Active Listening

Proverbs 28:9 (AMP) He who turns away his ear from hearing the law [of God and man], even his prayer is an abomination, hateful and revolting [to God]

• (MSG) God has no use for the prayers of the people who won't listen to him.


• Mark 7:99 (MSG) He [Jesus] went on, "Well, good for you. You get rid of God's command so you won't be inconvenienced in following the religious fashions!


• Jer6:10 (NLT) To whom can I give warning? Who will listen when I speak? Their ears are closed, and they cannot hear. They scorn the word of the LORD. They don't want to listen at all.


• Rom 1:24-25 (AMP) 24Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their [own] hearts to sexual impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves [abandoning them to the degrading power of sin], 25because they exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, Who is blessed forever! Amen (so be it).


• 2 Chronicles 7:14 (AMP) If My people, who are called by My name, shall humble themselves, pray, seek, crave, and require of necessity My face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven, forgive their sin, and heal their land.

Daily business issues-daily living issues-often seem to be out of the "realm" of prayer and reading the Word. It was the "big" issues that drive people to seek God; but it is those small, daily issues that we think we can handle on our own, that begin our slide down the slippery slope of idolatry where we worship the creature rather than the creator.

And if you are like me, you might dismiss some of the warnings in Scripture about ignoring the Law of the Lord. After all, Scripture is speaking to a nation of rebellious people. I'm not worshipping wooden or golden idols. I'm not building alters to some statue or fingering some beads in hope that if I recite words enough, I will be considered "good."  I'm not a Religious leader (like a Pharisee) who Jesus scourged with words before they scourged him with whips. I'm not one of those has been "liberated" and worship the body to the point of finding satisfaction with men. No, I'm straight and I'm not like those kinds of people.  Not I.

Then it hit me: I am just like them when I "do it my way" and ignore God's way. What I am often guilty of is simply not listening to God.

Running a business. Determining strategy.  Developing and implementing a sales plan. Preparing to mentor. The stuff of life. Even as a young Christian, there were times I thought, God's Word had little to say to help me do those kind of things. How wrong!

His Word is the essential of life: it provides a foundation for our core values. It shapes our purpose. It gives us true meaning. All the business and personal activities are about who we are and how we relate to others. God's Law is about both: who we are in Christ (and without Christ) and how we are to relate to others (with grace and truth - as He did).

His Word is essential. In the morning I wash my face with water and sometimes with the Word - but the later is more important to the act of living than the former. And it is sometimes. I could cover up the smell of the night with cologne if I skip water; but I cannot cover-up the smell of my sin, my arrogance, and my pride by skipping the washing of the Word. Tuning my ears to God's thoughts begins with my eyes focused on His word and my heart focused on Him in prayer.

How interesting; God listens to us when we listen to Him. Are you listening?


Copyright (c) 2006 by P. Griffith Lindell                   

For Whom Do You Work?

Proverbs 23:4-5 (NLV) Do not work hard to be rich. Stop trying to get things for yourself. When you set your eyes upon it, it is gone. For sure, riches make themselves wings like an eagle that flies toward the heavens.

• Isaiah 40:31 (NIV) "...but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."


• 1-Ecc 2:11; 2-Isa 55:2; 3-John 6:27a; 4-Dt 8: 13-14; 5-Mk 4:19; 6-Eph 1:18

Working hard is generally good. Working hard for the right things is always best. If working hard is just about me (and my family) then it is not good. Scripture is filled with references to this mindset and its folly. "...when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun."1 OR, "Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and you soul will delight in the richest of fare."2 And in the New Testament, "Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son o f Man will give you."3

This "working" is a mind-game; it is an attitude that must flow from "seek first the kingdom of God" and not seeking first our own "kingdom." This attitude of autonomy that plagues mankind has a strong grip on our hearts and souls. We begin live selfishly because someone else must care for us; growing up is the process of learning to "do it on our own" and not having Mom or Dad always pick us up and carry us, clean up after us, feed us, etc. Wound into this very nature of nurturing children is independence. Yet, God has called us to be dependent on Him. Doing it my way is dangerous. "...when your herds and flocks grow large and your sliver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.” 4

