Tear Down the Wall

There is a wall that exists today that needs to be torn down.

In large part, the wall reflects my own journey.

I grew up in church being taught that there was a large separation from the church & the world at large. Good Christians incubated themselves from ‘the outside world.’ It was our job to protect ourselves (and, likewise, those around us) from the things that would taint who we were. I look back these days and find some of the richest times of division to be humorous, if they weren’t so sad. My roots are seeped in a divided world view.

From there I went on to school to be a minister. The subculture of the small Christian private college I attended only fueled the separation. Following that I spent the first decade of my adult life in full-time ministry. All the while reluctantly living out a dichotomy between my faith and the world around me.

Then life changed.

I moved to Oklahoma City to work for a web development firm. We became involved with a house church movement (Bridgeway) where we found freedom and began understanding the bigger picture of God’s interaction with humanity. ‘The great divide’ began to contract as I became more ‘kingdom’ and less ‘church’ focused.

As the years have gone by this distinction has become an even bigger part of who I am.

This is the perception that we deal with at GiANT. In some people’s eyes we have two lines of business. On one side we have Catalyst, which caters to the church market. On the other side is our work with corporations & more within the business training space. It can easy to see the divide… if you’re used to seeing it.

The truth is that we have one overarching principle: leadership & the Kingdom.

Good leadership is good leadership. The principles that make a great leader are the same for everyone - no matter if you are a leader in a church or a leader in business. How it fleshes out practically may look a little different (as is the case from business to business or from church to church). However our focus is the same: to raise the standard of leadership.

The principles we teach are Biblically based. They are Kingdom principles - not church or business principles. They apply the answer of ‘who we should be’ to the immediate context that leaders found themselves in - wherever that may be.

In reality, there should be no distinction. The Church is Kingdom, not walls. It exists where we, as Christ followers, exist. And as the vast majority of us walk the hallways of a business more than those of a church building, we can no longer afford to walk them with a belief that who we are and what we do on Monday is any less important than on Sunday.

It’s time we tore down the wall of separation and embrace what God has already established: a Kingdom that washes over all that we do, all that we are, wherever we may be.

 

Posted 03.03.2010

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