Pioneer Christian Monthly - September, 1988

Do I Gert Involved Again?
Anne Visser

September. my favourite month. As I write this in the middle of a hot and humid July day the thought of the crispness in the air in September is very appealing. The asters will be in full bloom, the onions in my garden will be big and fat and the old plum tree in the backyard will be starting to turn colour early. Lots of flyers will be in the paper advertising for night courses. Do I become a participant in a night course, or a cooking class, or a gardening seminar, or do I become involved in my church. September is the time to make a decision.

Have you ever helped to start a group or lead one, or just participate in, one? Being involved can be a rewarding experience, and with the church many opportunities exist. Everything from arranging babysitting each week for the nursery, teaching a Sunday School class, directing a children's choir or supervising the Vacation Bible School. I've had the opportunity to do all of those things and have enjoyed working with the wonderful children, young people and teachers.

But (the big but), maybe I need a year off. I'm very busy at work, I'm raising my children, involved in other groups, and my husband would like to see me from time to time. Trying 'to decide what to do is a dilemma we all must wrestle with.

I love to sing and so do most kids I have come in contact with; or they love to play act, or tell stories (big stories), or read something they wrote. Every single one with their own special ability and at their own learning levels are wonderful and precious. Some even ask to know more about Christ in their lives and how He can be part of it. At Bible school for the past two summers, the children made a donation to the children in a special housing project. Some brought their own toys to give to those who had nothing, and felt very special. The wonders of sharing with others was learned by those children in the most powerful way - through giving something of themselves. And these children were all normal - noisy, busy, fighting, arguing, tired and happy and special. The teachers were special too. We had the chance to test our own faith by sharing what we believed with children and each other. We were all working together from the love that we feel in our faith.

After a class, or performance, or Bible school was finished we would get the "big reaction", the "comments" or the "feedback" ' whatever you want to call it. Sometimes the "big reaction" would be nothing. It would seem like we hadn't even done anything. Did no one notice? Did no one care? Was anyone supposed to say anything? It felt sad and dismal.

Sometimes a telephone call would draw our attention to the fact that the children were a bit loud and disruptive or a subject wasn't appropriately taught or wasn't proper for our church. Those were hard calls that could leave us angry with the caller, or the system we work under, and our ego was so bruised.

Once, someone from the church took the time to write a thank-you note! What a feeling! Someone noticed and 'cared and had taken the time to recognize our effort. We felt great and eager to do more. What little thing that word of encouragement seemed and yet it helped to restore our love for the job we had just worked so hard on.

That positive encouragement was the key all along. The apathy of not being noticed or thanked can wound and discourage everyone, right from the minister to the smallest baby in the nursery. Why do we not say thank you to our church members who are trying to do a good job in the church, rather than letting the negative comments take the upper hand. If the church is the family of God, we need to learn how to treat that family so the spirit is encouraged, and challenged and loved. Then when September comes around it will be easy to make a positive decision to accept a new challenge in the church. Each September we can all feel eager to spend some time with our church family because we'll want to be there, rather than feel like we have to be there.

"Be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other making allowance for each other's faults because of your love. Try always to be led along together by the Holy Spirit, and so be at peace with one another. We are all parts of one body, we have the same Spirit, and we have all been called to the same glorious future. " Ephesians 4:2-4

My husband was going to handle the administrative end of the business because I had never had that kind of expertise. He was the one who had to figure out what you have to buy something for and what you have to sell it for to keep from going broke in between.

When he tried to talk to me about it, I did not listen. My attitude was, "That's your problem. I'm busy with the important things over here - the colour of these jars and the literature, etc." One month to the day, when every single penny in our world was spent or committed, he died of a heart attack. Suddenly I had half a company.

What do you do? Do you stop or do you go on? The day of the funeral my two sons and my daughter were there and Richard, my twenty-year-old, said, "Mother, I will move to Dallas tomorrow to help you."

I thought, "Big deal." If Richard had a brain, I didn't know about it. Little did I know that God had given him an IBM head and that at the ripe old age of twenty-five he would be awarded the American Marketing Association's Man of the Year Award. Today he's known as one of the young financial genuises in our country.

My other son was there, too. Ben was eight years older than Richard and he lived in Houston and had little family of two children and a wife and a house and was making $700 or $800 a month, which, at that point, was very good. Ben said, "Mother, one of these day I would like to help you, too."

Now what you don't know is that Ben had been the bane of my existence all my life. He was the original Dennis the Menace: the child that, if you got him up in the morning, you couldn't get him dressed - and if you got him dressed, you couldn't get his breakfast down - and if you did and sent him off to school, they sent him home. So when he said he would like to join us I thought, "Heaven forbid!"

