Daily Concern

Photo by Trey Ratcliff, StuckInCustoms.com

A little over a decade ago I was in Terry Storch‘s living room for a small group meeting and he was telling me about this new product idea that involved writing a web-based church management software system (ChMS) and offering it to churches around the world.

My immediate response was “Sounds interesting but there’s NO way any church will allow their data to be hosted offsite”.

Thankfully Terry, Rick Chatham and the rest of the team didn’t take my shortsighted feedback seriously. They believed in their dream and built the first iterations of what would become Fellowship One. In January 2004 the dream was fully realized when Fellowship Technologies was formed under the leadership of Jeff Hook and they began offering Fellowship One to churches across America.

During that same period I was working for Hitachi Consulting but was ready for a change. In April 2004 I decided to leave Hitachi and verbally committed to joining another company that had offered me a great salary with some amazing upside potential. Due to a series of “seemingly” random events there was a delay in signing the contract to join this new company. It was during this gap in time that I ran into Terry Storch.

I had kept in touch with Terry but was unaware that the new company had launched. He recommended I consider joining Fellowship Technologies and setup a meeting with Jeff Hook. I was excited about what I heard, this time I had no doubts about the idea. The only trepidation was the salary. Jeff’s offer to me was “how much do you need to live on”?

When faced with a fork in the road between two or more great opportunities I don’t believe there is a single best answer. God is powerful enough to be in control regardless. As Erwin McManus once said, “If it was God’s plan for you to pastor a mega church in Atlanta and instead you chose to go to Africa to serve babies infected with AIDS, I doubt that God will be upset.” The most important thing is to not sit on the sidelines of life but to get into the game.

Now I also believe that the more you seek God’s counsel the better your decisions will be. From the moment I met with Terry and Jeff I knew what I wanted to do but I took the time to pray about it and sought the counsel of my wife and close friends. Thankfully my wife Melissa has always been 100% supportive of my decisions and so we made the necessary adjustments and joined Fellowship Technologies in May 2004.

Eight years later

Well eight years later I’m at that place again but this time the decision was even more difficult.

Being a part of Fellowship Technologies has been the most amazing part of my career so far. I’ve worked, traveled, cried and prayed alongside of some amazing men and women who place God and His Church first in their lives. I’ve personally made many mistakes along the way but I learned more about relationships and leadership than at any other time in my life. I’m eternally grateful for the opportunity to help churches be successful and I’m tremendously thankful for the many friends I’ve made at the company, our business partners and the churches we serve.

Fellowship Technologies is now a part of Active Network and I believe this will accelerate our mission to serve the church in innovative new ways. The staff of Active Network are a highly talented group that are just as passionate as the Fellowship One team is about making a positive impact on individual’s lives. I know that leaving now means I will be missing the most exciting period of growth and innovation in the church market.

So what would pull me away?

I was presented with a very unique opportunity. A good friend of mine, Trey Ratcliff, has become an incredibly popular and successful photographer. His art is highlighted on his site, www.StuckInCustoms.com, which is the top travel photography blog in the world. Over the past couple of years, Trey’s business has expanded to include licensing, affiliates, tutorials, eBooks, iOS/Android apps and more.

Trey contacted me a few weeks ago and asked that I join his team to run the operations side of his business. This would certainly be a hard left turn on my path but the uniqueness of this opportunity greatly intrigued me. In this role I can have the flexibility to work from home, be an integral part of helping a young business accelerate growth and engage the creative side of my personality.

As I said earlier, I believe God will bless my efforts if I stay at Active Network and I believe He will bless me in this other adventure as well. I strive to have the faith Jonathan exhibited when he said to his armor-bearer “Perhaps the Lord will act in our behalf. Nothing can hinder the LORD…” I have confidence that He will act on my behalf.

So after considerable prayer, advice and counsel I have decided to join StuckInCustoms as their COO. My last day at Active Network will be February 3rd. Going forward you can reach me at curtis.simmons(at)gmail.com

What’s ironic about these big decisions is that when I look back on the path my life has taken it’s clear that I was on the road that God had planned for me all along.

It’s as if there never was a fork in the road, just a change in scenery.

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. – Jeremiah 29:11

We make hundreds, perhaps thousands, of decisions every day.

Some decisions seem small … What to eat? What to wear?

Some seem huge … Where to work? Who to marry?

Some seem beyond our capacity … Which cancer treatment?

Regardless, every decision is significant. Who we are and what we accomplish is the sum of our decisions.

Thankfully, our God gave each of us the most powerful decision making tool in the universe – our brain. No supercomputer or global network of computers has ever exceeded the power of the human mind.

However, just like any tool, the mind can be abused, misused and decay from lack of use.

If you feed your mind a steady diet of junk food (reality tv, web surfing, pornography, negativity and abusive relationships) then why are you surprised at the outcomes of your decisions?

Replace that junk food with a healthy diet of inspirational art, interesting books, daily exercise, investments in others, and most importantly, time with our Wonderful Counselor and Mighty God through the Bible, in prayer and in community with others at a local church.

Based on my long history of poor decisions it is clear that I need to first seek God’s counsel and the counsel of other Christians. So please know this, making good decisions begins with just a single decision, the best decision, to surrender your life to Christ.

“There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death.” – Proverbs 16:25

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.” – Proverbs 1:7

There is a reason that your home cleaning device is called a vacuum, it’s because it sucks. By definition, a vacuum is a volume of space that is empty, completely void of matter. The pressure within a vacuum is less than the surrounding atmospheric pressure so it creates suction.

