What's Most Important to Atlanta Employees

• InterContinental Hotels Group – #5 on the Top 20 Large Companies list
• Windham Brannon – #22 on the Small Companies List
• Bomgar – #26 on the Small Companies List
• J. Smith Lanier – #47 on the Small Companies List

We’d also like to congratulate Advocate Consulting (#21 on the Small Companies List) who launched LLOL just days after the Top Places List was announced.

Interested to see who else made the list?  Check it out:

Top Large Workplaces

Top Midsize Workplaces

Top Small Workplaces

The AJC listed several variables that were key factors in determining which workplaces were the best.  After surveying employees of the designated companies/organizations, these were some of the most important characteristics of a top-notch workplace:

• Direction of the company
• Conditions of the workplace – specifically feeling genuinely appreciated by the company.
• Managers that help employees learn and grow

Interestingly enough, employees put more significance on work conditions rather than pay and benefits.  So what does all of this mean in reference to Life Lessons?  Well…we believe that having Life Lessons at your workplace can help to create a meaningful environment for employees in which they can feel that their well-being is important and that they are given avenues to learn and grow as an individual.  Life Lessons can add tremendous value to a workplace environment, not just because it is a bridge between faith and work, but also because it creates an outlet for employees to feel valued by the company…which according to the AJC, is one of the most important attributes to the ‘Best Places to Work’.

What about your company? Can your Life Lessons group help make it a great place to work? Add your comments here.

Are you a fan of the North Point Live albums?

     

Would you like to be there when the next one is recorded?

On Thursday, May 3rd, North Point Music will host the album recording concert for the next North Point Live worship album. Tickets are $10 each and are expected to sell out. Get your tickets here, while supplies last.

Want to go for free? Be one of the first two Life Lessons leaders to post a comment on one on the Staff Blog posts (other than this one), and you’ll win two tickets to the concert.

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Jesus compares his followers to sheep at least a dozen times in the New Testament. In Matthew 10:16, he’s talking about sending his disciples into the world to spread his message‐and into harm’s way. And while followers of Christ in 21st-century America rarely face the kind of persecution that awaited the apostles, we are still at risk when we take the message of Christ into hostile environment.

This past fall, one Life Lessons leader found this out first-hand.

Chris*, was a Business Banking Sales Manager at a bank here in Atlanta, until he was terminated in November, in part for his involvement with Life Lessons Over Lunch. An employee whom Chris had previously invited to his off-site Life Lessons group and church had been fired for poor performance later complained that her dismissal was the result of religious discrimination. She claimed that the invitations were unwelcome, and that her lack of attendance precipitated the firing. The bank took a zero-tolerance policy, and with little investigation, terminated Chris’s employment. Chris feels that the HR manager was unhappy with the faith expressions of several employees and was looking to make an example out of Chris. Chris has since found a similar position with another bank, and continues to engage in marketplace ministry, but his experience highlights an uncomfortable truth:
We have been sent into hostile territory.
* name has been changed

The thing is, Jesus knew his followers faced risk. “Therefore,” he advised them, “be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves.”

So what does that look like for Life Lessons leaders?

Let’s start with >>INNOCENT<<. Being innocent means being above reproach. It means giving those who wish to slander us nothing with which to work. That means:

1. Follow the rules. If the company laid out ground rules in giving approval for your Life Lessons group, be diligent about following those rules. That may mean that you don’t send mass emails. It may even mean you don’t use your work email address to send the invitations. It almost certainly means that your email list should be opt-in.
2. Be a team-player. Surrender the conference room cooperatively when it’s needed for company business. Make sure your meetings stay within the allotted time. Be willing to lead out if HR/management solicits your help with other corporate initiatives (or at least don’t cite your commitment to Life Lessons as a reason why you’re unavailable).

It’s not enough just to be innocent. Make sure you are also being >>SHREWD<<. Being shrewd means wise or prudent. A certain amount of risk is inherent in what we do; being shrewd is avoiding needless exposure to harm. That means:

1. Be careful who you invite. Inviting your direct reports may create the impression that they need to attend for the sake of their job, and that can come back to bite you. Inviting those who have been openly hostile to religious things—unless your invitation is based on a solid relationship you already have with them—can easily be perceived as unwelcome proselytizing.

