We have a mantra that we repeat around here on a regular basis, and that is, we have a commitment to minimize brick and maximize mission. Every week we hear in some way about Darfur which the United Nations has declared the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. One of the ways that we are winning as a church, in the midst of this crisis, is that this year we will spend more money in Darfur in our child protection development and safe water project than we will on all of our own building maintenance, our utilities and the staff budget for all of the facility cleaning and grounds keeping staff of two campuses. That is incredible! That's just one mission project. It takes $850,000 a year for 23 staff members who do building and grounds maintenance on two properties and includes utilities. But $1,000,000 will go toward Darfur, Sudan. That's incredible.
     
Because of that, we now have 15 worship opportunities every week. It will soon be 20. Whoever is preaching or teaching can only do six of those every week. So some weekends, those 3,000+ of you who are in the main worship room on Sunday morning will be watching this on video. When your neighbor looks at you and says, "Why are we sitting here watching this on video?" Say, "Because of Darfur, Sudan." This is one of the simple sacrifices that we make here that other people may simply live. I appreciate your sacrifice and commitment in this way.
 
Pray with me: Father God, we pray that You open our eyes to see the things that You want us to see and open our ears so that we can hear Your priority. We pray this in Jesus' name, Amen.
 
Open your Bibles to Nehemiah 6:15-19. This passage is about success. In 52 days, the wall had been completed. I want to ask you a question and I want you to identify a time, when after you have experienced success in your life or a significant event, where you have felt let down afterward. Has there ever been a time like that? How many of you could think of something immediately when I asked you that question? What amazed me is that Kim Miller knew exactly what her response would be, which I would never have guessed. She said after her daughter's wedding. Her daughter had been away at college for four years and then a year at graduate program and so she had come home for the first time to spend four months. For four months around their house it was just mom and daughter talking about wedding. I went home and asked Carolyn that question. She had an immediate response. She said one of the biggest letdowns of her life was when my son-in-law and daughter drove off after their wedding.

After success, after you've finished a project, that's when you can become most vulnerable as a leader. We are going to focus on how great leaders re-vision success at the end of a project or victory. Verse 15 is about how great leaders retain a future focus. In spite of the victory that they have experienced, the fatigue they may feel, they retain this future focus. In verse 15, we read that the wall was completed in 52 days. In verse 16, we read that the enemy was disheartened and sloughed away. But if you go to 7:1-3, Nehemiah immediately goes to the next thing. The wall is completed, but a great leader knows the work is never done. So Nehemiah doesn't stop and rest in his success, he continues to work for the welfare of God's city. In 7:1-3, he immediately goes to work in building up the people to be a defense for the city. Even though the enemy goes away, it will return at an opportune time. When Jesus successfully withstood the temptations of Satan in the desert for 40 days, we read that "the devil withdrew until an opportune time."
 
What we see in Nehemiah is that great leaders live for the work of God and from the perspective of eternity. They realize that the work of God will never be completed in their lifetime. They always have a forward focus. Hebrews 11 is my favorite book in the Bible and it's about the heroes and the sheroes of faith. It's like a hall of fame of faith. It defines faith as forward focus. People of faith are never settlers. There's a difference between settlers and  pioneers. Pioneers are always moving forward claiming new territory, new land. Settlers always come in behind pioneers and stop and settle. People of faith never settle in the present. They keep pioneering toward God's promising preferred future.
 