At that moment, he reached into his breast pocket, pulled out his savings book (and somehow he had saved $4,500) and he handed it to me and said, "Mother, I think you can do anything, and I want you to have this to use." That was the day I forgave him for everything. Six months later he did come to help us.

From the very first day our company philosophy was "God first, family second, job third" because I had found that in that order everything worked - and out of that order, nothing worked. Our company continues today with this as our philosophy, and the Golden Rule is our foundation in dealing with employees, our consultants and our customers.

It is wonderful to watch women come into our company who are not Christians and, after a while in watching those of us who are and emulating our actions, suddenly they find that our way of living is the way to go.

Now what exactly are the characteristics, the qualities, that you need to build a better you?

First of all, confidence - born of a certain sense of who you are and the role in life that God has for you.

Second, enthusiasm - enthusiasm is contagious. Are you an enthusiastic Christian? Is your enthusiasm worth catching?

Third, tenacity - the mark of a real leader is one who does not leave a trail of half-finished projects abandoned when the going gets rough.

Fourth, organization - you can save valuable time and experience more fulfillment by writing down on a pad, "The Six Most Important Things I Must Do Tomorrow". I would like to tell you the story behind this.

One day when Charles Schwab was President of Bethlehem Steel (not the big company that you and I know today, but one that was just a fledgling company), a man named Ivy Lee called upon him.

He said, "Mr. Schwab, I can increase your efficiency and your sales if you will allow me to spend just fifteen minutes with each of your executives." Of course, Mr. Schwab asked, "What will it cost me?" And Mr. Lee replied, "Nothing, unless it works. In three months you can send me a cheque for whatever you feel it was worth to you."

So Mr. Schwab agreed, and Lee spent fifteen minutes with each executive. He asked them to do one single thing, and that was, at the end of each work day they would take out an old envelope or something and write down the six most important things that they had to do tomorrow, they would leave it on their desk and, in the morning, when they came to their desk, to begin with the top one and work down the list, scratching them off as they went. If they didn't get something finished, then they would put it on the next day's list.

At the end of the three month trial, efficiency and sales had increased so much that Schwab sent Mr. Lee a cheque for $35,000.

As I heard that story, I thought - if it was worth $35,000 to him, it's worth 35 cents to me - and I made my very first list. I've been doing it ever since.

Start to do these lists today and in thirty days you can form the habit of having better, more fulfilled days by simply having planned those days. Your plan will keep you on track and keep you from wasting valuable time as we so often do.

If there's something you need to do for your family that is very important, put that on the list, too. If attending a school meeting is important to your child, that goes on the list. Whatever is important in your life. But put down the six most important things you must do tomorrow. Okay?

Fifth, vitality - you need vitality because nothing so inspires confidence as someone who is alive and vibrant. The person who displays this quality of life is like a magnet in our jaded world. Others will follow such a person.

Finally, of course, you need faith - with faith all things are possible. Faith overcomes obstacles. Faith keeps our vision bright, even when circumstances would dim our prospects.

As you develop these qualities, you will come into a place of leadership and your influence will count.

There are many examples of women of action in the Bible who had a plan and who followed through on that plan and changed lives.

Moses' mother had a plan in Exodus 2. If she had not had a plan for Moses'life, he would have been killed by the Egyptians. Not only did she plan how to save him, she also planned how she could nurse him by sending his sister to watch what happened to him and then volunteering his own mother to nurse him.

Deborah was a judge of the nation of Israel, as we find in Judges 4. She had a plan for defeating the enemies of Israel, and she called for Berek to lead the armies of Israel but even more, she went with Berek into the battlefield.

Hannah, Samuel's mother, had a plan for her son's life. She vowed that he would be a man of God so she gave him to the priest, Eli, to serve him. What a sacrifice she made so that her plan for her child's life would be fulfilled.

Naomi, Ruth's mother-in-law, also planned for her to marry Boaz. Ruth had to take some action. In Ruth 3:34,, Naomi told her how to attract him and Ruth's reply was, "All that you say to me, I will do."

All of these women's plans were blessed by God and they were a part of His plans, too.

I think that our company is a part of His plan as we help them to acquire confidence and to use those wonderful abilities that He has placed within each of us. So I hope you will begin today to build a better you. God said, "Your task is to build a better world." And I answered, "How? The world is such a large, vast place and so complicated now and I'm so small and useless and there is nothing I can do." But God in all His wisdom said, "Just build a better you."

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