that their religion has been hijacked by a small percentage of their faith who are mostly angry young men.  What makes it all the worse is that they condemn the actions of the violent few, but no one is listening to them.  Our press continues to train the cameras on, and hold the microphones in front of, the violent minority.  To compound it further, some of our public figures have used the situation to make comments that increase fear and hatred and strengthen stereotypes.

    The consequences of this are potentially much more deadly than all the terrorist attacks put together.  The 20th Century was the most deadly in history and the majority of the premature, violent deaths were the consequence of “Christian” nations going to war against other “Christian” nations in Europe and then drawing the rest of the world into the disaster.  Our democratic nations can only go to war when most of the population is convinced that it is necessary.  When fear and hatred are cultivated sufficiently, war becomes the “will of the people”.  This cycle has happened again and again and the only people who “win” are the banks and bankers that fund our national debts.

    Just a few weeks before Christmas Marti and I were in a gathering in Jerusalem where Jewish and Arab follower of Jesus made a high-profile, public covenant to stand together in unity—come what may.  It was a very dangerous thing to do!  They were well aware that their commitment ran against the tone of the communities in which they live.  Most Arabs and Jews in the Middle East are ready and willing to go to war against the other, whom they see has implacable enemies.  But the Spirit of Jesus can change that hatred and fear, even when it seems too strong to be challenged.  I will write more about this later.

    In this past year, similar commitments have been made by Chinese and Japanese followers of Jesus and by a great number of other nationalities and ethnic groups that have been enemies for decades or centuries.

    As fear and hatred grow and the world seems to become darker, the Kingdom of Light is also growing.  It rarely gets the headlines, but the growth is steady and momentum is increasing.

    Recent events, with the Paris terror being the latest, will provoke our nations to restrict international movement.  Governmental authorities will tend to feel that they have a mandate to alleviate their citizens fears with tighter and more invasive controls. They may feel that they are ramping up for all-out war.  But Jesus told his followers to GO to all nations.  That means his followers from all nations going to all nations.  Closed borders, fear of others based upon nationality, religion or ethnicity has no place in the Kingdom of God.  As His followers, we really do possess the antidote to the current fear and hatred.

    Where is your citizenship?

  • A Surprising Introduction in Cairo

    A Surprising Introduction in Cairo

    **This is a personal website and reflects my thoughts and convictions. It does not represent any official position held by Youth With A Mission.**

    About 15 years ago I convened a meeting of missionary leaders from Europe, the Middle East and Africa.  Cairo seemed a good place to meet and a friend there offered to take care of the logistics.  When I arrived everything seemed to be in order; we gathered at a flat in Cairo and from there were due to travel to the Western Desert area where there was a prayer centre awaiting our arrival. Then there was a knock on the door and our host hastily explained that he had invited a Coptic Orthodox Monk to speak to us on the history of monasticism.  I was so irritated!!  This was my meeting and I had not asked for a guest speaker!  We had many issues to discuss and to pray about; how dare he take precious time from us without asking!

    I think I managed to conceal my irritation, although my wife, who knows me best could see through my façade.

    I said hello to the “monk”, actually a Coptic Celibate Priest, though I am still not sure I understand the difference.  He was a very slight man—probably not more than five feet tall and very thin.  His black cassock, which reached to the floor, made him look even smaller; his voice was quiet and rather high pitched.  In addition, his accent was pronounced so I had to strain to understand him.  I did not look forward to listening to this man who seemed to be from another world.  My host explained that he had spent many years of his life in seclusion and that he ate and slept very little because he gave himself to prayer.  My private thoughts were that we had only one thing in common—we were both human beings.

    The next day we made the trip to the Western Desert and got settled into our very basic accommodation, then gathered for this man to speak to us.  When he opened his mouth the Holy Spirit spoke to me, even before he finished his first few sentences.  Deep in my spirit, I knew that this man would become very important in my life; it felt as though God had joined my spirit to his at some deep level.  Amazingly I later learned that he felt the same.

    So it has proven to be.  Most of us who know him call him Dr. Atef.  His life and his life-message is about continually growing closer to Jesus and becoming more like him.

    I need that message more and more.  It seems to me that spiritual growth, at every stage of life, is the foundation upon which all else rests.  I am currently reading another set of teaching notes by Dr. Atef; Spiritual Growth is the title and he has urged me to focus more of my own teaching on the subject, so the articles that will follow will draw on some of what he has taught me in recent years and also will draw from the rich heritage I have been privileged to have.  Some of the articles will be about subjects the earliest days in ministry, when I attended a School of Evangelism in Switzerland in 1969-70.  My life was transformed through the outstanding teaching and example of men and women of God during that year.  Others will arise from experiences in this much later phase of life.  Whether we are new Christians or living in our sixth or seventh decade of following Jesus, we need constant reminders about the essentials of spiritual growth.

    The next post will be about an overused word.  Integrity.  Perhaps you can think about that subject with the help of a great quote I read recently,

    “Persons have integrity when their inner being is transfused by harmony; when their decisions and actions flow from their honest judgment; when they faithfully pursue the values that they comprehend as means to their perfection.”