Articles for tag: Perfectionism

October 29, 2016

By Laura Dingman Bzzzt. Bzzzt. Bzzzt. Your alarm clock interrupts the rest you desperately need. It”s time to rise and shine. Well, rise anyway. You can”t shine until you get some coffee. You drag yourself through the morning routine, readying everyone else you”re responsible for as well as yourself. The day”s agenda floods your mind. Drop-offs. E-mails. Meetings. Conversations. To-do lists. A rhythm ties it all together. Even if we move through it unaware, there is a beat and a pace guiding us. It”s been this way since the beginning . . . In the beginning, God was. Through Him

February 19, 2015

Christian Standard

Church & Ministry Church Staff

Significant Others

By Jennifer Johnson I have never liked team sports. I avoid group projects. I am a recovering perfectionist who highly values competence and who has found that the quality of an endeavor is often inversely proportional to the number of people involved. Unless I can handpick my team (and, often, be in charge of it), I usually resonate with Scott Adams, creator of the Dilbert comic strip, who said the key advantage of collaboration is that “you end up with something for which you will not be personally blamed.” But God designed the universe to reward teamwork, even to require

January 7, 2015

Christian Standard

Christian Living

No More Laters

By Jim Tune Sometimes I struggle with the tendency to live by the motto, “Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow.” Mark Twain took things a step further when he said, “Never put off till tomorrow what you can do day after tomorrow just as well.” There is both humor and truth in Twain”s axiom. On a more serious note, I think Dan Carruth captured the truth about procrastination when he wrote, “The biggest lie we tell ourselves in the area of action is, I”ll do it later.” The interesting thing about “later” is it can”t easily

August 1, 2012

Christian Standard

Church Leadership

Learning to Trust

By Mike MacKenzie Jeff is not unlike many ministers we see. He has been in ministry for 25 years and has been reasonably successful. He accepted his current senior pastor position eight years ago knowing it was going to be a challenge. The congregation”s former senior pastor, who was also the founding pastor, had left under a cloud of suspicion. The church”s building program was hanging in limbo after a church split had seen half the members leave. And the finances were messy. But Jeff figured, with his experience, he had a responsibility to do what he could when he

November 4, 2007

Christian Standard

Church & Ministry Leadership Development

Recovering from Excellence

By Daniel Schantz An angry young man blocked my exit from my college classroom. He thrust a term paper in my face, and with quivering voice said, “How come I only got a B on this paper?” “Well,” I replied, “a B is an excellent grade.” He was not satisfied with my answer. He is one of the self-esteem generation who expects to get nothing but As. To them, anything that is not an A is an F. Now, the excellence generation has taken the reins of the church. It is a generation with astronomical expectations. “Excellence” is their mantra.