Note: Many people need professional help (therapy) to deal with some of these painful events. Please seek the help you need. When we have a broken bone, we go to a doctor. When we have a broken spirit, we just need a different kind of doctor. Remember, God sometimes works through trained professionals.
Lesson 7 - If It's Worth Doing, It's Worth Doing Right
When you build houses for a living, you are building something that is going to be someone’s home. For that reason alone, one would think that a carpenter would strive to do a good job. But there was a difference in Richard’s "good" job and most other people’s "good."
I was helping the carpenter hang a garage door one time and for some reason, there was a tiny crack between the door and the frame. When I say tiny, that is exactly what I meant. To me, it was barely perceptible. You may have been able to slide a piece of paper into the crack but that was about all. In fact, to the untrained eye, the crack was invisible. Yet Richard worked and worked and worked on that crack until it was perfect. My guess is that we spent an hour on what I would have considered nothing and what the customer probably would never have noticed.
"If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing right." the carpenter said, "You won’t have to do it over."
When it came to his work, Richard was one of the biggest perfectionists that I have ever met. If you paid for a job, the job was done right; whether it was a barn or a building or a house. He would go over and over a job, making sure that every corner was square, every door hung just right, every wall level, and every window perfect. And if you were one of the professionals he contracted, he made sure you did your work right as well. After all, it was his name and reputation on the line. Carpentry is such a word of mouth business that mistakes could cripple your company. The only way to maintain your reputation was to do things right the first time.
When I was a young man, high school and college age, I did not do dating right. Intellectually, I knew what "right" was. I should look for character first. I should seek to build a strong, deep friendship. I should go slowly. I should avoid sexual immorality. I knew all the right things to do; I just chose not to do them. It turned out to be a disaster. Every dating relationship that I pursued was a disaster and when I eventually did get married, it was for the wrong reasons at the wrong time to a woman not right for me. We just weren’t right for one another. Knowing how to do something right and actually doing it right are two very different things. If it is worth doing, it is worth doing right.
Every day, I am faced with tasks that I must accomplish. I have tried to take the attitude of the carpenter. I try my best to do it right the first time. If it is worth doing, I want to do it right. I’m not always successful but I try. Strive to do more than is expected, at work and outside work. There should be something inside us, like in the carpenter, which will not allow us to perform with mediocrity. This attitude will serve us well in everything that we set out to build.
I meet many people through my job as a trainer and professional speaker. Many of these people are good hearted, hardworking people. But I also meet many people that do just enough to get by and seek not to do a great job at what they do. They seek to do the bare minimum. I meet husbands that do the bare minimum for their wife and children; employees that do the bare minimum for their employers; and Christians that do the bare minimum for God. What separates the hard workers who care from those that do not? What made the carpenter work so hard to get it right?
The conclusion that I have come to is that it is something that proceeds from the deepest levels of the heart. It is passion. Passion is essential to build anything of importance. In fact, if it is worth doing, it is worth doing with passion!
Whatever you do, do it enthusiastically, as some thing done for the Lord and not for men, knowing that you will receive the reward of an inheritance from the Lord – you serve the Lord Christ.
Colossians 3:23-24
Why do I work hard to be the best husband that I can be? Is it to make myself look good or to have a great marriage that pleases God? There is a big difference in working for your glory and working for the glory of God.
Why do I work hard to be the best father that I can be? I have passion for being a godly model and influence on my children. Why do I work hard to be the best trainer that I can be? I have passion for the people that I am helping to better their lives. Why do I go to church consistently, read my Bible regularly, pray consistently, and say no to sin as much as I can? Passion!
There are hundreds of opportunities every day to do right. It may be something we are doing for our jobs, our families or for someone else. As Noah was building the Ark, imagine what the trip would have been like if he had not gotten it right the first time. I am certain that the temptation to cut corners on the Ark was there. But he had passion for doing it God’s way!
Or what about Moses facing down Pharaoh? Imagine what would have happened on Passover night if he had only gotten God’s instructions halfway right. "Oh yea, the Lord God says to kill a lamb. Hmmm, wasn’t there something else? Oh well, that should be enough." I would not want to be a first born male son if Moses had given just half the instructions. One thing about Moses, he had passion for getting it right!
Or take a lesson from Saul who failed to wait for Samuel as he was told in 1 Samuel 13. He lacked the passion to get it right. Or when he failed to carry out God’s instructions about destroying the Amalekites in 1 Samuel 15. I find it somewhat ironic that Saul ended up being killed by an Amalekite, one of the people that God had told Saul to completely annihilate. There are always consequences for doing a job only halfway right.
