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You are here: Home / 2013 / Archives for July 2013

Archives for July 2013

"But He's Not My Neighbor"

July 31, 2013 by Matt Perman

It seems to me that we have, perhaps, inadvertently reversed the parable of the Good Samaritan.

Jesus’ point in the parable is that our neighbor is anyone in need. In order to make this point clear, he tells the story of the Samaritan coming across a man who was beaten and robbed. Even though this man was culturally his enemy, he takes action and helps.

Jesus’ point is: don’t let yourself off the hook of the command to love your neighbor as yourself by limiting it only to a narrow group of people. Love even your enemies, do this sacrificially (as the Samaritan did), and be willing to risk (as it was a dangerous road).

I think precisely because of this parable, few people in the world who are familiar with the teaching of Jesus would be callous enough to walk by a person bleeding on the side of the road. Or, if they did, they would know it was deeply wrong (unlike the religious people in the parable, who apparently didn’t even get that).

But that’s only half the point. In fact, I would suggest if that’s all we get from the parable, we’ve totally missed the point — even if when presented with the exact circumstances of the parable, we would stop to help.

The reason is this: we don’t very often come across people who are bleeding on the side of the road. So how does the parable apply to us the rest of the time?

I think we’ve inadvertently taken the parable and restricted the meaning of our “neighbor” in the other direction, thus doing the very thing Jesus is forbidding. We’ve come to think that our neighbor is only a person in extreme need — the person bleeding on the side of the road.

But what about the person who is not bleeding on the side of the road, but has other, much smaller but still very real needs?

We tend to just pass on by. “He’s not my neighbor — my neighbor is the person bleeding on the side of the road.” And yet it never crosses our mind to say, “Hmm…; isn’t it strange that I’ve never actually come across such a person in my entire life?”

Jesus told this parable to teach us something that is to apply to us every single day of our lives. He gave an extreme example to counter the common notion of the day that limited the scope of who we are to love. But then we’ve strangely seized on the example he gave and limited the meaning of “neighbor” in an entirely different direction, to mean only those in extreme need. That was not Jesus point.

Overlooking seemingly “small,” everyday, and ordinary needs is also a great sin. Your neighbor is not just the person in extreme need, but the person right before you at work, in your neighborhood, in your community. Your client, business partner, employee, co-worker, person who comes off the street into your business asking for directions, or person who attends your church and has a concern. Anyone and everyone who has any need is your neighbor.

If you think you’ve got it together because you don’t pass by people who are beaten up on the side of the road, but overlook issues of everyday need in the people right before you, you are missing it.

And don’t we all need to hear this? I know I do.

So, let’s get with it. Let’s about the world with our eyes and ears open to seek out, identify, and meet all types of needs that the people have whom God brings across our paths. Let’s ditch this notion that our neighbor is only someone in extreme need. Let’s be proactive in meeting less extreme needs as well.

And, as we do that, then we will be truly obeying the point of the parable, even if we never literally come across someone beaten up and bleeding on the side of the road.

And, we just might come to see that this seemingly “small” needs aren’t quite so small after all.

Filed Under: Love

Interview on The Gospel and Productivity

July 31, 2013 by Matt Perman

Several weeks ago I had the privilege of being a guest on Loren Pinilis’s very helpful podcast on Christian time management.

Loren is a great interviewer and I really enjoyed talking with him. I think we talked for almost three hours! He has broken up our conversation into several episodes in his podcast. Here’s the first episode. In it, we discuss:

  • The roles of discipline and passion
  • How to pursue excellence without being a perfectionist
  • What the difference is between a legalistic productivity approach and a gospel-based productivity approach.
  • How to approach productivity and life when you’re not really enjoying God’s grace and his love.
  • The crucial nature of understanding justification by faith alone and how that affects productivity
  • The roles of discernment and uncertainty in productivity
  • What it was like writing the book
  • What I hope readers take away from the book

 

 

Filed Under: Interviews, WBN the Book

Thanks to Mere Agency for the Faster Web Hosting

July 30, 2013 by Matt Perman

Many thanks to my friend, Matt Heerema, for setting the blog up on a new and much faster, more reliable server. Thank you Matt!

Matt is the founder and owner of Mere Agency, a web agency that offers services in the area of organizational strategy consulting, website information architecture, design, website construction, and website hosting services. (Full disclosure: I do some contract work for Matt.)