2. Be careful how you invite. Be clear that while everyone is welcome, participation is completely voluntary. You’d be glad to have them, but there’s no pressure to attend. Persistence can be confused with pushiness, and pushiness is asking for trouble. Be willing to accept “no” for an answer; it’s not necessarily “no” forever. Once they know what you’re doing, when they’re ready, they’ll know who to see.
3. Be clear about your purpose. The purpose of Life Lessons Over Lunch isn’t to be a place where you can share your faith or “witness” to non-Christians. The purpose is to “create safe and relevant environments… where participants are exposed to biblical principles and have the opportunity to consider issues of faith.” We want to set the stage for future conversations about spiritual growth; trying to “convert” people in the meeting usually works against us.

So we’re constantly working on ways to make the process ordering your DVDs smoother and more effective. Now you can:

• Fill out the online DVD Order Form, click Submit, and you’re done. No more downloading a Word doc to your computer, filling it out, saving it, and emailing it to us.
• Save your shipping address in your Profile, and it will pre-populate the Order Form for you.
• Request up to 4 DVDs at a time. In fact, we’d prefer that you order at least 2, to make the most of our shipping budget.
• Add your first DVD to the Order Form directly from that series’s Series Page.

Because we know it’s how you use this website the most, we’re putting quick links to the Order Form and the Curriculum Listing on every page in the Leaders section.

I’m excited to add The Comparison Tramp to the Life Lessons catalog because it’s such a natural fit for Life Lessons groups. We all deal with the problem of comparing ourselves to those around us, trying to figure out where we stand and if we make the cut. At least, I know I deal with it. When this series ran live at North Point, I missed part 1 with bronchitis. When I listened to the podcast of it a week later to catch up, I was on a treadmill at the gym. And at the very moment Andy talked about how we look to our right and to our left… I happened to be sneaking a glance at the treadmill to my left, comparing their speed to mine. I was caught in the trap!

If I deal with the comparison trap and you do too, chances are that we’re not alone. Those in your sphere of influence, regardless of where they stand spiritually, deal with the same issue—and your Life Lessons group may be their best opportunity to find out how to escape the comparison trap!

[Visit the series page for series description, MP3 downloads, video preview, and more.]

This is a response to your requests for some stand-alone messages to fill holes in your calendars.  If you need something to fill a date or two between message series, these are a great option!  As different messages become available, we will put them on the site to allow you to order them.  They will not be on the DVD order form however, so please email us at lifeorders@northpoint.org to request one.

Please note that the discs are DVD-Rs, not the standard DVDs that we usually use.  DVD-Rs work will work in all DVD-equipped computers and most newer DVD players.  Make sure to test them out before showing at your group.

Due to the fact that these are stored in our warehouse, the delivery time will be a bit longer than the normal DVD delivery…expect about 2 weeks on these so order accordingly.

Click here to go to our Single Message Series page where the descriptions and previews are available!

Here are the current available single messages:

Trading Up (1/22/12)
This One Thing (1/8/12)
A Random Christmas (12/18/11)
Uncomplicating Christmas (12/11/11)
Where is God’s Love Now? – Justin Grunewald (4/11/10)
The Final Hours (4/5/09) – Easter 2009
Footnote (12/21/08) – Christmas 2008

We are excited to have more resources available to our leaders!

– Developing and preparing for a Bible lessons is hard; showing a DVD is easier.
– Inviting your co-workers to church is hard; inviting them to lunch is easier.

When we make things easier, we remove obstacles that keep people from investing in their sphere of influence, or from connecting with God.

Sometimes, all it takes is showing people the most obstacle-free path. Jon Dilley, who leads the Life Lessons group at Synergis, provided a great example of this in the email he sent to his group’s participants. Like many leaders do, he put the link for the MP3 of their most recent message in the body of the email. The brilliant part was adding the following sentence, which appeared just below the link:

      Tip: If you have a smartphone, just open up this E-mail on your phone, tap the link and it’ll play (great for the drive to or from work). Enjoy.

