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“I will rain down bread from heaven for you.  The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day.”  – Exodus 16:4

In the Exodus story, after crossing the Red Sea, God provided food for the Israelites by raining down bread (manna) from heaven.  But there was a rule that they must gather only what they need for that day and no more.  “No one is to keep any of it until morning,” Moses instructed them.  “However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but it was full of maggots and began to smell.”

What happened with the Israelites thousands of years ago also applies to us today when we collect too much stuff.  I recall several years ago in our previous home having gone into the attic for something when I noticed a dusty box sitting off in the farthest corner. Curious, I crawled over to retrieve it and discovered it contained a set of dishes from my grandmother’s house.  For eighteen years it had been sitting there!

It made me realize how attached we all have become to stuff – myself included – how our need for security has led us to an insane obsession for hanging on to things.  Though sentimental, I realized I didn’t need cups and saucers to help me remember my wonderful grandmother.  Yet, for eighteen years what could have been put to greater use by someone else sat hoarded away in a dusty box in my attic.

Giving away those dishes, along with many other unused stored-away items, was a liberating event.  It was a lesson in the freedom to be found through simplicity.  As Richard Foster states so well in his book Celebration of Discipline, “Simplicity sets us free to receive the provision of God as a gift that is not ours to keep and can be freely shared with others.”

As with the Israelites, when we collect too much stuff and hoard things we no longer use or need, it is destined to nothing more than collecting dust, to rust, tarnish, rot, or in our fashion-conscious culture becoming out of style – even becoming infested with rodents or bugs like the manna kept until morning.  But when we keep only what we need, then we are set free from our insane attachment to things, and set free “to receive the provision of God as a gift.”

“As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.”  – Proverbs 27:17 

During my investment banking days, I once got into a heated debate with my boss about the performance of a certain individual in our firm, who my boss considered invaluable because of his genius bond trading ability.  While I could not disagree about his superior skills, the problem was he made enemies with almost everyone with whom he came in contact, which I argued was costing the firm more than his genius produced.

The problem with genius, Liz Wiseman explains in her brilliant book, Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter, is that some seem “to drain intelligence and capability out of the people around them.  Their focus on their own intelligence and their resolve to be the smartest person in the room has a diminishing effect on everyone else’s.”  Others, however, use “their intelligence as a tool rather than a weapon.  They apply their intelligence to amplify the smarts and capability of people around them.”  Wiseman refers to the former as “diminishers” due to their tendency to be “so absorbed in their own intelligence that they stifle others and dilute the organization’s crucial intelligence and capability.”  The latter she labels as “multipliers” who bring out “the intelligence in others, creating collective, viral intelligence in their organization.  One leader is a genius.  The other is a genius maker.”

This whole concept she cleverly summarizes in the opening chapter of the book with a quote by Irish rock star Bono.  “It has been said,” Bono states, “that after meeting with the great British Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone, you left feeling he was the smartest person in the world, but after meeting with his rival Benjamin Disraeli, you left thinking you were the smartest person in the world.”

Gladstone and Disraeli were both indisputably genius leaders in their time.  But if one was a “diminisher” and the other a “multiplier” – that is, one purely genius versus the other a genius maker – which do you suppose had the greater and longer-lasting impact?  And that, fundamentally, was the argument I was having with my boss that day.  Certainly, the bond trader’s genius was to be applauded and rewarded, but how much more could have been produced by his genius had he been a multiplier rather than a diminisher?  For, “As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.”

“Behold, I make all things new.”  Revelations 21:5 

As has been my custom these past thirteen years, Issue 50 will be the final edition of Abundant Living for 2017.  So, I take this opportunity to wish all of you, my faithful readers, supporters and encouragers, a blessed Christmas and holiday season with these final thoughts: 

It is not known the exact time of Jesus’ birth, which has created much speculation throughout the centuries, along with extensive scholarly research.  December 25, of course, eventually became the settled-upon date for celebrating the birth of our Lord, but no one seems to know for sure why that day was chosen either.  There are, however, several factors that may have influenced the choice.  One source I read theorized, “December 25 was the date the Romans marked as the winter solstice, the shortest and darkest day of the year, and the first day in which the days would begin to elongate, and the sun would have a longer presence in the sky.  Jesus was identified with the ‘sun’ based on an Old Testament verse [from the Book of Malachi], and the date [25^th] is exactly nine months following the Annunciation, when the conception of Jesus is celebrated.”  Several other theories exist, but no one knows for sure.

