Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / February 27, 2019 | Men Of Success - Winter 2019: Right Away and All At Once - Session 6

Transcript

February 27, 2019 | Men Of Success - Winter 2019: Right Away and All At Once - Session 6 · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: So, Rodney, it says on here, 12 sessions end April the 2nd.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: We sort of sidetracked ourselves through this print of the stuff.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: We did.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: So there's no way we're going to be getting through Maxwell's 21 laws, at least not all of them this semester.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, you told me yesterday you thought we ought to go ahead and move in next week into uh I put the book over on the table and uh handouts.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: What's the name of it?
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: Mandino, Og Mandino?
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Greatest salesman in the world.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: Greatest salesman in the world.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: You just read that book this year, didn't you?
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I did.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: Have you any any of you guys read it?
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe the most famous uh sales story in the world.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's about a boy and a camel and and the lessons he learns in life.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: And uh a mega billion dollar selling book from from back before maybe either one of us was born, if that's possible.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: So it's really good.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we'll do that next week, and who knows?
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: We may even take more than one week on that, right?
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: So Oh, by the way, uh Tom wanted me to say to you guys uh if any of you guys have an extra Metallica ticket, uh I don't know when the concert is, but he wanted me to pass along instead of saying thank you to him this morning, you could just go ahead and pass him one of those tickets.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: So and he's not kidding.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: Tom, the works of the church, Metallica.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: That's it's yeah.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's him.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: If he had three tickets, his two daughters would love to go to.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: So there was a big game this week, and uh KU survived to fight another day.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: K-State played as though it had a two-game lead.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and in fact, K-State in the Big 12 standings is the inside track.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: They're 11-4, tied with Texas Tech.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: And Kansas State has the easiest road to the championship.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: They have three games that are rated to win, and Texas Tech has to play at Iowa State.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, so we'll see.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: Looks like I'm sure that the Wildcats would love to be the team that stops Kansas' streak.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_01: We would be, yeah, we would be.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it'll happen.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_01: Seems like KU, like every single year, they find a way to pull it out.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, both K-State and Texas Tech would have to lose a game.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: K KU would have to lose a game.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: I would sweep past us, though.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: What about the way we played?
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: You can't lose to the little sisters of Mary.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: Baylor, I'm sorry.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's not gonna happen.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: I think Melody and I are gonna drive out to Manhattan to watch the uh girls' basketball game tonight.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: So that should be fun.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: So, right away and all at once, that's the book we're looking at.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: And it's next Tuesday, next Monday, that Greg's coming into town, Washburn University grad, outspoken Christian.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's a really good book.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, how many of you guys uh bought the book after last time?
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: Good job.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: Three guys?
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_01: You guys started reading it yet?
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:16
  unknown: It's good.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: Good lit.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: Telling you you guys go find it somewhere, do something.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's uh it's really good.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Who needs a turnaround?
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: This guy's the turnaround king.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: He turned around Burger King, he turned around Continental Airlines.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: And remember last week or two weeks ago, before our latest snowfall, his answer was that obviously families and companies that are in crisis need a turnaround if you're in serious trouble.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: But his second answer was that companies were people who are seemingly doing just fine but are underperforming.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: So you ask yourself, do I need a personal turnaround?
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: Am I performing to my full potential in life?
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: Two, does my life feel fulfilling and significant apart from my business?
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: And third, are there any areas where I need to change?
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: Which sort of, I mean if you can't answer yes to one of those questions, it must be 6.30 in the morning and you're too sleepy to think.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: So he comes up, he's got five steps.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, on the left-hand side, they're the business steps.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: Have a plan, build a fortress, think money in, not money out, build a team, inmates, let the inmates run the asylum.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: But his book is different from any other book you'll ever read because he's got a second chapter for each of these, where he brings it over into your personal life, your life as a husband, as a father, as a Christian.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Make a life plan, he says.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Second, choose freedom, financial freedom is what he means.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: We talked about that.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: And the third one fits with that.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: Think money out, not money in, you know, be a giver.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: Fourth and fifth are this morning.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's gonna be about, you know, friendship and stuff.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: He's got five Fs: Faith, Family, Friends, Fitness, Finance.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: And he has a go forward life plan we introduced last week.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: And it'd be something for any of us to do and uh have a deep walk with God.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: Second, have a lasting Christian, leave a lasting Christian legacy to your family.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: Third, mentor others, and fourth, leave a financial legacy, money out, not money in.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: So that's uh under all under number one.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: Number two is financial freedom.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: Number three is think money out, not money in.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we're gonna deal with the whole team and friendship thing today.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: By the way, I'm looking at a friend, Brian Boyd, who isn't this like your last week in uh God's country, and then you're headed down to Tennessee or Kentucky or something?
