QUOTES

No transition will happen smoothly unless the organization’s core leadership team believes the change is in its best interest. For this reason, an outgoing leader must work closely with her inner circle to identify potential successors.

Incoming leaders also need to plan ahead, for as the proverb says, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.” People are apprehensive of change and resistant to it. Pour the fuel of uncertainty on top of change, and you’re in for fireworks. As a new leader, use every opportunity to paint a picture of where you’re headed, and be intentional about reassuring key players of their value to the team. Your ability to communicate clearly and consistently will defuse some of the tension surrounding your arrival.

When you resign, leave. Let your successor do his job outside of your shadow. Make yourself available to your replacement for counsel, but only insofar as he initiates contact. Even then, refrain from giving any unsolicited input. Also, when you lend advice, do not monitor whether or not your successor implements it. After you’re no longer in charge, you need to let go 100%.

If you have ever gone through a major change in life, then you remember it vividly because it was undoubtedly painful. Even at their best, transitions are difficult. Accustomed to putting her imprint on the organization, the outgoing leader experiences a season of withdrawal. Meanwhile, the new leader quickly realizes that not everyone is thrilled to have her in charge.

An incoming leader would have to be extraordinarily naïve or incredibly egotistic to think that he could make everyone happy on his new team. In some ways, an incoming leader will never measure up to his predecessor. The new leader is bound to be inferior to the person he’s replacing in at least one area. The key is not to attempt to live up to the legacy of the previous leader, but to begin crafting a legacy of your own.

If a child has a strong financial education from home, they can do what they love and still do well financially. Teach them young!

You take a giant step in maturity when you agree with King David’s words in 2nd Chronicles 29:14, “Everything we have has come from You, and we only give You what is Yours already.” Long before you knew you needed someone to provide for your needs, God already had!

I thank God for the truth of the resurrection of His Son and I thank God for the more than 500 witnesses who saw Christ after the resurrection. Without that hope, I would be a miserable man.

The nature of hope is to expect that which faith believes. ~Richard Sibbes~

Many things are struggles but nothing can defeat you unless you give in.

Satan gets to those who get half the distance and then feel like giving up and blame burnout for leaning on self-sufficiency. The Christian life is not a sprint but a marathon.

Pastor Denis Davenport

“The law never works grace: punishment does not make us love; in and of itself it may produce regret, but it cannot produce repentance. Only the hope of forgiveness can produce repentance.” Sinclair B. Ferguson, To Seek and to Save 136. "What biblical manhood should really stand for is the purpose and meaning of a man in relation to his God."

The Christian gets not only a new head, to know religion, or a new tongue, to talk of it, but a new heart to love and embrace it. — Thomas Boston “One of the blessings of church history is that believers who have...thought long and hard about the difficult questions of the Christian life.” — Guy Prentiss Waters, Facing the Last Enemy, 43.

It is fear that consults with flesh and blood, while faith is engaged with God for the supply of strength to endure the siege." - John Flavel. A Practical Treatise of Fear. Works 3:275.

“The beginning of spiritual liberty is when the Spirit of God stirs up the heart to answer God’s call to salvation.” — Richard Sibbes “Nothing is more powerful for inflaming our hearts with love to God than the knowledge, sense, and taste of the divine love shed abroad in them.” — Herman Witsius He who loved the church from eternity and gave Himself up for her unto death will return to take her to Himself and cause her to share His glory forever. —Bavinck

“God has satisfied God.” — Richard Sibbes “All believers in him—who are members of his body—share that life-giving justification he received on Easter morning. Thus, in him, we are given new life, and we become the very righteousness of God (2 Cor. 5:21).” — Michael Reeves, Right With God, 24.

“That Christ, however, did rise from the dead is proven by the testimony of angels, women, evangelists, apostles, and other saints, who saw him, felt him, and conversed with him after his resurrection.” — Zacharias Ursinus, Commentary on the Heidelberg Catechism, 233.