My mother died in 2004 and my father passed away in 2007.  It was not sudden or tragic but the end of a long life for each of them.  Dad had been sick for several years and my mother had died from Parkinson’s three years before so it was not unexpected.  Friends had told me that each of the children would grieve in particular ways and there was nothing that could predict how that grief would affect us.  There are undoubtedly some principles of grief and some common patterns we can read about in books but our friends were right.  Each of the three children had their own relationship with…

I grew up in a time in publishing where getting Billy Graham’s endorsement on a book was not exactly a guarantee of respectable sales but it was key.  While his was probably not the first example of the importance of endorsement (Arthur Godfrey and Art Linkletter had already blazed the trail there) it was certainly one of the first in the evangelical world.  As everyone knows after that the power of imprimatur moved from Billy Graham to Chuck Colson Bill Hybels Rick Warren and now Tim Keller. In fact many books published today have several pages of endorsements from a wide variety of influential pastors thought leaders consultants artists celebrities…

  I love Jason Russell and the work of Invisible Children.  I love the work of Scott Harrison and Charity:Water.  I love the work of Gary Haugen and IJM; Jena Nardella and Blood:Water; Peter Greer and HOPE International; and (increasingly) many, many others.  I especially like that my younger friends care about these issues and I support their work in whatever way I can.  I read about the ravages of malaria, poverty, and sex-trafficking. I read daily of the atrocities inflicted on defenseless women and children.  I have seen them first-hand.  I have taught Bonhoeffer and the words he speaks and the willing sacrifice of his life more than challenge…

  I have been part of a number of conversations in the last few weeks about the possibility of donors collaborating on projects – both locally and internationally.  While we often encourage our grantees to collaborate it’s too often true that neither we nor they know what that means or what is expected.  Like many words, it means something different in the mind of everyone involved and we often start working on collaborations without taking the time to define it and to get on the same page.  Years ago I read a paper by the Council on Foundations about the several levels of the continuum of collaboration – from the…

  I read with interest the news of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association laying off 50 of their staff – or 10% of their total.  In the announcement was their plan to focus more of their resources on internet evangelism and by implication away from the more traditional activities of the association.  I’m assuming that means crusades and the retreat/conference ministry of the Cove among other things. This is the second time in three years they have reduced their staff.  It’s not a reflection of hard times financially as the BGEA is probably one of the best funded ministries in the world with a 2010 budget of almost $128 million…

  Every year I get about 200 inquiries from ministries and Gathering participants asking to talk about the possibility of their organization or their favorite ministry making a presentation at The Gathering.  While The Gathering is not a grant making foundation it does have one asset that is valuable to ministry leaders: exposure to present and potential funders.  The opportunity to be visible with those who attend the annual conference is a rare one and I understand that.  As well if a ministry is doing it’s development job right ” it will have Gathering participants asking me and the program committee to invite them to speak – whether it is…

My family and friends give me grief for watching public television because they think I’m just watching book reviews and documentaries. In fact I’m also downloading blues classics like Albert King and Stevie Ray Vaughan together on “In Session” or B.B. King and Eric Clapton on “Riding With The King.” Of course the list of white artists whose music and careers has been built on the work of black musicians like Muddy Waters Buddy Guy Bessie Smith Koko Taylor Willie Dixon Blind Lemon Jefferson and T-Bone Walker is long. Most of those men and women played the Southern “chitlin circuit” for years with little or no recognition by the mainstream.…

Years ago I was part of an organization – Leadership Network – that convened senior pastors and staff of large churches.  While they were used to hearing from their peers they told us they wanted to hear from non-pastors about issues of management and leadership because the seminaries and conferences they attended did not address those issues for large churches.  We began to seed our conferences with management speakers business professionals secular authors and other “non-church” resources.  While the emphasis was still on church professionals learning from other church professionals about the “business” of the church the introduction of outside resources was welcomed with enthusiasm.  A couple of weeks ago…

Ross Douthat’s article this week in the New York Times titled “Can The Working Class Be Saved?” starts with a reference to Charles Murray’s latest book “Coming Apart.” “What’s brilliant is Murray’s portrait rich in data and anecdote of the steady breakdown of what he calls America’s “founding virtues” — thrift and industriousness fidelity and parental responsibility piety and civic engagement — within America’s working class and the personal and communal wreckage that’s ensued.” There may be one more founding virtue as well. It’s what Lord Moulton in a 1924 essay in “The Atlantic Monthly” called “obedience to the unenforceable.” What’s that? “There are three great domains of Human Action.…