In nature, things always attempt to return to equilibrium. If there is a even the slightest opening in a vacuum, the pressure inside and outside of it will attempt to equalize. The vacuum will indiscriminately suck in whatever it is that surrounds it.

To state it more simply… Nothing is always filled with something.

Vacuums exist all around us, we may just not recognize them. This is why my life sucks right now. I have too many vacuums in my life and I surrounded myself with the wrong things. So I shouldn’t have been surprised when things tried to equalize and the bad stuff was sucked in.

• Empty rooms will suck in furniture and other items.
• Empty schedules will suck in urgent, non-essential tasks.
• Empty jobs suck in average or below average efforts.
• Empty purchases (car, boat, pool, etc) will suck in money for usage and maintenance.
• Empty stomachs will suck in unhealthy foods.
• Empty minds will suck in false and harmful information.
• Empty hearts will suck in resentment and hate.
• Empty relationships will suck in people who do not care.
• Empty souls will suck in the things of Hell.

I finally decided I was tired of my poor choices literally sucking the life out of me. My journey has only begun but here’s a few things I have done so far, with the full support of my amazing wife, Melissa. Thankfully, I was starting from a firm foundation, my salvation in Jesus Christ. However, there was still too much junk, too many distractions, in and around my life.

• We sold some of our toys, namely our boat. Our infrequent usage could not justify the expense.
• We sold our home and moved to a smaller one just one mile away. We simply didn’t need that much space, nor did we use the pool enough. Our new home will require less time and less expense to maintain.
• We try to keep only healthy foods in the house so that when we’re hungry there are only healthy alternatives.
• We go on a date night at least once per week to keep the love alive and strong.
• We are going through a marriage book together to proactively work on our listening and communication skills.
• We attend church regularly and read the Bible so that we have a constant stream of truth poured into our lives.
• We joined a home group at church to meet new, like-minded, couples.
• I carefully prioritize my schedule so that I focus on important items rather than urgent ones.
• I’m learning how to align what I love to do with what I have to do.
• I’m focusing on serving others rather then serving myself

The biggest area that still needs improvement is prayer. Sadly, this is the most important item and yet I’ve placed it last on my list of priorities. Without a strong relationship with my Maker, nothing else matters.

“Do not turn aside after empty things that cannot profit or deliver, for they are empty” – 1 Samuel 12:21

“Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” - Philippians 4:8

“Know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” – Ephesians 3:19

About a year ago I was asked by Tim Schraeder to participate in a project he was working on related to Communications and the Church. The vision was to bring together a collection of tips and practical advice that churches could leverage to improve how they communicate the greatest story ever told, the life-changing message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I was honored to be one of the 60+ contributors to the book, particularly because the rest of the list was the “Who’s Who” in church communications and I was in the category of a “Who’s that?”.

The book is titled Outspoken! and was released in September of this year and it turned out excellent. Tim Schraeder, Kevin Hendricks and others did an amazing job pulling it all together.

While I hope that my two-page contribution helps a few people, the real power of the book is the compilation of practical, no nonsense, advice from experts all around the world that can be implemented immediately. It’s a great resource to read straight through and then keep near your desk for quick reference.

I would like to give you a copy of Outspoken!

I have ten physical copies of the book that I would like to give away to church staff members or key volunteers that serve their church in the area of communications or design.

Simply post a comment on this blog with your name, email and a few words about why you chose to serve your church in your current role and I’ll ship a copy of the book to you.

“A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in a setting of silver” Proverbs 25:11

Many years ago my grandfather taught me how to mow his yard. In order to mow the grass in long straight lines he told me to fixate my eyes on a object far in the distance (a car or pole or tree) and then push the mower toward that object rather than just looking a few feet ahead of me.

I stubbornly refused on the first attempt. I focused on the ground just ahead of the mower and was confident I was doing fine. When I came to the end of the yard to turn around (his yard was huge) I was embarrassed to see I had made a long slow curve across the yard. Even though I was sure I had maintained a straight line I ended by being several yards off course.

I swallowed my pride, located a tree off in the distance, aimed the mower in that direction, never taking my eyes off that tree. My grandfather simply gave me a knowing nod when I turned around this time to see a flawless straight line.

It seems like a small thing but 30 years later I realize how important this concept is in many areas of my life.

In order to achieve my goals I must remain focused on the finish line and not be swayed by pride, selfishness and small obstacles along the way.

Perhaps it seems like an obvious analogy and life lesson but are you practicing what you preach? I know I’m not. I am far too easily distracted and discouraged during the journey. I drift off course and become directionally challenged. Often times traveling in circles, making no forward progress at all.

I must set long-term goals and review them regularly or I will get derailed by the penny on the tracks. Far too often I…

• make short-sighted, materialistic, purchases rather than investing in the future
• eat or drink what makes me feel good instead of focusing on my long-term health
• try to please one customer at the expense of all the others
• go after short-term revenue rather than long-term stability
• punish my children instead of teaching them a better way
• stress about pet-peeves instead of learning to love the uniqueness of my spouse
• work on urgent items instead of the important ones
• choose self-gratifying sin without considering the long-term consequences
• worry about tomorrow instead of praying about the future
• focus on myself instead of caring about others
• keep looking into the mirror instead of keeping my eyes on Jesus

I vow to do better, to set goals and keep my eyes on the prize. I will not become discouraged or deterred if my progress is slower than I expect or an unplanned issue arises. Life happens but I will view each day anew, with fresh hope for what can be accomplished.

“Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.” Colossians 3:1-2

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.” Hebrews 12:1-3