This week, we were away on a senior management team retreat. There are eight of us on the senior management team and every year we go away in the fall with the leadership board for a couple of days and we name the next year's priorities. In 2007, we are focusing on five priorities. The eight senior management team members go away in May, look at those five priorities, and ask ourselves, being accountable to our board, how are we doing on these five priorities. Are there any mid-year or mid-course adjustments we need to make to these five priorities? I always put on the bottom of the white board: what's next. What do we need to be focusing on and doing the preliminary work on right now that we'll experience the fruit of in 2010, 2011 and even 2015? I reminded the staff that we've got three years left on our commitment to child protection and safe water in Sudan – but, what's next that we need to do preliminary work on? What's next is the onsite 26-acre project for at-risk kids. There were two things on our "what's next" list. The second was the leadership institute that we are going to develop right here at Ginghamsburg Church which will be a seminary. It will be a seminary that any of you can participate in and get credits to further your mission for the Kingdom of God. People can come here from around the world to participate in this leadership institute. Right now, I am working on and focusing on the year 2015. In 2010, my focus will shift to 2020. If you don't keep that forward focus, you begin to live in the past. You begin to draw your identity and meaning from things that have happened in the past. You've heard that expression "remember when?" You don't want to become a "remember when" person.
 
One of the great leaders of the Old Testament was King David who kicked the bong out of Goliath. David, a tremendous leader for God, allowed himself to trip up on this forward focus one time that had the devastating results of adultery and then resulted in murder. 2 Samuel says, "In the spring at the time when kings go off to war . . ." David was a king and was supposed to go to war every spring. Every winter he was in the gym and in the batting cage. But, every spring, he went in front of his troops. It didn't matter that David was 55 or 60 or that he had won for 35 previous years. Every spring, the king led his troops in battle. But, this time, he sent Joab, the commander of the army, with the Israelites and they won. David stayed in Jerusalem and got into trouble. David got comfortable with his success. He rested in his success. Leaders continually re-vision. Proverbs says, "Where there is no vision the people perish." When you quit living for the future, you die. Most people don't know they are dead. I call them the living dead or the walking dead, but when you quit living for the future, you die.
 
You keep re-visioning by constantly imagining and articulating God's preferred future. What does it mean to imagine God's preferred future? When Carolyn and I used to take the kids to Florida in the summer, in those days we always drove. The only way we could make it was to go to AAA, the automobile club, and we would get a book on Disney World. These kids would be yelling when we were still in Ohio, "When are we going to get there?" as we were sitting in a Friday afternoon traffic jam trying to get across the bridge into northern Kentucky. The only way they could make it was by handing them these books from AAA that would have the picture of the destination. No one sets out for a place if they don't have a picture of the destination. Great leaders are constantly imagining that preferred future in their marriage, and for their children. Moms and dads, you need to be picturing that preferred picture for your children. Carolyn and I used to go into our children's rooms when they were four and five years old, while they were sleeping. They didn't even know we were there. We would lay our hands on those kids and pray for who their future spouses would be. We were picturing in our heads exactly the preferred future of these Christian leaders, who God would connect them to and who would be part of the seed, the resources of our generation. You have to imagine God's preferred future for your vocation and your life's mission.
 
Moses, at age 80, was imagining God's preferred future in a burning bush. It gave him 40 more years. Abraham, at age 75, was imagining God's preferred future and he set out for a new place of promise. I remember May 5, 1961, I was in the fifth grade at Clovernook elementary school and we all went into the multipurpose room that had a black and white TV sitting on a stand on the stage. A man was about ready to launch into space. Alan Shepard was the first American to go into space. The paper called it the man in a can because we had formerly sent a chimpanzee. The Russians had not only sent a man into space, but had successfully orbited the earth multiple times. Most people at NASA thought we were not ready to launch this man in a can and the totality of the trip was 15 minutes and 28 seconds and traveled 300 miles. The launch was delayed and he asked permission to wet in his suit because NASA wasn't advanced enough to figure out how to do that yet. He was delayed for three hours, sitting in this can and Alan Shepard said the whole three hours all he was thinking about was, "Every component on this space craft was made by the lowest bidder?" How many of you remember this moment? President Kennedy spoke on TV and said, "By the end of this decade, we will put a man on the moon." Even as a fourth grader, I thought, "I don't think so." I thought he would have said by the end of this century, but he said by the end of this decade. On July 21, 1969, with a few months to spare, a man from just north of here by the name of Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. That's the power of imagining and articulating the future. If you are not living to the future, you are dead!