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_00: Week from Friday?
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna miss you, man.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna miss you.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so let's uh uh would you uh take us into this is so there's two sides.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: He's talking about building a team.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: This is all about team, and then chapter five is gonna be friendship.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: And um, you know, he talks about cleaning house if necessary when you're building a team.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so the business side of this um this chapter is it's it's really good, it's really insightful.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um he's saying whenever whenever you put together your go forward plan, you have to build a an executive team around you who's gonna come and support you um in in your go-forward plan.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: And if you need the clean house, well then that's what you gotta do.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um he says it's very hard for the sled dogs that drove the sled into the ditch to pull it out and head in the right direction.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: And in turnarounds, you almost always need new teams.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um and uh in John Knoxwell's book, he talks about this as well.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: Like whenever they come in and to um take over a company or to try to help a company, the first thing they do is they fire everybody.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: And they go, and people will ask why do you do that?
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: And he says, We do that because um if we weren't needed, um we wouldn't be here uh if we weren't needed.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so those people who led to get to this point, they need to go.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_01: So uh so that that's the kind of the whole premise of the thing.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: Man, that's cool.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, it's really cool.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it does.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um but it's it's very true.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's very true when you look at it from a business standpoint.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: You um everything hinges on the type of leadership that's in place.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: And then he talks about the kind of team that you should should build in a business.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: He talks about the importance of a board.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I copied off those pages and handed them out to my Jews for Jesus board last weekend and s in San Fran because they were the best, it's like a best three-page summary of what a board needs to be courageous, diverse, things like that, that I'd ever seen.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: So uh, but then he moves on beyond that to an executive team, and he talks about selecting servant leaders around you.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: That was interesting to me.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: It sounds almost Christian.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it does.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and and you need these type of people who are gonna be on your team who are um who are willing to come in and think about the company and think about the people first and not all about themselves.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_01: Just made me think a lot about good to great.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if you've ever read that book.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we even went over that level five months.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_01: So uh, and then he kind of gets into well, how do you do that?
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_01: You have to build a culture, you have to create a common language.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: One thing that they do is um when they're in meetings, when they're with his executive team, among all people, he says one of the his things is you need to be here now.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: If we're in a meeting, you need to put away your phone, you need to uh put away all distractions, and we need you here right now.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: To me, it's like I didn't think that you would need to tell somebody who's a high executive that, hey, it's most important that you be here now, but uh one of those things that's the first meeting, didn't he?
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: Say he locks the door exactly at time, and so the people who are not in the who are not there, they're they're left out, they're never late again.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: He says But then yeah, be here now is uh it's uh yeah, yeah.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean my board meeting last week.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: A leading guy had a had a had a matter that he thought was really important, so he stayed awake almost all morning, and then he didn't care about anything else.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_00: And then a board that only had 15 people around the table.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: He put his arms back, leaned his head back, and fell asleep and snored in the afternoon.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: I was ready to kill him.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, be here now.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: I thought that was really, really interesting.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: But he he says that it's a key to all of life, you know, be wherever you are at that moment.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, he'd say it's he'd say, you know, uh be an active listener at your table this morning, or wherever you're at, whomever you're with, right?
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: You're nodding, Dan.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Have you talked about this with your officers?
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so don't be thinking about K or K State this morning.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: So uh so then he moves into the personal side and he talks about building your life team, and sometimes you need to prune that team as well.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he so he kind of takes all these these ideas from business and he says, uh, you know, just like you would take time to build your executive team, um, he says, uh the same is true.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: If you want to have success, just like in business, if you want to have this the same success in life, um, you need to build the same type of team for your personal life.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_01: That oftentimes, if how many of you guys uh after two weeks ago, how many of you guys put together a go for a plan?
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: Any any of you guys do that?
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: Nope.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, maybe I was the only one there.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but if if you want to have any sort of success, if you want to be accountable to that, it's just as important as it is in business to build a team, it it's just as important in your personal life to do the same.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I think, you know, I think one of the things is uh you look at ladies, I think women do this far more, uh they do it better than we do as guys.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: Uh they have a I I'll talk to my wife, she'll be like, you just don't need anybody.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I'm like, no, the truth is I do need people in my life.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: I just don't need as many as you do in your life.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_01: Um but the truth is I need guys who will come around me and guys who will hold me accountable, guys who know my go-forward plan, who know my life plan and will hold me accountable to it.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um and so then he says, he says, you know, a lot of times uh if you know, there are there are people in your life who are um who are good for you, and there's people in your lives who are bad for you.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um and he says, he says, I want you guys to, he he asks this question in the book, he says, Who are the people who give you energy?