Matt and his company do fantastic work , and if you or your organization are looking for help in any of those areas, it would be worth checking them out.

Filed Under: Gospel Movements, WBN News

The Book is Done (Finally)!

July 30, 2013 by Matt Perman

I have some great news. The book I’ve been working on for the past two years (or more) is finally done.

The book, which you’ve probably heard me talk about before, is on the gospel and productivity. It’s called What’s Best Next: How the Gospel Transforms the Way You Get Things Done and has a two-fold aim:

  1. Present a God-centered, gospel-driven perspective of our work and all the things we do every day that is motivating, biblical, and encouraging, and isn’t trite, superficial, or reliant on trendy Christian catch-phrases that nobody really understands anyway. 
  2. Give you a practical approach for getting things done — whether at work, home, in your community, or anywhere else — that is solidly anchored in the Scriptures and actually works. 

This is what I’ve needed (as I talk about in the introduction and other parts of the book) and what I’ve found so many others need as I’ve talked and interacted with thousands of Christians around the world for the last several years. The subject of how to be effective in managing our work and lives from a biblical perspective is a huge gap in Christian thinking right now that I hope this book can help fill. It’s filled with biblical reflection, practical tips, and (I hope!) interesting personal stories that show the mistakes I’ve made (sometimes kind of funny) just as much as any accomplishments.

I hope the book helps a lot of people. More details on the book to come.

Now, a bit about the blog.

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you’ve probably noticed that I haven’t been blogging much for a while. The book is why. It took up all the time I had (and much more) and was absolutely exhausting.

Writing this book was by far the most challenging, difficult, and painful thing I’ve ever done. The worst thing of all is that it just wouldn’t let up. I’d think I was done, then it turned out I wasn’t. I thought I was done again, but was wrong again. And so it continued.

As far back as a year and a half ago, when I completed the first draft, I tweeted that it was the hardest thing I had ever done, times ten. Little did I know…I still had a long ways to go and it would get way harder. 

I’ve been trapped in a canyon, fell flat on my face while running in the Wal-Mart parking lot, had horrible nose surgery, and experienced a whole host of other painful realities, and this book was worse than any of them — by far. 

But, the book is finally done, for real, and with the publisher (Zondervan) and on track for release this winter. (I actually finished it in early June, but it’s taken me this long to get back above water after the writing process.) I am grateful to the Lord for sustaining me through the process. Without his support and strength, I would have sunk for good long ago, no question.

Now that I’m getting back to a normal workload, here are some of my immediate and longer-term plans for the blog, Lord willing:

  1. Get caught up on some past things I’ve wanted to post about.
  2. Do a series on why the book took so long (because I think it’s very interesting).
  3. Do a whole bunch of other cool and interesting posts and series of posts that I’ve had a bunch of ideas for but haven’t had the time to write.
  4. Get back into my blogging routine.
  5. Expand the content on the blog. I have hundreds of articles and dozens of audio messages I’ve been wanting to get posted for a while, and as I can I’ll be getting that content online.

Thanks for sticking with me through this process. I’m excited about the future and, Lord willing, there will be lots of interesting stuff on the blog to come!

Filed Under: WBN the Book

About

What’s Best Next exists to help you achieve greater impact with your time and energy — and in a gospel-centered way.

We help you do work that changes the world. We believe this is possible when you reflect the gospel in your work. So here you’ll find resources and training to help you lead, create, and get things done. To do work that matters, and do it better — for the glory of God and flourishing of society.

We call it gospel-driven productivity, and it’s the path to finding the deepest possible meaning in your work and the path to greatest effectiveness.

Learn More

About Matt Perman

Matt Perman started What’s Best Next in 2008 as a blog on God-centered productivity. It has now become an organization dedicated to helping you do work that matters.

Matt is the author of What’s Best Next: How the Gospel Transforms the Way You Get Things Done and a frequent speaker on leadership and productivity from a gospel-driven perspective. He has led the website teams at Desiring God and Made to Flourish, and is now director of career development at The King’s College NYC. He lives in Manhattan.

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3 Questions on Productivity
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Productivity is Really About Good Works
Management in Light of the Supremacy of God
The Resolutions of Jonathan Edwards in Categories
Business: A Sequel to the Parable of the Good Samaritan
How Do You Love Your Neighbor at Work?

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