Josiah became king of Judah when he was only 8 years old. The Bible tells us that Josiah "did what was right in the Lord’s sight and walked in all the ways of his ancestor David; he did not turn to the right or the left." 2 Kings 22:2. The kings that reigned before Josiah had been evil. The people Josiah led had stopped worshipping God. There was nothing in Josiah’s life that should have influenced him to do right; but that was exactly the choice that Josiah made. Why? Could it have been a deep rooted passion for doing right? Could it have been a heart level desire to be a good king? Josiah ended up starting a revival in Judah. He began a program to repair the temple of God. When the workers found the Book of the Law of God which had been lost for probably centuries, they brought it to the king. Notice Josiah’s passion:
Then Shaphan the court secretary told the king, "Hilkiah the priest has given me a book," and Shaphan read it in the presence of the king. When the king heard the words of the book of the law, he tore his clothes. Then he commanded Hilkiah the priest, Ahikam son of Shaphan, Achbor son of Micaiah, Shaphan the court secretary, and the king’s servant Asaiah: "Go and inquire of the LORD for me, the people, and all Judah about the instruction in this book that has been found. For great is the LORD’s wrath that is kindled against us because our ancestors have not obeyed the words of this book in order to do everything written about us."
2 Kings 22:10-13
Josiah went on to purge Judah of sin, reinstitute the Jewish Passover, rebuild the temple, and become one of Judah’s most beloved kings. What a great king! What a king full of passion!
Every one of us are going to make mistakes and fall short, we are only human. Passion is what drives us on when everything else is going wrong. Passion is what helps us pick ourselves up when we fall. Consider Peter who denied Christ three times. Peter found his passion by Acts 2 to start the church that still lives today. John, the beloved disciple, couldn’t stay awake when Jesus needed him most. John regained his passion and wrote some of the most passionate writings of the New Testament. Both men fell short but passion brought them back!
As you are building your life, do not forget the role of passion. It is what makes the journey of life worth traveling. You can do everything else in this book, but if you do not have passion for what you are building, you will not have what it takes to be a great builder. Great fathers are great because they have passion for t
heir role. Great marriages are built by men and women with passion for their marriage and their mates. Great companies are built by men and women of great passion for their product and service. Great men and women of God are men and women full of passion for God and for others. If you don’t have passion, make the choice today to get passionate about what you are building.
Our attitudes should be that of the carpenter, one in which we strive to do it right the first time. Is this your attitude toward the work you perform? Would your boss agree? What about your spouse? Is this your attitude around the house and your attitude in public? When you’re asked to do something, can people trust that it is going to be done all the way, the right way? How are you doing raising your children? What about if you are single and dating? Are you doing it right? You only have one chance to do it right.
Is it worth doing?
Practical Application:
Your Spiritual Relationship (On a scale of 1-10, what is your level of passion for your relationship with God? Read Revelations 3:14-16 What is God’s attitude toward those lacking passion for their spiritual walks? What do you need to do to increase your passion?)
Your Marriage (What has this chapter taught you about your need for passion in building a great marriage? Are you and your spouse building a great marriage with passion? Or are you half-heartedly going through the motions?)
Your Family (Do your kids know what you’re most passionate about? Is it your spouse and them? How do you show your passion toward building a great family?)
Your Career (Is your passion for your job obvious at work? Are you passionate about what you do? If you could do any job you wanted, what would you get really passionate about? What would it take to work in something you’re passionate for?)
Lesson 8 - You Can’t do it All
It was late one night when I went with the carpenter to inspect one of the houses he was building. We got there and went in. To my surprise, someone had been in that house since the last time I was there. Where there had been wooden frames there was actually covered walls. White drywall had somehow mysteriously appeared. It was on the walls and on the ceilings. Richard went through every room, running his hands over the joints, looking at the corners and inspecting every piece.
"When did you put up the dry wall?" I asked the carpenter.
"I didn’t," he replied. "My dry wall man did it."
Dry Wall Man? Sounded like some sort of new superhero. I tried to imagine what this superhero would look like or what his superpowers might be. It was too absurd to even imagine.
Building a house is a real team event. It is impossible for one person to build it. You have to rely on other people. When Richard would build a house, he would have other people helping him. He would also have other people come in to do a part of it that he did not do himself. He was not a plumber so he would have someone come in to do the plumbing. The Plumbing Man! The same thing applied to the electricity. A lot of the finishing work would be contracted out as well like the drywall, the carpeting and the painting. It took all these pieces coming together at just the right times for the house to be completed.
The thing that always puzzled me was that Richard was so talented that he could have done it all. I am sure that he could have done the plumbing and the electricity and the dry wall and the… well, you get the point. I am sure that there is nothing involved in the construction of a house that he could not have done himself. Yet he didn’t even try. I often wondered why.