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I want you guys to consider that for a moment.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: Who are the people in your life who give you energy?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: Who are the people that you interact with on a daily basis, or maybe just a typical encounter, you leave away from that relationship more energized.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: Who are the people that mentor you?
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: And then who are the people who um who who you are mentoring and discipline?
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_01: He says, when you look at that and you look at um those types of people, those are the people that you want to build your life team around.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: He says, and then you have to carefully, thoughtfully, and consistently prune unaligned relationships.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_01: And that was that was surprising to me.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: So I never heard somebody say that you have to carefully, thoughtfully, and consistently prune those relationships that are unaligned with your life plan, that are unaligned with those people who give you energy.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then he asked, you know, you gotta you gotta think about those people who drain the energy from you.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not that you wanna cut those people out of your lives, it's that you want to you wanna put those people who are those people who are what you would consider your A team, you want to put them close.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: You wanna keep, you wanna decrease the time you spend with what he calls C team players who drain you and decrease the time you spend with A team.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: And the way that he does this, he says, you know, uh I I don't try to be cold in this.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um matter of fact, what I try to do is I my goal is I want to build kind of three circles.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: And his first circle is um his inner circle, his very small circle.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: He says this consists of his wife, consists of maybe uh two or three businessmen who are in the same um uh um kind of seasoned, same position as him.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: Hangs with him every week.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, every week they get together.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and then he has a a middle circle, a larger middle score circle, maybe 25, 30 people.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and then he has a very large outer circle.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: This is 600 people that he's talking to.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: And he says, the goal here is this.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: He says, I want every one of these single people to know, whether they're in my inner circle, outer, or very large outer, that I care about them.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm gonna reach out to them.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I want them to know no matter how much we talk, you matter to me.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: He says, when when I'm thinking about pruning those relationships, I think win, win, win.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_01: If it's a win for me to not spend as much time with them, it's probably a win for them.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: And then thirdly, it's a win because it allows them to pursue a relationship that might be beneficial to another person.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um and he compares it, he says he got the idea sort of from Jesus with his three.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, who are his inner circle?
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Peter, James, and John, right?
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus spent all this time with them.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: Then there was the 12, and Jesus, he and he says Jesus even took one of the twelve and moved him out to the outer circle after a while.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: We we know he's talking about there.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then he said there was 72.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, then there were the masses out there.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: But he said, you know what, what who's in your?
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now he would say that middle circle would consist of those people that you're mentoring on your team.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: They're not necessarily your bosom buddies, but he says keep them relatively close, like the 12, you know, but they're not the three that you're hanging with every day or every week.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: That was good stuff.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: But it involves learning to say no, learning to prune, learning to, and so I think it's valuable to think about um, you know, this idea that you move, so you moved from Memphis not long ago, and there's just, you know, when you move, you definitely change your team.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: You certainly uh change the people you're gonna meet with every week.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: So the inner three changes.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: To some extent, the 12 changes, though you may keep contact with uh, you know, with some of the people you've known.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: I I remember uh I read Arthur Ash's uh biography.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_00: Arthur Ash, uh, you know, the famous tennis player predates a lot of you, but he he still had friends from from grade school, because he said his the theme of his life was he said there was an African proverb, hold on to your friends with both hands.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, which is not me, it's Melody.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: For me, it's out of sight, out of mind.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: For her, it's absence makes the heart grow fonder.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: So um, so but this pruning thing is very interesting.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, uh, and it made me it made me think, and I just want to ask, I just want to post these questions to us as a group this morning.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, he he does say pruning relationships uh has its benefits, just like if you were to have a vineyard, you'd go out and you would prune that vineyard in order that you might have the ripest, most full grapes that so you can have the best wine.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: He says if if you don't, what you'll end up doing is drinking a box of Dylan's uh wine in your life.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, what's so bad about that?
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um$3.99.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: I can't tell the difference.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but I I do want to pose these questions for us this morning just to think about uh today for the next week.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um how many of us have true close friendships?
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: If you don't have I'm not talking, you know, six, seven, eight guys, I'm talking two or three guys who truly know you.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_01: If you don't have them, why not?