Once you articulate and imagine that future you've got to act on that future. A lot of people have big dreams, but very few people commit to acting on those dreams. That means you have to commit your energy and resources to that future. When you picture God's preferred future, move into Darfur. Let's get involved in agriculture. Let's get involved in child protection and development. Let's get involved in safe water. When you articulate that, it begins to build a collective vision and when vision becomes collective, we see the release of heaven's purpose on earth. In our households, when we articulate the picture for who are children are supposed to marry, who our children are allowed to date - yes, that's why you are mom and dad, you get to say yes and NO! I always told Carolyn, no is shorter and easier to say than yes. You get to build that collective vision.
 
The next thing great leaders do is reflect the source of that success. Look with me at verse 16, "When all our enemies heard about this, all the surrounding nations were afraid and lost their self-confidence, because they realized that this work had been done with the help of our God." You don't have to tell other people where this success comes from; they recognize that God's hand was in it. They look at a great leader and are not seeing a great leader, they are not honoring the great leader, they are seeing the presence of God, the hand of God in it. Great leaders never forget or stop depending on the source of great success. Great leaders realize that God is Creator and I am creature and my sole responsibility on this planet is to worship him and serve his purpose forever and ever and ever. That's my sole purpose.
 
During my first six months at Ginghamsburg Church, Carolyn and I wanted to go back to Cincinnati. It was hard. People were calling us young whippersnappers. When you step out to do the work of God, you are going to meet with resistance. We have seen that every week here. During that time, one of the people who is now on our board loaned us their cottage on Lake Erie. I was sitting on the beach one day and the Lord showed me the first chapter of Joshua. We read it this week in the Transformation Journal. In that first chapter of Joshua was the word of the Lord that God gave me and I didn't quit and run. God said to Joshua, "Have courage and do not be afraid." He said that three times. "I will give you every place where you set your foot." They had been in the wilderness 40 years and he was getting ready to move into Israel where he was going to have to take the land. God's promise was, "I am going to give you" - does it mean you're not going to have to fight? That some people are not going to get cut and bleed and die? No, it doesn't mean that, it means here's my promise, Joshua, as long as you keep stepping, where you step, I have already given it to you. I will be with you as I was with Moses and I will not leave you
 
When we came in 1979, God gave me that promise. By 1986, this little two-room country church had grown to 400 average attendance. That was unheard of and people started asking me to come around the country and speak about this little country church that grew to almost 400 in attendance. One newspaper in Texas did an article, "The Little Church That Can." They started asking me to teach seminary classes and I started teaching seminary classes on Monday mornings one day a week. Constantly, the question I heard and still hear, "If the bishop moves you someplace else, can you do this again?" No! I didn't do it the first time! This is the amazing thing, there is some purpose of God, some working of God, some unfolding of God's cosmic purpose here and the only thing I do is keep believing God and keep stepping toward God's preferred future. That's all I do - and lift up Jesus Christ. Jesus said, "If I be lifted up, I draw all people unto me." That's all I do: keep believing God, keep stepping, and keep lifting up Jesus. That's the whole story.
     
A great leader doesn't have to keep saying "Jesus." Great leaders reflect the source of their success. They are great because they understand their dependence on the Holy Spirit. A lot of Christians believe in Jesus. They have saving faith and believe in the resurrection, but they don't know how to live in the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus was having a meal with the disciples after the resurrection and told them, "Don't leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift that the Father promised which you heard me speak about." Don't go out and try to do what God is calling you to do by yourself. Don't get ahead of God. "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you." Great leaders don't want to get ahead of God. When you are dependent on the power of the Holy Spirit, you can operate in the gifts of the Holy Spirit. That's supernatural. The same gifts that were operative in Jesus' life will be operative in your life. That's why Jesus said, "The things I do, you will do, and greater things than these." When you are operating and depending on the power of the Holy Spirit, then you will display the fruits of the Spirit. Nehemiah didn't have to tell them God had done this. They recognized that the hand of God was in it. They saw the presence of God in it. Then because you are operating in the gifts of the Spirit and are producing the fruit of the spirit, then you will honor Jesus' name which is the purpose of the Holy Spirit.
 
