Celebrating Accomplished and Mostly Accomplished Goals of 2018
In January of 2018 I read Michael Hyatt’s book YOUR BEST YEAR EVER. You can read my review of the book here. In the book Hyatt introduces the reader to five steps to attaining your best year ever. One of the steps “Design Your Future” talks about the necessity of goal setting if we want to accomplish great things. While 2018 was definitely not my best year ever, I did take the challenge of setting and achieving goals. I did not accomplish all the goals I set but I do celebrate the ones that I did accomplish (by the grace of God) and would like to share some of these successes with you.
- Serve in the Philippines with my family. Raise the necessary funds so we can go. This was a huge blessing and a huge undertaking. In late spring 2017 my family and I knew for certain God was calling us to go to the Philippines to serve alongside our friends and missionaries, Sam and Amy Divinigracia for a short-term mission trip.
This became a reality for us in June of 2018. After prayerfully seeking God and receiving enough funds from so many great friends we went to Iloilo City to serve. We spent two weeks ministering with the Divinigracias in the Philippines. God is doing awesome things in their lives and I ask that you commit to praying with me for this family. They may have a small ministry, but they are making a huge impact. During our time there we helped work at their future farm in the mountains of Bucari, worshiped at their home church CCF (who is doing amazing things in Iloilo) twice, served the Ati people in Iloilo, encouraged Sam and Amy in their mission work and learned what they are doing in response to the call of God in their lives.
I cannot wait to go back again one day. - Proactively seek guidance from God to serve him in a healthy ministry. Find a new job. I came to Florida in the summer of 2015 to serve in a church. I enjoyed and sensed a deep call to serve the children, youth, families and adults of this church. I saw some amazing things happen in little over three years that I was the Associate Pastor. However, in February of 2018 I began to feel the sense and prodding of the Holy Spirit to begin praying about seeking a new place to minister. This had nothing to do with the people as I loved so many in this congregation. However, God had other plans for me. In August I resigned my position and became a bi-vocational Pastor at another church. This means that I work a job outside of the church as well as serving God inside of the church.
Now, this was not what I was planning but it was certainly what God had planned. Thankfully, God has led me to an awesome church where I can serve in so many ways. I am so thankful to the Pastor as he is and has been walking alongside me in my new journey of determining God’s next big step for me. So in the time being, my family and I are connected to this healthy church and loving it. In 2019 I will continue to seek a full-time ministry position. - Mentor/disciple four or five men. Build trusting and meaningful relationships with these men. This is one that is hard to call a goal because mentoring and discipleship are more of a calling than a goal, but I did commit to building relationships with men and I am so glad I did. The mentor/discipleship relationship looks different for each person and I can say that I am thankful for the men in my life who were able and continue to walk with me in my journey of faith and I can continue to walk with them as they journey through life. However, we do this with the common connection of Jesus Christ. Since these are relationships they are still ongoing and I plan to continue in these relationships and be more intentional in our times together.
- Read at least one book a month that helps me to become a better leader, pastor, father, and husband. I read some great books in 2018 and so many of them helped me to accomplish my goals of becoming a better leader, pastor, father, and husband. Below is a list of the leadership/improvement books I read
- Your Best Year Ever – Michael Hyatt
- How to Lead When You are Not in Charge – Clay Scroggins
- Great At Work- Morten Hansen
- Powerful: Building a Culture of Freedom and Responsibility – Patty McCord
- Start: Punch Fear in the Face, Escape Average, and Do Work That Matters – Jon Acuff
- The Power of Your Leadership – John Maxwell
- The Power of Your Potential – John Maxwell
- Steal the Show: From Speeches to Job Interviews to Deal-Closing Pitches, How to Guarantee a Standing Ovation for All the Performances in Your Life – Michael Port
- A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership – James Comey
- Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High – Kerry Patterson and Joseph Grenny
- Start With Why – Simon Sinek
- The Life Giving Leader – Tyler Reagin
- No Fail Meetings – Michael Hyatt
These are the goals I almost accomplished and fell short, but still I still celebrate because I made much progress in these areas.
- Read through the Bible using the FOUNDATIONS 260 plan and journal using the H.E.A.R. method. I made it through 32 weeks of this plan and I faithfully journaled these 32 Bible readings online (you can read them HERE). Yes, I did not complete the plan, but I do plan on completing it this year. I celebrate because this plan helped me become more disciplined in my Bible reading and I accomplished 32 weeks, that’s a lot of writing. I may not have journaled all of the readings, but I continued to read my Bible on a MOSTLY daily basis and this is a win.
- Lose a determined amount of weight. I admit my goal was lofty, but it was realistic. I have many excuses as to why I didn’t accomplish my goal, but excuses won’t change anything. I did not lose the targeted weight, but I do celebrate that I lost about 30 lbs in 2018.