I soon found out as I tried life on my own. I learned very quickly in life that I cannot do it all. When I try, I usually fall flat on my face. The fact is that there are people that do some things better and faster than I do. The carpenter was a smart man. He would use other people to complement his strengths. He was a builder, great with wood and nails; but he left certain aspects of building to other experts.
So it should be in our own lives. We should follow the example of the carpenter and surround ourselves with people that complement us. This was a lesson even Moses had to learn.
The next day Moses sat down to judge the people, and they stood around Moses from morning until evening. When Moses’ father-in-law saw everything he was doing for them he asked, "What is this thing you’re doing for the people? Why are you alone sitting as judge, while all the people stand around you from morning until evening?" Moses replied to his father-in-law, "Because the people come to me to inquire of God. Whenever they have a dispute, it comes to me, and I make a decision between one man and another. I teach them God’s statutes and laws." "What you’re doing is not good," Moses’ father-in-law said to him. "You will certainly wear out both yourself and these people who are with you, because the task is too heavy for you. You can’t do it alone. Now listen to me; I will give you some advice, and God be with you. You be the one to represent the people before God and bring their cases to Him. Instruct them about the statutes and laws, and teach them the way to live and what they must do. But you should select from all the people able men, God-fearing, trustworthy, and hating bribes. Place them over the people as officials of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens. They should judge the people at all times. Then they can bring you every important case but judge every minor case themselves. In this way you will lighten your load, and they will bear it with you. If you do this, and God so directs you, you will be able to endure, and also all these people will be able to go home satisfied." Moses listened to his father-in-law and did everything he said. So Moses chose able men from all Israel and made them leaders over the people as officials of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens. They judged the people at all times; the hard cases they would bring to Moses, but every minor case they would judge themselves.
Exodus 18:13-26
If this was good advice for Moses, the man that faced down Pharaoh and led almost 3 million people through the desert to the Promised Land, it is good advice for us as well. Proverbs 27:17 says that "Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another." Do you have people in your life to "help" you where you need help and "sharpen" you where you need sharpened? Even Jesus didn’t go it alone, he carefully chose twelve men to help him and be with him. Within those twelve, he had three that were as close to him as brothers. Peter, James and John were with him during his most difficult hours and his most triumphant. If even the Son of God needed people in his life, don’t we all?
I have a number of talents and strengths. Unfortunately, relationship building is not one of them. The biggest need in my life is to have someone close to me who helps me with my marriage, someone to sharpen me to be the sharpest husband that I can be. I have never been a parent of a teenager before; therefore I need help in training my teenager to be a well-rounded young man. Just like the carpenter used people that were better at certain things than he was, so we must all try to surround ourselves with our own "dry wall men" to come in and help us build.
A few months ago, my wife and I were having a little disagreement. No, that is not entirely true. The truth is that we were experiencing a major crisis in our marriage. We were in the middle of a huge fight and could not see our own sin clearly enough to resolve it. I left the house to "cool off" and by the time I got back, a couple of our friends had arrived to help us resolve our conflict. My wife had called in the calvary while I was away! As you read this, some of you are in shock. Wives are thinking, "If I called friends to help us resolve our fights, my husband would kill me!" Husbands are thinking, "If my wife called friends to help us resolve our fights, I would kill her." This works because my wife and I have an agreement and an understanding that we will get the help we need to have a great marriage. A few months later, I had to call in "the Calvary" for another issue.
Do you have your own "dry wall man?" Who is intimately involved in your life and helping you build the things in your life? Do you have a marriage expert that you call in to help when your marriage isn’t going the way you want? What about a parenting expert, someone that has done the job and done it well? How about a spiritual mentor? Do yo
u have someone that advises you on your career like a mentor? Start putting your team together now.
Practical Application:
Someone once told me that you are the average of your five closest friends. List below the people you have in your life that are helping you build your life. What are their strengths and how do they help you be the best man or women that you can be?
Friends and advisers/ Their Strengths
1
2
3
4
5
What gaps do you have (spiritual, parenting, marriage, etc…)? Who are you going to get to fill those gaps?
Lesson 9 - You Can’t Judge a "House" by its Cover
One time, when I was in college, the carpenter and my mom bought an old house to remodel. There were two parts to this house, the old part and a much newer part that had been added to it. From the outside, it was just one house, the parts indistinguishable from each other. Yet one part of this house was a rotten hunk that would have to be tore down and rebuilt. Which part? Surprisingly, it was the newer half of the house that would have to be destroyed.
The House that Richard Built Page 4
