The Love Does Tour will raise funds for Restore International, specifically its Restore Leadership Academy in Uganda, providing scholarships, text-books, uniforms, medical care and classrooms for future leaders of Africa. The tour is organized by Venture Expeditions.

Venture exists to “actively engage people in God’s story of Justice

Restore International’s goal is simple: to fight injustice.

The tour is also centered around the good work of Bob Goff  who is the New York Times Best-Selling Author of Love Does, as well as an attorney who founded Restore International.  Goff is all about inspiring current and future influencers to get to the ”do” part of life.  Please join me in praying for these amazing folks as they live “love does!”

You can follow their journey here…Tweets about “#lovedoestour”

There’s a wonderful quote from Benjamin Franklin. “There are three sorts of people in the world: Those who are immovable, people who don’t get, they don’t want to get it, they’re going to do anything about it. There are people who are movable, people who see the need for change and are prepared to listen to it. And there are people who move, people who make things happen.” And if we can encourage more people, that will be a movement. And if the movement is strong enough, that’s, in the best sense of the word, a revolution. And that’s what we need.   -Sir Ken Robinson: How to escape education’s death valley

saw this on dan’s blog.  a powerful reminder…that we are all quick to judge why a person is doing what they do.  to be honest earlier this year when we took a group of EVO students and adults for ServeFest 13 at Building Hope in the City I was duly reminded…that words we use to describe others matter.  check this out.

The Catalyst Leader (purchase here) authored by Brad Lomenick is a game changing leadership book.  Brad has more than 20 years of leadership experience.  For the  last 10 years his experience as the president and lead visionary of Catalyst has leveraged the Kingdom in and through so many.

In this new work Brad maps out 8 essentials for becoming a change maker. Ultimately identifying the essentials of a Catalyst Leader needed for leading well, and leading now.

I’ll give you a quick overview/tease of what those 8 essentials are:
Calling: discover God’s unique calling on your life
Authenticity: embrace your true identity and share it with others
Passion: develop an insatiable hunger for a vibrant relationship with God
Capable: chase after a level of excellence that will stretch you and astonish others
Courageous: learn to push through fear and take risks
Principled: root yourself in unchanging principles rather than shifting circumstances
Hopeful: create and cast a compelling vision for the future
Collaborative: build bridges with others for the purpose of learning and cooperating
I love that Brad starts with the idea of “calling” and think his definition is dead on.

What is Calling? “God’s personal invitation for me to work on His agenda, using the talents I’ve been given in ways that are eternally significant.”

I’ve listened and read Brad for years.  If you don’t know him, this podcast about the new book is a great introduction to his heart and passion to equip leaders.  If you didn’t know, the organization he leads, Catalyst is a experiential and creative leadership movement that has been going on for now almost 14 years.  They offer several conferences around the country annually and from my perspective  the are one of the best organizations today that is challenging the local church to think outside of the box.  The Catalyst Leader blog is worth the follow too.

Here’s a quick video about the book:

Readers should note that as a special bonus-anyone who purchases the book this week, from April 22-26, scan and send your receipt to catalystleaderbook@gmail.com and you’ll receive over $300 of leadership resources for FREE, all for simply purchasing the book during this week from any outlet, including the Catalyst store as well as other retail outlets.

I can tell you that for Catalyst, leadership development is at the heart of what they do, and so this book is simply a leadership manifesto based on stories – from Brad’s personal leadership to his interaction with the incredible men and women who have been part of Catalyst over the years and finally the result of many interactions with those on the front lines of leading churches and non-profits.

The true reality is that all of us want to be a great leader, but many times we’re not sure how to build in the essentials in a way that will deliver the most impact in our own leadership, and in the teams and organizations we lead. This book will help you do just that.

You may be recognized as a leader, but that doesn’t mean you are influencing well and truly making a difference.  This book will help shape and direct your abilities and capacity.

(note: i did get an advance ebook copy of the catalyst leader for the purpose of this review.)

get this now…click here.

In today’s culture, offering advice to young men about what they should know about growing into manhood is one of things I find myself doing a lot.  Over the year’s I’ve led dozens of men through studies of John Eldredge’s Wild at Heart.  It has been transformational for them.  There has been a void in addressing the masculine journey for teens.

