The False God of Impact

Out of Ur blog interviews Paul Visher, one of the founders of Veggie Tales about impact and leadership. Paul Says:

Near the end we were selling a gazillion [Veggie Tales] videos and I was getting four hundred fan letters a day, but one day I was reading my Bible and I came across the verse that lists the fruit of the Spirit. It occurred to me that none of those things were present in my life. It didn’t say the fruit of the Spirit is impact, large numbers, or selling lots of videos. I realized something was not right.

I began asking, how am I supposed to live? I thought I had that figured out, but evidently I was completely wrong. So over three months I went through all of Paul’s letters and wrote down every directive or instructive statement he made. And when I read all of those statements it became clear that the gospel I had was a sham. It was more the gospel of Benjamin Franklin than the gospel of Jesus Christ. It was more about self-improvement, and pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, and going out and changing the world. It was American cultural values masquerading as the words of Christ.

Now I ask myself, have I done what God has asked me to do? Am I walking with him daily? Success has very little to do with where I end up. I don’t know exactly why, but we seem wired to look for numerical results for affirmation. But success in ministry cannot be about measurable impact.

We should have peace. We should have joy. And that doesn’t mean we should force ourselves to have it, because we can’t. It will come from us when we’ve let go of our life, when we’ve let go of our ministry, when we’ve let go of any aspiration for having an impact. When it’s just us and God we’ll find the joy and the peace. Then, we can get back to work and help other people follow that path.

This spoke volumes to me. How often do I seek impact and effectiveness over depth and relationship with God and others. It's a hard balance sometimes, especially when we see so much hurt and need in the community. But I guess it's as much about 'being' as 'doing'. I've been trying to learn that lesson for a long time now.

PageMill, Wells Fargo and Sam Zell

Dear Friends, Normal.dotm 0 0 1 888 5066 Northern California Urban Development 42 10 6221 12.0 0 false 18 pt 18 pt 0 0 false false false As many of you know we've been in discussion recently with Wells Fargo and Equity Residential, the proposed buyers of the former Pagemill Properties on the west side of East Palo Alto. As an East Palo Alto resident and leader I view this issue, and how Wells Fargo handles this important portfolio as a milestone event for our community and it’s residents. First, a little background (from my perspective): A few years ago over 80% of East Palo Alto's multi family housing stock was purchased piece by piece by a predator equity group, Pagemill Properties. After the purchase Pagemill began systematically dismantling our rent control ordinances and aggressively evicting working class families. The community was in shock. However, the Pagemill group went bankrupt in 2009 and lost the property to Wachovia,...

Non Profit Payday Loans?

Here's a recent New York Times article sent to me from Katie at NCHM on payday lending. I know that the NCUD / CTCU-EPA partnership is going to have to create the right program addressing the needs for short term lending for low income families. We don't have the answers yet, but it's definitely on our radar. APPLETON, Wis. — This city of 70,000 has five McDonald’s franchises, three Pizza Huts, four Starbucks shops — and 19 payday loan stores, brightly lighted storefronts with names like EZ Money and Check Into Cash that offer two-week loans without credit checks. Peggy Truckey, 53, knows the allure. Last year she owed nearly $1,300 to four of those stores, and was paying about $600 a month in finance fees alone. “I thought I was going to have to take a second job just to pay off the interest,” Ms. Truckey said. Then she heard about a new nonprofit program operated out of a Goodwill thrift store, one of several hundred lower-cost payday loan products that are now bein...

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