So, what should we be focused upon if "the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful?"5 It strikes me that we are called in our work life, to use a heavenly screen, as it were, to filter out everything that is about us. If we are praying before and through our day, then our work can be about Him and our impact for the Kingdom. Sure, we may end up doing the same activities that make up our work day; but, bathing our work in prayer, we might then have “the eyes of our hearts flooded with light so that we can understand the wonderful future he has for us and to grasp the immensity of this glorious way of life he has for Christians.”6

It is all about attitude - about what is in our hearts. New cars. New houses. Hobbies. Vacation homes. Traveling. Season tickets to the Symphony, Opera, to sporting events. All of these are subject to our attitude. God has given us a certain level and ability to accumulate resources. What we do with those resources, what we think about this resources, what we say about them reflect our heart. The question is do these things possess us or are we stewards of God's bounty to us?

Stewardship is a function of the heart - how we think about what we have. We are not called to want more and more, collecting excess stuff, but we are challenged to be content (in our hearts) and use what we have for His glory. Our real treasure is eternal. Work hard to store up treasure there - where the return on your investment is eternal. Hard to beat that ROI.

Fly like an eagle - work for God. Not yourself.


Copyright (c) 2006 by P. Griffith Lindell     

Do You Have the Heart to Lead?

Proverbs 22: 11 (MSG) GOD loves the pure-hearted and well-spoken; good leaders also delight in their friendship.

• Col 4:6 (NIV) Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.


• Eccl 10:12 (NIV) The words of the wise are like goads, their collected sayings like firmly embedded nails-given by one Shepherd.

The qualifications for a Christian Businessperson are simple and direct: purity of heart and pureness of speech. The heart is not often seen: what is said can be misleading, but in the end, it is what is said and how it is said that gives away the heart. Well-spoken people don't flatter for favor; they don't goad or gossip; they speak from a sense of purpose with clarity, conciseness and completeness. They know what to say and when to say it. It is not about vocabulary: it is about speaking clean and smooth reflecting the heart. Purity of heart is not only about illicit desire; it is also about lack of deceit and devotion to self. The conundrum is that no one has a pure heart. Our hearts are desperately wicked. It is only by God's grace that we can have purity of heart. It is a heart that has made room for the Holy Spirit to take-up residence. It is He that will clean out impurity - if we allow Him.

I am reminded of Matt. 5:8 "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Here, in the list of the beatitudes we have a integration of holiness and happiness. Only those who are holy may see God - a holiness that is imputed to us. No matter what we do for a living, it all starts in the heart - not the head. It is what is missing in corporate America today - a heart-attitude for the people who depend on the firm for livelihood. Greed has replaced graciousness. Mocking has replaced mentoring. Cheating has replaced carefulness. People, who work for their Creator and their Lord, work differently than those who work for themselves. American business ethics have disappeared for many reasons: one certainly is that pureness of heart has been replaced with profit at any cost.

Do you want to make a change in your workplace? Work on your heart and leave the rest up to God. His love for you will cover the consequences of your stand for righteousness - your expression of a pure heart. Work for an executive that manages by intimidation and expect you to also? Stand firm in your conviction to be well spoken, not mean-spirited. Remember, we are called to love our enemies. Not to return evil with evil, but evil with good. Sure, you can sometimes achieve results with your team with browbeating and intimidation; however, your 9 - 5 job is your mission field. God has called each of us to represent Him in how we work.

Good business leaders have heart and motivate others to follow: Christian business leaders should have an advantage because we can lead from a pure heart and our speech can be seasoned with graciousness that only God can give us.

Share your heart. God did.

Copyright (c) 2006 by P. Griffith Lindell                     

This Little Light of Mine

Proverbs 20:27 NLV The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord. It shows all the inside parts of his heart.