For teens there hasn’t been many books that I’ve found that addresses the issues so many teen guys have today….things that author Donald Miller talks about at length in his book  Father Fiction and his own masculine journey:

I wasn’t sure how to manage myself, how to talk to a woman, how to build a career, how to—well, be a man. To me, life was something you had to stumble through alone. It wasn’t something you enjoyed or conquered, it was something that happened to you, and you didn’t have a whole lot of say about the way it turned out. You just acted out your feelings and hoped you’d never get caught.”

So I was delighted to learn of this book from my allies in the trenches of student ministry – Jeff Wallace, Mike Hammer and Matty McCage.

I actually conducted a not-so-scienitific conversation that was incredibly engaging and attention holding with several different groups of male teens over the past week to gauge the worth of this volume.

With each group I explained the concept and the focus of the work.  And then asked the young men to randomly call out a number between 1-99.   We turned to that “thing” and read it.  We covered the gambit – Dating & Sex, Relationships, Acceptance, Finances, Spiritual Growth & Disciplines, Leadership , Identity, and Legacy.

The collection of 99 things is an incredible springboard to conversation and truly the answers the authors have penned are dead-on and quick to the point.   Though the context of my conversation was with mostly un-churched youth, the validity and guidance from the authors was well received and has actually generated several follow-up conversations.

I heartily endorse this volume–BUY IT!  It’s writing is witty, focused and concise.  It fills a void in helping to give answers to the questions that every young man takes on the journey to adulthood.  With a little bit of effort, each chapter could be developed into a great conversation for a young men’s small group.

There is definitely a hunger among today’s young men to better…navigate relationships, success and life’s other big stuff…Jeff-Mike & Matty have gotten us closer to giving thoughtful answers.   Just click the book cover above to order your copy today.  I’d be interested in your thoughts once you had an opportunity to read it.

(editor’s note: I received a complimentary electronic version of this book for this review).

only 4% of women around the world consider themselves beautiful.

This video truly captures the truth about beauty…and offers amazing insights on how women should see themselves.

special thanks to mamamia

by the way…there is another video, that i’ve used over the years that is equally powerful to help young women (and the young men) see that what is perceived is NOT real.

The Right Honorable Baroness Thatcher and I – November 1995

Been thinking abit.  not sure what all the pieces are as the number of them keeps growing.  but have had numerous conversations today about the legacy of Lady Thatcher (LT).  Having gotten the news early today that she had died of a stroke.

It was more than 20 years ago, that i worked diligently to secure a positive response to an invitation that had been extended for her to visit our community.  She left office in late 1990 and i began working on the details of what I hoped would be a 10th anniversary celebration of then President Reagan’s visit to our community.   There were many reasons why LT would be the most logical appropriate guest for such an occasion.

I remember distinctly when the phone call came in late January, 1993, her scheduler said LT had gladly accepted the invitation and was looking forward to visiting our community.   What transpired over the next 9 months was extraordinary and adventure-filed.  More details on that later.

Over the next three years I was privileged to host and organize  three other visits by LT.

But for now, I’m going to ponder a bit more her legacy and give thanks for what she risked to be and do.

An old friend, Bill Kristol, at the Weekly Standard offered this thought about her death today in the context of being the last of the three, Thatcher/ Reagan/Pope John Paul II who basically won the Cold War.  Personally this end of an era suggests to me one more time the difficulty of preserving Liberty. and what is required from each of us.  Kristol quotes from a letter to Wm F. Buckley from Whittaker Chambers (a soviet defector), the task of each generation is reminded:

So each age has to find its own leaders for an eternal task—the defense and renewal of civilization.

I’m reminded daily that this “renewal” is so desperately needed.  My privilege to have interacted with LT only confirms the task that remains…and further encourages me in my calling.

Actor/musician Nick Cannon on his partnership with the “End It Movement” to stop slavery around the world.

Good stuff. Do your part on 9 April! Learn more here

at ground zero in joplin, mo as part of the present hope tour with my gopro2 on my helmet

IJM Freedom Tour

Present Hope Tour

if you look back through my videos you’ll find almost all of the footage is done on a gopro. (i’ve got over 2 terabytes of video archived) this story of how the company got started reflects what one person with an idea fueled by passion can accomplish. I use my gopro to capture life…in my bride’s garden-at youth group-on my bike-at youth conferences…i love that it allows me to visually tell stories that otherwise words would somehow seem incomplete. this article by Ryan Mac in Forbes, Five Startup Lessons From GoPro Founder And Billionaire Nick Woodman   Woodman’s story is a crazy one.  several points from his pursuit to perfect the gopro camera stand out.

1) Follow your passions.

2) Fear failure.

Ryan Mac’s interview is worth the watch.