A Bigger Idea Than “Starbucks for Life!”

Your favorite coffee stop has a big idea this holiday season: “Starbucks for Life!”

Just go online and enter the code from your Starbucks receipt and you’ll be entered in the promotion to win Starbucks for life. (Or as the company defines life: “Starbucks for life means one free food or beverage item per day for 30 years.”) 

Maybe if you drink coffee for almost 11,000 days straight, it will do you in after 30 years?

So what does all that caffeine have to do with the governance of Christ-centered organizations?

The coffee promotion (a pretty big idea) got my attention. And then I wondered,

“What might be some of the truly
God-inspired big ideas coming in 2015?”

One of the classic governance roles of boards, according to BoardSource, is to “ensure effective planning.” (Read the Ten Basic Responsibilities of Nonprofit Boards, by Richard T. Ingram). Board members in 2015 will either add value or diminish value as they discern future priorities.

For some boards, it will be business as usual. Cross the “t’s” and dot the “i’s” and operate without faith goals.

Perhaps you’re on a board that’s worked very hard in 2014—and you’re tired. You just need a quiet, uneventful year—maybe focused on faithfulness and obedience versus human-size big ideas. That may be entirely appropriate.

A few boards, however, will pray for attentiveness to God’s voice and, with hands open, will embrace both big and small ideas from our Holy God. Imagine…the privilege of discerning God’s voice and following His plan! (And funding often follows when we follow His plan.)

We already know God’s biggest idea (which leaves Starbucks in the dust): eternity! And that unimaginable gift of Grace doesn’t expire in 30 years. Wow.

QUESTION: How will you help your board discern God’s voice for 2015? Are you chasing after Big Hairy Audacious Goals or Big HOLY Audacious Goals?