• (AMP)"The spirit of man [that factor in human personality which proceeds immediately from God] is the lamp of the Lord, searching all his innermost parts."


• I Cor. 2:11 (AMP)  "For what person perceives (knows and understands) what passes through a man's thoughts except the man's own spirit within him? Just so, no one discerns (comes to know and comprehend) the thoughts of God, except the Spirit of God."


• Luke 8:16-18 (AMP) "16No one after he has lighted a lamp covers it with a vessel or puts it under a [dining table] couch; but he puts it on a lamp stand, that those who come in may see the light. 17For there is nothing hidden that shall not be disclosed, nor anything secret that shall not be known and come out into the open. 18Be careful therefore how you listen. For to him who has [spiritual knowledge] will more be given; and from him who does not have [spiritual knowledge], even what he thinks and guesses and supposes that he has will be taken away."

It is "the spirit of a person" that distinguishes us from animals. This spirit, which God breathed into man at his creation, gave humans the ability to really begin to understand themselves. We were created distinct from the animal kingdom and that distinction makes a difference.

Note the clarification of this "spirit" in the Amplified rendering. This conscience is from God - it is not ours, but His. In a discussion with a friend concerning a family member that has chose the gay life, he commented that he tires of her wanting everyone else to legitimatize the lifestyle. His comment was that it is like she knows deep within her soul that the choice is not a God-driven choice - it is solely hers and although she is not "religious" or even spiritual, he is convinced that part of her "knows."

Her awareness grows out of this verse. Our culture, and sometimes the inappropriate behavior of the church, has done much to quash this inner voice. Rationalization rules. Righteousness has been left to competing interpretations. Modern writers in the field of organizational behavior, who have no spiritual base, are coming to the conclusion that a person's conscience cannot be explained away as "religious upbringing" when so many people in the workplace have none. Yet, that "light" is there. Any accountability process that uses the Creator's Handbook as a guide focuses, not only on the spiritual components and ramifications of leadership and decision-making, but also on the foundational elements that are built into each human. What Christian businesspeople have learned is that at the core of managing is the realization that only with a “humble heart” will we be able to see what God has for us to learn about how we “show up” in our interactions with others; how corporate value are expressed in our behavior; how we plan; how we implement our mission.

There is the small problem that before we can be "the light" we must first allow His light to reveal in us those things that do not bring Him glory and therefore are not pleasing to Him. Then, and really only then, can we help each other build extraordinary companies and influential lives.

Have you allowed the eternal light to both reveal and then heal?

Copyright (c) 2005 by P. Griffith Lindell     

Understand Motivation

Proverbs 16:2 (NLV) 2All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the thoughts of the heart.

• (MSG) "Humans are satisfied with whatever looks good; GOD probes for what is good."

• Job 31:6 (NIV) Let God weigh me in honest scales and he will know that I am blameless...

• I Sam 2:3 (NIV) [Hannah's prayer] 3 "Do not keep talking so proudly or let your mouth speak such arrogance, or the LORD is a God who knows, and by him deeds are weighed.

• Psalm 86:11 (MSG) "Train me, GOD, to walk straight; then I'll follow your true path. Put me together, one heart and mind; then, undivided, I'll worship in joyful fear."

• I Cor. 4:5 (NLT) When the Lord comes, he will bring our deepest secrets to light and will reveal our private motives. And then God will give to everyone whatever praise is due.

• James 4:3 (NLT) And even when you do ask, you don't get it because your whole motive is wrong--you want only what will give you pleasure.

• Rev. 2:23 (AMP) And all the assemblies (churches) shall recognize and understand that I am He Who searches minds (the thoughts, feelings, and purposes) and the [inmost] hearts, and I will give to each of you [the reward for what you have done] as your work deserve.  

Motives weighed. Deepest secrets exposed. Thoughts, feelings and purposes searched out.