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um I think we are, I think we as men we're in desperate need of this.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um even though some of us it's really hard for me.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'm an out of side, out of mind type of person as well.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um but I desperately need a close relationship.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was asking you this week, okay, who are the close friends in Memphis that you're still close to?
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: And you look at me like, right, nobody.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then um what steps do you need to take um to develop your personal life executive team?
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: Who are those guys that come to your mind right now that you need to reach out to today, or sometimes within this next week or next two weeks, and just start building that relationship?
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: Guys that you are close with, that you say, hey, I'm gonna intentionally spend time with you.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna make time for you because I know that you're gonna hold me accountable to what it is that I want my life to be about, uh, and I want my life to say about me when I'm on my deathbed.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we move to chapter five, and chapter five is related to that.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_00: Chapter four is a little more like your team.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh chapter five is a little more like uh you know, friends.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and the title of chapter five, the business side, is Let the Inmates Run the Asylum.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_00: That is, let the people around you build them so that they can run it without you being there all the time.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we're gonna jump past that and talk about a little deeper, investing in family and friends, truly great friends, he says, are hard to find, difficult to leave, and impossible to forget.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_00: And he said after talking about the growing of wine and how long it takes to make really good friends and how you need to work at it, and how you need to move some people that used to be your friends out of the inner circle to outer circles, you know, because they're part of the 10% who drain you.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: He says uh he believes in four rules, four personal rules for family and friends.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: Number one, know your platform, and he means the platform of who you are in life, who you should be spending your time with because of who God's made you to be in your gifts and personality.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: Second, invest over a long period of time.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: It's not uh wham bam, thank man.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: Number three, know your enemies and be prepared to deal with them, and four, have fun.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: So let's take those uh really quickly because um you know I didn't realize um getting to know you that you were a lot like me, which is not good.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: That is that you know, there's some people, uh uh, you know, I'm looking at one out here who's a who's a good friend of mine named Les.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_00: And Les has always had close friends, and the world loves Les and Les loves the world.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: I've never been that way.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: So I've always been, you know.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I've had some people I've liked, you know, that I've wanted to be around.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: I've been, but I've been a little more selfish.
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_00: I've been like that guy, you know, the story of the three guys on the desert island or the marooned on the island, the genie comes and offers them all one wish, and the first guy says, I really miss my business in Kansas City.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: Whew, she's gone, you know.
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_00: And uh the second one says, I I really you know miss my family, I'd like to be back there.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: Whoosh he's gone.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Then, you know, that you've heard this, and then uh third guy says, Wow, I'm really lonely.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: I miss my friends, you know, I want them back.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: So um that that would be more my tendency, I want what I want.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: So um uh he he makes this really uh spiritual.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: Know who God made you to be.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_00: Ask yourself, what do I really care about in life?
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: How can I best invest in the lives of my family and friends?
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: So your first question is what kind of a legacy do I want to leave?
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_00: What kind of a person am I?
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: I ought to look for people that I can surround myself with and friends who care about the same thing.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I couldn't help thinking of uh if you ever read one of the best books in friendship is The Four Loves by C.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: S Lewis.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: C.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: S.
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_00: Lewis says the way you make a friend is you're standing with someone, you're talking with them at a party or whatever, and all of a sudden you find they think exactly the same way you do about something important.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, the first sentence of friendship is oftentimes, what?
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: You think the same way I do about that.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: I thought I was the only one.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, because the essence of friendship, as versus love, is in love, two people are staring at one another and always talking about each other and their love.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: Friends never do that.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_00: They're always standing side by side, in a sense, looking out at something out there and saying, you know, feeling they feel the same way about that thing.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: That's why he says the people who want friends the most never can make any because they're always looking around, be my friend, be my friend, be my friend.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it's always looking people in the eyes.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: Rather than being interested in something out there and finding someone else who cares about, you know, the wildcats or whatever it is as much as you do, and having that common element and saying, This is what I really care about.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, I found someone else who cares about the exact same thing, who really cares about pouring the word of God into the life of people, for instance, who really cares about making a difference in the world through individual people.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: So anyway, I just spouted there for a minute.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: But uh, but I I love this whole concept that C.S.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: Lewis has of friends side by side rather than face to face.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: And then I would add this your platform is not just one thing.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's a it's it's what makes up your entire life.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: So your platform may be um your your family first.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: That's your first platform.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_01: That's what you have influence over.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's what God has given you influence of um over.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it might be um, you know, your inner circle, those guys who are close to you.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: It might be the employees at work, like that is God's platform.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: You have to you have to know those things and know this is what it is that God has given me influence and skill in and a desire for, and then develop that.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: Expand it.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_01: Do whatever you got to do uh to to not only know your platform, but it develop that.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, and it's not for the benefit of you, it's for the benefit of other people.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: The second thing he says is you need uh social butterflies will never really make and keep friends.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: You need to invest over a long period of time.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this is also true in business, but but uh this is where you need to hang with someone, you need to be patient with them, you need to love your friends over a period of time, right?
