Month: March 2017

What is Grit?—2017 GLS Faculty Spotlight

Posted on March 23, 2017 by - News & Updates

In the past year, everyone has has been talking about grit.

Last spring, Angela Duckworth released her long-awaited book Grit: The Power of Passion and Perserverence and it quickly became a staple on numerous Best Business Book lists. Based on a multi-year research project, she found grit to be the key component for success in life and leadership. We are excited to welcome Angela Duckworth to the 2017 Global Leadership Summit faculty!

In this four-minute video, Angela helps us understand why grit is important and how we can develop it in ourselves and others.

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Angela Duckworth is a professor of psychology at University of Pennsylvania and founder of Character Lab, a nonprofit whose mission is to advance the practice of character development. An advisor to the White House, the World Bank and Fortune 500 CEOs, Duckworth studies grit and self-control, two attributes critical to success and well-being. Her first book, Grit: the Power of Passion and Perserverence, debuted in 2016 as a New York Times bestseller.

 

Guest faculty members are invited to participate in The Global Leadership Summit based on proven leadership abilities in their field of expertise. Their beliefs may not necessarily reflect those of Willow Creek Association and Willow Creek Community Church, and their presence at the Summit does not imply blanket endorsement of their views or affiliations.

Sharing Jesus in the Dark: Hope for the Church in Russia

Posted on March 22, 2017 by - Church & Faith-Based, Eastern Europe, Europe, Stories

A couple years have passed since fall of the Soviet Union in 1993.

A young pastor in his 20s, with a heart for people far from God, decided to move back to his home in Russia after spending time in North America where his family had emigrated when he was a teenager.

His motivation came from his passion to plant a church in his home town in Russia, and reach people for Christ.

Growth in the beginning was slow. He felt alone, but he pressed on.

His small church moved 11 times in the first six months, once to an unheated warehouse in -40 degree weather!

Church growth came from what some might think is an unlikely group.

He decided to work with local alcoholics and drug addicts to help them with rehabilitation. Addicts, alcoholics and their friends and family members started attending his church. People found healing, and discovered Jesus’ love.

They became his church.

Since those early days, the church has grown to more than 1,000 members today, 30 percent of them are former alcoholics and drug addicts. The church continues to grow.

They now are an active, innovative parent church with five affiliate church plants in Russia. They’ve also helped plant 15 churches across Russia, Crimea and South Korea.

In 2006, this pastor was key in bringing the first GLS event to Moscow. Since then, the GLS in Russia has experienced a rocky road due to the political climate. It was particularly difficult this year, and most of our planned events in Russia were canceled due to security concerns.

But at a recent GLS in Moscow, the GLS blessed 120 leaders, who were eager for inspiration and encouragement in their current context.

We’re praying for the Church in Russia.

We’re praying for its leaders. We’re praying the GLS will be able to continue to equip, encourage and inspire them in their context, providing them with hope for the future of the country.

When God Tells You to Stop

Posted on March 21, 2017 by - Articles, Decision-Making, Leading Organizations, Productivity

Leaders face challenging decisions every day. Those choices accumulate and eventually become our life story. In his new book, Divine Direction: 7 Decisions That Will Change Your Life, Craig Groeschel (GLS 2015, 2012, 2008) takes a fresh look at how we can improve our decisions. Here’s an excerpt:

Stopping to consider whether our choices will take us in the right direction is important. But sometimes we head in a direction we know is the wrong one, moving farther away from the story we want to tell.

When this happens, we need to pause, not only to consider the consequences, but also to choose to stop traveling in the wrong direction. The word repentance literally means to change course, to stop walking in one direction and return to God and his path for us.

There’s a great example of stopping to reconsider a better course of action in the Old Testament. In Exodus 18, Moses knew something had to change or he was going to fall apart trying to manage all the demands on his life. After successfully leading the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt, Moses became responsible for hearing all of the Israelites’ problems and handing down judgments. He kept this up, all day every day, until he was spent.

Finally, Moses’ father-in-law, Jethro, came to offer him some tough love: “What you are doing is not good. You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out. The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone. Listen now to me and I will give you some advice” (Ex. 18:17–19).

Can you relate? Are you juggling so many chainsaws that it feels impossible to keep going, but also impossible to stop? What keeps you in this situation? What are you doing today that’s not good for your story? Do you have some habit, a mindset, an addiction, an attitude, a thought process—something in your life that’s hijacking the story you want to tell?

You need the same encouragement Jethro offered to Moses: “May God be with you” (v. 19). He went on to suggest a simple, practical solution. Stop doing it the way you’ve been doing it and get some help. Jethro told Moses to select a few capable leaders and train them to handle the disputes he had been hearing himself. He described a system that could handle the volume of complaints without overwhelming any of the leaders, essentially a hierarchy in which some people would oversee thousands, some hundreds, some fifties and some tens.

Delegation 101, right?

Instead of Moses taking all of that responsibility upon himself, he could delegate his authority in a way that everyone would still be heard, leaving Moses to deal with only the most complicated and important cases—the ones his managers couldn’t handle themselves. If he shared his responsibilities, he could make his load lighter, and everyone would go home satisfied.

Apparently, Moses didn’t have to think twice: “Moses listened to his father-in-law and did everything he said” (v. 24).

He stopped trying to do everything himself. And that made all the difference.