Regardless how it came about, what I find curiously fascinating about December 25 is its one-week proximity to New Year’s Day, such that in our modern world we have tended to lump them together.  I doubt that was intentional in the beginning, but perhaps through the increasing commercialization and secularizing of Christmas it has simply evolved into an extended celebration.  We say, “Merry Christmas and Happy New Year” in one breath, and commonly refer to this time of year as the “Holiday Season”, as if it were all one singular event.

The great irony is that they should be lumped together, for both events celebrate new beginnings.  The difference is that New Year’s places the burden on us to begin anew, why we make New Year’s resolutions.  Christmas, on the other hand, places the burden on a Babe in a manger who offers new beginnings, restoring our relationship with God.  New Year’s resolutions are a sure failure.  But the Babe in the manger is a sure thing, for He is the one who proclaims, “Behold, I make all things new.”    

“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him . . .”          Genesis 1:27 

According to Julia Cameron in her classic book The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Guide to Higher Creativity, if we (mankind) are in fact created in the image of the Creator, then it stands to reason that we too are creators.  Having always assumed that certain people possess a natural gift of creativity while others don’t, myself included, that concept had never occurred to me.  A great example is my Dad who was exceptionally artistic, a talent none of which I inherited.  As proof, the walls in our home are filled with many of his beautiful paintings.  I, on the other hand, can’t even draw good stick people, only to reinforce my long-standing belief that some people are creative while others are not.

I had held on to that belief for most of my life, that is until about fifteen years ago when I left the corporate world in search of a new career path.  That’s when I hired Lori, an executive coach, to help with my transition.  One day she said to me, “Dan, you are a very creative person.  But, because of the work you’ve been engaged in your creativity has become suppressed, and I’m trying to reawaken that in you.”  I was shocked!  The idea of my being creative had never occurred to me.  That revelation eventually led me to Julia Cameron’s book and the profound realization that I am created in the image of the Creator, which means I too am a creator.  It was a life-changing experience.

This is not only my story, though, it’s yours as well.  In fact, it is everyone’s story; for if I am created in the image God, then so are you, and so is every other human on earth.  Some, however, like me need to be reminded or made aware that we are all created in the image of the Creator, therefore empowered with an ability to create.  How we create may vary – my Dad could paint while I cannot – but we are nonetheless each uniquely creative.  What matters is that we use it, use it well, and most importantly that we use it generously for the well-being of others and the purposes for which the Creator intended.

When I find myself discouraged about the mess the world is in – and the world is never not in a mess! – this is what gives me hope, that “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him”, and those who use their creativity for the purposes the Creator intended will eventually come to the fore.  Sooner or later they always do.

“A kind man benefits himself, but a cruel man brings trouble on himself.”          –  Proverbs 11:17

Ted was a checker at large supermarket located in our former neighborhood.  He had been there a long time and almost all the regular shoppers knew him.  Ted had this slow steady rhythm about him when he checked people out, not nearly as fast as some of the younger checkout clerks.  Yet amazingly, customers would go out of their way to be in his lane rather than the shorter, faster ones – simply because they wanted to be checked out by Ted.  The reason was simple.  Ted always had a friendly smile, a story to tell, a conversation to carry on, and he new all the regular customers by name.  But mostly it was because he was a genuinely kind and gentle man.

The teenage son of one of our close friends entered the store one day in need of some emergency cash and had not been able to get in touch with his parents.  Without batting an eye, Ted pulled out his wallet and handed the young man a hundred-dollar bill, the only stipulation being to pay it back whenever he could.  The boy’s parents, of course, saw to it that he was promptly repaid.  But that’s the kind of person Ted was.

Then one day we learned that Ted’s beloved wife had passed away after a lengthy illness.  And not too long afterwards Ted was forced to retire due to health issues of his own.  Sometime later I ran into him in a Home Depot store, the first time I had seen him since his retirement.  I expressed to him my condolences over the loss of his wife, that he had been in my thoughts and prayers, and how much we all missed him in the supermarket.  In his usual kind, cheerful manner he responded that he missed seeing us too.  Then he said this, “So many people like you have been so kind.  I think I must be the most prayed over and loved man on the face of the earth.” 

And no wonder; for “A kind man benefits himself” (in contrast to “a cruel man brings trouble on himself”), and Ted was a living example of that.  Why else would customers go out or their way to be in his checkout lane at the grocery store?  Or why did so many grieve with him in his loss, pray for him in his time of need, and miss him when he was no longer around?  Why else did he feel he was the most loved man on the face of the earth?  It had to do with Ted being a kind man, and kindness begets kindness, does it not?