• 24:37
  unknown: Yes.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: Uh third is know your enemies, and by this, what he means is the things that kill friendship and that kill people.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_00: And he talks about how about when you have a friend who's who's been guilty of infidelity, you find that crumbles a friendship, or when they have such depression that it controls their relationships, even with you, and that begins to drain you, and they become part of the five to ten percent of people who actually aren't good for you because they're always sucking you dry.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: Third is addiction.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: A person who can't get rid of their addictions will damage friendship.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I'd like to add my three, um my three enemies, uh, if I could, for just a second.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: We were uh on our way to launch yesterday, and it just made me think about um I think these are these are real enemies to investing over the long period of time and investing in family and friends and some things that get us off track.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: But I also want to add these things.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um I think one is discouragement.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um oftentimes we get into seasons of life where we are extremely discouraged.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: Life has just kicked us right in the middle, and um it's hard.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I say number two is criticism.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um so often we can get sidetracked by what somebody else says about us, and we just need to keep pressing forward.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: In the midst of discouragement, in the midst of criticism, we need to keep investing over the long hole.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: Don't get distracted, don't get discouraged by those things.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: I think the third one is um lack of appreciation.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um people we're we're not, especially us as guys, we're not good at, hey man, I really appreciate you.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: Hey man, this is what you do well.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: Hey man, I see that you you've been at this thing for 15 years.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_01: Keep trucking.
• 26:35
  SPEAKER_01: And and I I gotta tell the story.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_01: I was I was telling Jim this yesterday at lunch because we were talking about this, and I uh and in the book he talks about um how certain people will will write handwritten notes.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um he said Arthur, uh I think it was his name, it was Frank Blake.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: He was a CEO of Home Depot.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: He would write uh every Sunday 200 handwritten notes.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I I just read this last night and I was kind of blown away with it.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um but I saw this practically in my life uh about five weeks ago, four or five weeks ago.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_01: I was sitting, I told you guys two weeks ago, maybe three or four weeks ago, I was sitting on the couch, kind of crying my eyes out, thinking about the guys who had invested in me.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_01: And what I ended up doing, I don't think I'll share this part of the story, is that I ended up writing probably three or four notes to guys who were my mentors back in Memphis.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I just said, uh, hey guys, thank you for what you did, thank you, et cetera, et cetera, for uh everything you gave me over the last five years.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I sent those off of the mail, didn't expect anything.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_01: Well, just by happenstance, we ended up being in Memphis about a week or two after I sent those letters.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: And my sister works for a guy who mentored me uh uh professionally, and I went to go see her, and uh I went to go see her and see him, and he he pulled me aside in his office and he said, he said, I can't thank you enough.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_01: Now, this guy has been the CFO of Black and Decker, True Temper Sports.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_01: Like he's kind of been there, done that.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: And he pulls me aside, he says, I can't tell you how much I appreciated you taking time to write that note for me.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_01: He says, because I've been praying, because I've been looking at my life and praying, thinking about whether or not I had made any sort of impact at all over my career.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: This guy's 55, 60 years old.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: He's had all the success in the world, drives a BMW, drives a company BMW, lives in a nice large house, like he has it all.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, I was considering quitting my job here and going and doing something else.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't know if I mattered here anymore.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, Your letter was an answer to prayer.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so I just encourage you guys, if there's some, like, don't let the lack of appreciation for people who are in your life uh let somebody else get sidetracked.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: But didn't you also wasn't one of those letters to a guy who spiritually mentored you and he took that sucker in the pulpit and read it the following week or something?