Most of the great stories we have about Moses’ exceptional leadership, the things we remember him for, took place after he made this one simple, practical change.

Don’t miss the importance of Moses’ decision. It wasn’t that he did more. He did less.

The choice to stop doing something not only changed his circumstances, but also changed the story Moses would one day tell.

The same is true for you.

God may call you to abort, abandon, or abolish something—to stop one thing that helps you live the story he wants you to tell. Many times we must let go of what we’ve been holding so we can receive what God wants to give us.

Taken from Divine Direction: 7 Decisions That Will Change Your Life by Craig Groeschel. Copyright 2017 by Craig Groeschel. Use by permission of Zondervan. www.zondervan.com.

 

 

Businessman Addresses Inequality in South Africa by Trading Wealth

Posted on March 20, 2017 by - Africa, Because of the GLS, Business, Calling, Nonprofit, Stories

Wesley Smith, a businessman from South Africa, was deeply inspired by The GLS to address inequality through a sustainable ‘win-win’ investment model. As a result, he and his team have helped thousands of orphans and vulnerable children, ultimately creating capital for the poor, and providing holistic care. Be inspired by this excerpt from this incredible Grander Vision story that came out of The GLS! (To read the entire original article, click here)

 

‘There’s a great saying,’ says Wesley, that ‘your purpose in life is where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet’.

He distinctly remembers the day he first caught a glimpse of his purpose in life. It was on 11 October 2009 while attending a Global Leadership Summit, an event hosted by a church in Chicago and broadcast around the world.

‘They have wonderful speakers,’ says Wesley. ‘It’s a good mixture of church leaders and business leaders.’

The conference that year focused heavily on the poor. Three of the speakers particularly influenced Wesley, with the first being a dynamic young lady called Jessica Jackley. She’s an American businesswoman and entrepreneur known for co-founding Kiva.org, a non-profit organisation that promotes development through microloans. Kiva allows people to lend money via the Internet to low-income entrepreneurs and students in 82 countries. Its mission is to connect people through lending to alleviate poverty.

‘Five young people had put it together and by their third year of running it, US$140 million had flown through Kiva. Interestingly, in America they see micro-lending as enabling the poor, as opposed to South Africa where it’s generally run by loan sharks.’

The next guy that spoke was Andrew Rugasira, a Ugandan businessman. ‘He spoke about aid versus trade. He told America to “stop giving aid to Africa; trade with us. We’re entrepreneurial: let us sell you coffee, don’t take our beans and sell coffee back to us.”’

The third speaker, Wes Stafford, the president of Compassion International, spoke of his life story and how Compassion International takes care of orphans and vulnerable kids.

‘I felt God clearly spoke to me there, saying your purpose in life is to stand in the gap, defend the rights of the poor and the needy, and stand up for justice. I knew right then that it had to do with wealth creation for the poor. Not by aid, not by donation, but by trading wealth,’ says Wesley.

[…]

A month after attending The Global Leadership Summit, Wesley got a phone call from Tich Smith, a friend and client of his. ‘He told me how God had given him a vision to build a village for orphans. It was a big vision … It would be called LIV Village, and they would build 96 homes for 1000 children along with a school, a sports field and a clinic. He was asking me to help him structure this set-up. And I said, sure!’

[…]

We could make acquisitions on behalf of the poor so they could have their own storehouse of wealth and needn’t go begging every year and ask for hand-outs. ‘The field of private equity is not available to many people, even the wealthy. So I thought, why don’t we bring private equity to the poor?’

Feeling that he needed to put his entire focus on LIV Village, he resigned from PwC. His journey of creating capital for the poor had just begun. Wesley went on to launch LIV Business, a Pty Limited and the profit vehicle that would function as the commercial arm of the non-profit organisation.

‘Today LIV provides holistic residential care for vulnerable children. Their core vision is to rescue a child, restore a life, raise a leader, and release a star. It exists to raise the next generation of leaders in our nation. They place parentless children into a family environment where they receive unconditional love, spiritual discipleship, care and nurturing. All their physical needs are met.

‘We want these children to grow up to be a generation that will influence positive change within South Africa, our continent and the world. If these children are equipped with essential moral values and life skills, they truly can live lives that influence and inspire significance and lasting impact. The future plan is to see many villages across our land.’

Wesley spent three years at LIV Village, where he successfully made six acquisitions for them. His very first acquisition would be a company specializing in producing hydroponically grown flowers. Today it’s known as LIV Flowers and is one of the largest cut flower producers in South Africa. Some of his other successful acquisitions are EMCOM wireless, LIV Clean, LIV Eggs and Amicitia.

‘One of these investments in September 2015 distributed a dividend of R1,2 million, which was able to go towards the amazing work these NPOs are doing. At the same time our investors also received a return, so it’s really a win-win situation. The “magic” really takes place within these NPOs, where hundreds of orphaned and vulnerable children are being rescued, housed, educated, medically cared for and loved; where literally thousands of people are being fed on a daily basis; where multiple early childhood development (ECD) centres are providing quality education to vulnerable children; and where human trafficking victims are being rescued, restored and reintegrated into society.’

Wesley concludes: ‘God has been so good and faithful to us. Through the various NPOs we serve, the poor own equity stakes in seven different companies. They own their own capital!’