Well now that we’re working hard to recover from the flood here in Nashville, I can’t think of a better time to talk about not just how to start over, but how to start something new, fresh, bold, and exciting.
Often times in church we talk about theoretical things. Hardly do we ever talk about the application or the “how-to’s.” So the past several weeks in the HOW series, we’ve talked about How to Make Peace With God, How to Hear From God, How to Manage Stress, and today we talked about How to Start Something.
I was raised in a blue-collar home where my parents worked for other people. We had a “work for the man” mentality. And yet as I’ve grown and gotten older, I’ve realized that every person truly does work for themselves. You are your own corporation. You may show up and punch a clock and get paid so much, but the truth is when you stand before God you’re going to be responsible for the work that you’ve done; not the corporation, not the company, not “the man.”
Often we think to start something you have to have cash, connections, and control. Those are the three big ones, aren’t they? With those, you can do anything. The truth of the matter is those three commodities come and go, ebb and flow throughout all of life.
Yeah, cash can buy you a lot of stuff, but it can’t buy you success. Connections can help get you to the right places but they can’t convince the right people to be part of your venture. And control is really great when you’re up. You can treat people any way you want to. But the truth is, what comes up always goes down. And when you lose control, then what do you do?
If you really want to start something – a business, an idea, a movement – to not just make money (although you can do that) but to change the world, to leave a legacy, and make a difference, all you need is four things. You need a core, you need a calling, you need a cause, and you need a conduit.
Today we talked about how each one of these comes out of the other. Without a solid core, you won’t be able to survive the changes that are inevitably going to come. Without a sense of calling, you’ll bring no identity or uniqueness to what you do. Without a sense of cause, you’ll give up and quit. And without a conduit or a platform, no one will ever know who you are, or what you offer.