So, I'm thinking as I write this:  Just what are my motives in writing these daily thoughts? Are they pure or self-serving? Am I looking for affirmation or am I affirming the work of the Spirit in my heart? I would like to think that my motives are pure. That my motives are built on the power of Spirit and not my "power." That I have trained my mind when writing these to be open to the leading of the Spirit not some supposed ability to exegete a passage.

My sense is that we humans often don't think critically about our training - I know that I did not. We accepted our culture's focus on "me" with a spirit of timidity, not wanting to shake the boat. The Psalmist understood that we must be intentional about God training us and integrating our hearts, minds and soul so that we reflect the mind of Christ is what we think, what we do and what we say. But we can be so easily fooled. What we think about ourselves is declared to be suspect by the One who created us. He warns us that we cannot trust ourselves. Those thoughts must come from prayerful consideration. And even then we must be careful - James warns us that even our prayers can be suspect - they can be all about us, about what gives us pleasure, and not about Him. The chief end of man is to glorify God - give God pleasure. I find that challenging. I can see how easily our culture has sucked us into looking at the appearance and not critically thinking about the motivations behind the appearance. Performance cannot be sloppy and be pleasing to God. But performance if its own sake is one of those slippery slopes that can seduce.

When what we do is about us and not about Him, our motives are wrong. Hard to weigh that one. Our scales are weighted in our favor.

What motivates you? What motivates me?

Copyright (c) 2006 by P. Griffith Lindell          

The Heart of a Business Leader

Proverbs 15:7, 14, 28 (NIV) 7 The lips of the wise spread knowledge; not so the hearts of fools. 14 The discerning heart seeks knowledge, but the mouth of a fool feeds on folly.  28 The heart of the righteous weighs its answers, but the mouth of the wicked gushes evil.

• Jeremiah 17:9 (NKJV) The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; Who can know it?


• Matthew 15:18 (MSG) But what comes out of the mouth gets its start in the heart.


• Luke 8:15 (NLT) But the good soil represents honest, good-hearted people who hear God's message, cling to it, and steadily produce a huge harvest.

In an old HBR article on picking leaders by Sorcher and Brant (2002) they make the point (without saying it) that leadership is really a heart issue - and I'm using "heart" in it full Biblical meaning - the totality of man's inner or immaterial nature - the whole spectrum of human emotions and the deepest, innermost feelings. They talk about the "soft" skills of a leader. And those "soft skills" are what the word heart in these passages refers to.

The Hebrew language builds idioms around this word: Wisdom resides in the heart; Understanding resides in the heart; the heart is where the seat of the will resides; and more. Leaders are life-long learners (seekers of knowledge). Leaders know how to think through not only the information, but also the impact it might have on the hearers. Leaders share information. Leaders have integrity. And today, this is sorely needed in America's public (and private) companies. Look at the cost to corporations that must follow the guidelines of the Sarbanes-Oxley law: it has changed the face of the audit committee, and the availability of auditors to the point that smaller corporations are suddenly without their Auditing firm because that firm has so much work from the larger corporations.

Look now at the failure of even Enron that had an Ethics Manual that was over an inch thick. We learn that it is not in the writing of the words on paper; rather, it is the writing of the words in the heart. Assimilating ethical guidelines is not a casual, haphazard process but demands disciplined leadership to not only live out the core values, but also to demand of the executives a growth in the understanding of how they are to be applied in the day-to-day operations of the enterprise. What a CEO says has meaning beyond the simple words.

We have experienced a collapse of American business because of sin and the resultant lack of Biblically based leadership from some of America's CEOs. Their actions tell us what was in their hearts. Their teams, that willingly, in most cases, participated tells us what was in their hearts. We are talking about decisions that are greater than simply "legal" decisions: moral decisions and legal boundaries are not the same. We are called to live by a moral law. We are called to live with a renewed heart that yields a harvest for righteousness.

Do you have the tools needed to apply the principles of Business Best Practices in a way that will differentiate them from those who feed on folly? Feed right, you will.

What are you feeding on?


Copyright (c) 2006 by P. Griffith Lindell