A Big Hole in Christian Literature. Do You Know What It Is?

What’s the Big Hole?

We have been encouraged by a publisher to write a book on the Unstatus Your Quo® Growth Plan. A literary agent came to the same conclusion as to why we should. What did they tell us? There is an area of Christian literature that has few books that are effective at helping readers know what individualized next steps to take for God’s glory.

There are countless books, essays, dissertations, etc. on a book, the Bible, that is not changing nor are the promises that the Lord makes to us in the Bible. However, there are sometimes some different spins and stories that are good at reframing what the Bible is saying. There are books with more current vocabulary or cultural insights. New books come out that are according to His timing for our lives. However, there is little literature that speaks to what personalized actions we can take for His glory. In fairness to authors, there is a clear reason for this and why we have hesitated. Read on for the answer…

Very Unique Does Not Make Sense

The word “unique” is an absolute. It’s like pregnancy. A mother is either pregnant or she is not. The definition of “unique” is: Being the only one of its kind; unlike anything else. So, adding “very” or “really” to “unique” does not add anything but headaches to editors of books. In fact, my correction technology is warning me not to use “Very Unique” in the header of this paragraph.

So, what complicates advice delivered by a book on what specific steps you can take is the fact that we are uniquely designed by God. There has never been anybody like you in history, there is nobody just like you now, and there will be nobody just like you in the future. You have been put on this earth, at this specific time, with the specific gifts you possess, and for a specific way to glorify God. Therefore, written advice to a stranger is not very helpful.

What Happens Today

Preachers try to end their sermons with three calls for action that we should do. A common action recommended is to get into the Word. While that is a great thing to do, that advice has been given many times before. The members of the body have probably failed 10+ times already to make “getting into the Word” a habit, so what do we do?

When talking to a pastor one day about this issue, he told me that there was a great chasm between the pulpit and the pew. Pastors ask the members of their bodies to make 90-degree changes in their lives, and we don’t do it. We have shown that almost all of us can’t do it. He said the process the Lord led Unstatus Your Quo® (and perhaps some others) to design is one, but not the only, bridge between the pulpit and the pew. The process of making tiny, incremental changes of behavior becoming habits for His glory will ultimately lead to that 90-degree change in our life over time.

What Success Looks Like

Since we are uniquely designed, we will need a path of tiny changes unique to us. A book is a tough medium to use for helping people design an action plan for unique individuals. So, what does success look like:

1. Two people, a disciple maker and the discipled, are in Christian relationship with the Lord and each other.
2. Both know the gifts, personality and spiritual maturity level of the person being discipled in all the basic areas of life.
3. The disciple maker helps design a personalized, tiny action plan that over time will lead in its accumulation to big changes in the unique life of the one being discipled.
4. There is mutual accountability and co-design happening into the future.
5. The overall process does not have to be as sophisticated as ours as the Lord is sovereign.

Notice that the key is a spiritually mature leader who is in relationship with someone in love with the Lord but needs some concrete actions that would be pleasing to the Lord. In other words, the unique design of the person being discipled needs to be known and incorporated into the plan of tiny actions. A traditional book can’t do that very well, except perhaps a self-help book that puts all the onus on the reader.

Conclusion: In This Period of New Year’s Resolutions, How Can You Finally Succeed

If you are making a New Year’s Resolution, don’t start with one where you have already failed. Start with a behavior that would be hugely emotionally impactful should you achieve it. Reduce that behavior into a starter behavior that is extremely small and easy to achieve. Prove to yourself that you can do it as a habit (action requiring no thinking). When a habit, increase the tiny step a little, then form a new habit, then increase and so on until the ultimate target behavior is a habit. Don’t rush. Also, repetition has very little to do with habit formation. A very well-researched book on this very issue has just been released: Tiny Habits: Small Changes That Change Everything.  If you would like to know more about the book just released or more about this process, please email me at [email protected].

Charlie Haines

Per research, only 13% of employees are engaged at work. A personalized career plan may help you avoid this statistic and idols at work.