The power of the Spirit is different from the power of the world. When we are talking about great leadership and about the great leaders in the world, there's a difference here. The power of the world is about more - being more famous, more rich, more honored. The power of the Holy Spirit is to be less - less proud, less greedy, less envious, less angry, less lustful so that people see more of Jesus and less of me. John the Baptist said, "The more I grow in the Lord, he must increase and I must decrease." A person who is filled with the Spirit is filled with the presence of Jesus, his joy, his love, and his peace.
 
We see how leaders re-vision success. One is they keep retaining this future focus. They don't ever settle in the present. They keep pioneering God's preferred future. They don't talk about the source of success, they reflect it. They disarm jealousy. When God creates his purpose through your life, he's not looking for great people; he's looking for surrendered people. When God reflects his purpose and his success through your life, other people are going to resent your success. Look at that in verses 17 and 18, the very people who worked alongside Nehemiah now that the project was complete and successful, began to bad mouth Nehemiah to his enemies.
 
In the midst of your success, some of the people closest to you can even try to sabotage your success, your sobriety, your reputation. Great leaders not only disarm jealousy in others, they don't resent or try to emulate the success of others. Look at verse 19. Moreover, they kept reporting or telling Nehemiah about this other guy's good deeds, Tobias' good deeds. What people will try to do in your life is make comparisons. "Yes, but you are not as good as. . ." Sometimes right after my great successes, I can be flipping through a magazine and I will see in that magazine an advertisement for a book that one of my friends has written. I say, "Well, why didn't this magazine do a review on my book?" Do you see how that can work. Great leaders never resent or try to emulate the success of someone else. Sometimes, I will wish I wrote as good as Rob Bell. If you have not read Rob's book Velvet Elvis, you need to read it. He wrote another one called Sex God. I just started reading that one this afternoon. Sometimes I hear Erwin McManus speak and I wish I had his vocabulary. I already told you a couple months ago that Rick Warren, who I worked with on the Prince of Egypt project with DreamWorks, his book sells millions and mine sells thousands. Saul was the first king of Israel, he was God's anointed, but he got caught up in his jealousy over David because everyone started singing songs about David. Saul had his thousands, but David had ten-thousands. Great leaders never resent or try to emulate the success of someone else. God knows what my part is in building this wall and what Rick Warren's part is in building this wall because God can't trust me with that much money yet. I told you what Rick does with it. Rick lives off ten percent and gives 90 percent. He drives a four-year-old Ford Explorer. I'd be out there in one of those Bentleys on MTV's Cribs, and building myself a castle. God knows what I need. I just feel privileged to be of this great work of God on Planet Earth. What I need to do is focus on building my part of God's wall and you commit fully to build your part of the wall that God has called you to - and together we can build the city of God.
 
I do a lot of things to grow spiritually. I'm a fan of the Catholic church and I use much of the Catholic church's saints and prayers for my devotional life. This week, I found a great prayer of one of the Catholic saints that I thought would be perfect to say together before we came to this table. It has a lot to do with re-visioning success and humility. Here it is: Lord, deliver me from the desire from being esteemed, of being loved . . . When I read that, I asked why shouldn't I have a desire to be loved. A lot of us will compromise our obedience to Jesus to win the love of another person. Until we are complete in and of ourselves in God's love, then we are not ready for a relationship with any other person because we will look for another person to give us meaning instead of our Creator, our source of the meaning - that's what that means. . . . of being extolled, of being honored, of being praised, of being preferred, of being consulted, of being approved. If I am ever honored, or loved, or praised, let me give all that honor and glory and praise to you, my God, Amen. Isn't that a meaningful prayer.

Would you stand with me and we will say this together. Lord, deliver me from the desire from being esteemed, of being loved, of being extolled, of being honored, of being praised, of being preferred, of being consulted, of being approved. If I am ever honored, or loved, or praised, let me give all that honor and glory and praise to you, my God, Amen.