A clever seat

Are the kids OK?

Via Christianity Today, the question for parents: "How do we actually go about developing empathy in our kids?"

A major point: "…the key to fostering moral development is to focus on your actions and not words alone."

Apropos of Independence Day, what it was like to raise children back in the day: "At our nation’s beginning, childhood meant participating in the family’s provision of basic needs (for example, by working on a farm) while today, by contrast, most children’s activities are oriented around self-fulfillment."

How to do it: "One of the best ways for parents to demonstrate the value of empathy…is volunteering as a family and finding ways to serve both local and global communities."

Look outward for stability

A paradoxical statement: “…disruption is a tool God uses with frustrating frequency for the good of those who love him (Rom. 8:28), and even for those who don’t.”

Why look over the linked article?

• “…the disruption Jesus wrought was not punishment for misguided leaders.”
• “…disruption brings real losses that must not be trivialized or dispatched with truisms. But the loss is not the whole thing.”
• “…when we are simply unable to see the good of disruption—and may not be able to this side of heaven—we thankfully have the church.”

Pursuing the unfinished business of your calling puts you in the middle of disruption, but the vision it gives you helps you navigate instability.

Intellectual journeys

Found via Instapundit, a personal journey to faith through the thicket of unbelief.

Starting point: “I didn’t need faith to ground my identity or my values…and my perception of Christianity fitted well with the views of my fellow students: Christians were anti-intellectual and self-righteous.”

A few points along the way:

• “Briggs [Professor of Nanomaterials at Oxford and a Christian] asked me whether I believed in God. I fumbled. Perhaps I was an agnostic?  He responded, ‘Do you really want to sit on the fence forever?’”
• “I walked into a church for the first time as someone earnestly seeking God. Before long I found myself overwhelmed.  At last I was fully known and seen and, I realised, unconditionally loved.”
• “God wants anything but the unthinking faith I had once assumed characterized Christianity. God wants us to wrestle with Him; to struggle through doubt and faith, sorrow and hope. Moreover, God wants broken people, not self-righteous ones.”
• “…salvation is not about us earning our way to some place in the clouds through good works. On the contrary; there is nothing we can do to reconcile ourselves to God.”
• “Christianity was also, to my surprise, radical – far more radical than the leftist ideologies with which I had previously been enamored.”
• “To live as a Christian is a call to be part of this new, radical, creation. I am not passively awaiting a place in the clouds.”

These are the people who have the kind of impact described by Melba Maggay in Transforming Society (hardcover, paperback).

Remembering on this Memorial Day.

Linking strategy to execution

10 principles from a strategy consulting firm for strategy and execution. You'll find these in most articles and textbooks, so why pay attention? Read through the article and pay attention to the language. It tends to be a language of calling rather than function.

Phrases like "making a better world through your products, services, and presence" are aspirational. Rather than accomplishing functional goals like return for shareholders, the principles are expressed in terms of transforming the world.

A few key points:

• "…dedication to excellence that seems almost obsessive to outsiders."
• "…every structure in your organization should make your capabilities stronger, and focus them on delivering your strategic goals."
• "…many companies unintentionally diminish their capabilities by allowing functions to operate independently."
• "Embrace digital technology’s potential to transform your company."

Potential catalyst causing people to leave the military

Testimony to Congress by the US Army's Chief of Staff seemed pretty contentious: “Candidly, failure to pass a budget, in my view both as an American citizen and chief of staff of the United States Army, constitutes professional malpractice. I don't think we should accept it as the new normal. I think we should pass it and pass the supplemental with it. And get on with it.”

Points:

• ”…by early summer training will stop across much of the military”
• “Routine maintenance of equipment will be halted, and thousands of military families will see transfer orders put on hold.”

Counterpoint by Representative Adam Smith (D-WA): “can't agree ‘that we can somehow pull defense out of the entire rest of the federal government … as if all the other money we spend on government doesn't matter.’”