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_01: So one of the guys, uh lead he was a lead pastor, he spent a lot of time with me during my time in Memphis, and I wrote him and I just said, Hey, thank you for everything.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: And uh we were sitting uh a couple Sundays ago before we went to Memphis, and all of a sudden my flow started started blowing up, and so did my wife's.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: And we started reading them there like, hey, um, you know, Kennan just read a letter that Rodney wrote him and uh just made me miss you guys, et cetera, et cetera.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_01: And I go back and I I listened to the message because I don't want to hear what he said about me.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: Like, and he slammed my handwriting and he did all this other stuff.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um thanks.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: I won't write you another letter.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: But he said, uh, because he was preaching on um the um the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_01: And throughout this, he was talking about how we're supposed to take what it is that God has given us and bring it to him, let him bless it, let him break it, and then distribute it.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_01: He said, My letter was one a reminder for him that God had used what he had, he had, and he had given it to me, and he had saw the the fruits of that.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, and he, I mean, there's probably 3,000 people that go to this church, and I I was blown away just by the fact that my my little kind words, he said, This is one of those letters that, you know, my dad died when he was 42 and I was 17, and I I still have notes from him, and I have notes from mentors um like um uh guys that have been at DTS and all these kind of famous guys, and he says, I have these letters stored away in a box.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_01: He said, This one is going in there with it.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, I I'm a 30-year-old guy, like what what importance does that have?
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it just it's a reminder that all of us want to be appreciated, all of us want to be known for, I've made a difference in somebody else's life.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so I think it'd be great for us if we if we all took a little bit of time and just reached out to somebody and just said, Hey, thank you for this.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think it would encourage them on the race that God has marked out for them to keep going, to keep pressing on, to keep investing over the long haul.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: Isn't that a great story?
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_00: And the fourth thing he says is have fun, which sounds so secular.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, those of you who are old like I am, know that the people who've really become your real friends are the ones that you haven't just spent time with, but you've had fun with.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_00: You've laughed, you've done something crazy.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: Okay?
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: I gotta say this about him.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: This is one of the most fun guys I've been around.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um Derek knows different.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_00: He and I have spent time together.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_00: He used to eastig, and he'd fall asleep on me, like, yeah.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: We'll go out to eat.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_01: I just want to tell this real quick.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_01: He's so and this is what you kind of want to have.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: We'll go out to lunch and we'll we'll go out and we'll just be sitting there talking, and I'll, you know, I'll try I'll try to just take an hour at lunch and we'll be there 55 minutes in, and I'll be like, oh shoot, I gotta go back to lunch.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: Like, okay, yeah, let's talk about the book.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so we'll spend the next two or three minutes talking about the book, and then you know, we jit out there.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: But we just I just have fun sitting with Jim.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: We'll talk about sports, kids, families, tantrums, whatever it is, but it's just fun.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh and and that's I think what you need to have.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_00: You just need to have people that you had to throw in the word tantrums there real quick, didn't you?
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so uh now he ends the book.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: We're we're gonna end here two or three minutes.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_00: So uh by saying you can do all this stuff in your personal life, you can you can do it if you do it right away and all at once, you create by far the most momentum and deliver the rest of the stuff.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_00: If you do all five steps at once.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_00: Very interesting, very interesting.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_00: Instead of this, oh, take the next 10 years.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: He says, he says, I'll not turn, you can't turn around a major business unless you do it in six months.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_00: You got to do it right now.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_00: So here's some questions for you to deal with in your group discussion.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: By the way, next week, greatest salesman in the world.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_00: You can uh grab it at the library, you can read this baby in just an hour or two.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's a couple hours.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's really there's a reason it's the best seller of all time.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_00: All right?
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_00: It's a story about a boy in the Mideast, and uh anyway, it's really good.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: But here's some questions.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_00: Are you always here now?
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: Are you now here now?
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: Number two, what drainers in your life do you need to decrease your time with?
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: Who should you try to spend more time with?
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, what names do you need to shift in your three circles?
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_00: Number three, who is in your inner circle of friends?
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_00: All right, pray for us.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_01: Lord, we thank you for this morning that we can come together just as men and be encouraged to be spurred on, uh, to have fellowship with other men.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I pray that you would uh Lord that you would bring people in our lives that we can run this race with.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, that we would invest in each other, we would invest in our families, we would invest in our friends, um, Lord, that we would uh one day look back over this great life that you give us, this great race that you've marked out for us and know that it was fun and that uh Lord, in every season of life, whether it's been whether it be hard things or good things, um, Lord, that you were with us and that we had people who are with us.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Lord, I pray that you would uh help us to be the men that you've called us to.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_01: Lord, may our lives be worthy of the calling that you've given us in Christ.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh may we know who it is that you've created us to be, and may we influence and impact this world uh for your glory and for your sake.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_01: We ask and pray these things in your name.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.