And just like that, Jon made it easier for people to catch up on a message they may have missed. Ordinarily, when people see the link, they may subconsciously identify the obstacles. “Maybe I’ll download the MP3, load it into iTunes, and put it on my iPod… if I have time.” “Maybe I’ll listen to it online tonight… if things aren’t too crazy at home.”

But thanks to Jon’s tip, some of those people now see an easy way to listen to the MP3 tonight on their way home. Thanks for sharing, Jon!

How do you remove obstacles for your Life Lessons participants? Add your comments here.

What was your favorite series of 2011? Was there a specific series that your group really enjoyed?

1. Time of Your Life
2. Life Apps
3. Game Plan
4. It Came From Within
5. Thrill of Hope
6. Your Move
6. Why Worry
7. Five Things God Uses to Grow Your Faith
8. Balanced
9. Destinations/Boulevard of Broken Dreams
10. White Flag

A Rabbi, an Atheist, and a Wiccan High Priestess walk into Macy’s….

This is not the beginning of a joke; it’s the story of my Monday.
One of the cool facets of being the “workplace ministry guy” for an organization like North Point is that it presents some interesting opportunities. This week I had the chance to be a panelist for a lunch-and-learn event hosted at Macy’s Systems & Technology. The topic of the event, sponsored by the company’s Council on Diversity and Inclusion, was “How does your faith/belief system empower you to be a good human being.” They invited panelists from seven different faith perspectives reflecting the beliefs of their employees:

• Atheism

• Hinduism
• Wicca
• Islam
• Christianity
• Baha’i
• Judaism

Participating in this panel was an incredible privilege… and quite a challenge. Engaging the listeners, addressing the prescribed questions (about faith and being a good person), and sharing the key message of Christianity with a largely non-Christian audience—all in five minutes—was even more difficult than I expected. I reasoned that “being a good person” largely comes down to following the two greatest commandments (Matthew 22:36-40) and how having a relationship with Jesus Christ provides both the motivation and the ability to put others before ourselves. But from my perspective, when it comes to Christianity, the critical point to understand was this:

The most important thing about being a good, is that being good is not the most important thing.

Closing my presentation with this thought afforded me the opportunity to offer everyone in the audience a Christmas gift. I had brought enough copies of Andy Stanley’s book How Good Is Good Enough? for anyone that wanted one. What was amazing was that 60 people made a point of coming up to get the books.
What a gift! Not the book, but rather the invitation from Macy’s Systems & Technology to essentially come share the good news of Jesus Christ with more than 100 of their employees.

If you had the chance to talk with a non-believer about the idea of faith and “being a good person,” what would you say? Add your comments here.

Over the past couple of years, Life Lessons Over Lunch has experienced tremendous growth.

One of our ministry goals for 2012 is to develop stronger connections with our Life Lessons leaders. So in addition to handling of the administrative side Life Lessons Over Lunch, Jill will join me in providing coaching and ongoing support to our leaders. In particular, she is going to serve as the initial contact point for groups that are primarily led by women. There are a couple of ways we think this will help us better serve you. One is that we’ll be able to be more proactive, rather than just reactive, in our communication with you. Another is that we think it will allow us to visit many more groups than we have in the past—enhancing our knowledge of what’s happening “on the ground,” and increasing the likelihood that we can visit your group this year. And finally, it will allow us to have more one-on-one meetings with leaders—something I haven’t been able to do at all with our female leaders.

Jill’s email address is jill.thornton[at]northpoint.org and her number here at the office is 678-892-5567. You can read more about her on the new Meet the LLOL Staff page. The lifelessons[at]northpoint.org email address will go to both of us, and the Life Lessons main number 678-892-LLOL (5565) will ring at both of our desks. My direct number will change to 678-892-5566. I will continue to serve as the Director of Life Lessons Over Lunch and am still available to you as well, but you no longer have to rely on just me.