Gary Haugen serves as president of International Justice Mission (IJM), an international agency that rescues victims of violence, sexual exploitation, slavery, and oppression worldwide. Haugen founded IJM in 1994 after working with the U.S. Department of Justice and the United Nations. He is the author of various articles on international law, foreign affairs, and human rights and has completed the much anticipated book, Just Courage. Haugen and the work of IJM have been featured on “Dateline NBC” and “The Oprah Winfrey Show.”
Notes from this session follow…
- All of us want our leadership to matter.
- Leadership that maters to God is leadership in matters that are important to God.
- Just because I am leading and people are following doesn’t mean
- Are Jesus and I really interested in the same things?
- What is God truly passionate about?
- God’s passion for the world
- John 3:16 – For God so loved the world…
- The most difficult thing for people to believe about God is that God is good, because people are in so much pain.
- What is God’s plan for making it believeable that God is good? Us. And there is no backup plan.
- God’s passion for justice.
- Injustice is the sin of the powerful abusing their power by taking from weak.
- 27 million people live in slavery today. 2 million children in forced prostitution.
- What is God’s plan for justice in the world? Us. And there is no backup plan.
- Psalm 7 – The Lord loves justice. Micah, Isaiah (anyone get the specific scripture references?)
- Leading against injustice can be intimidating and hard.
- Leadership matters most when things seem hopeless, discouraging, and hard.
- What have we learned about leading when the task seems hopeless?
- By recentering the focus of our hope.
- Hope is recovered when we realize that when God is passionate about getting it done, He is also responsible for getting it done.
- Feeding the 5,000. Looks hopeless… Jesus asks, “What do you have?” “Give it to me.”
- Am I willing to give what I have and allow God to get it done?
- What have we learned about leading when the task seems scary?
- In exchange we’ve experienced God.
- Jesus did not come to make us safe. He came to make us brave.
- If you’re following Jesus and there’s no danger, you might want to check to be sure you’re really following Jesus.
- God is calling us out of triviality to make a real difference.
- I sense from many of my Christian friends they are on the journey but missing the adventure.
- Jesus calls us to go beyond the safety and security of our own abilities and what we can control, to a calling where we will actually need Him.
- What have we learned about leading when the task seems hard?
- Effective leadership comes from 4 choices:
- Choosing not to be safe.
- Choosing deep spritual health.
- When you’re in hard places, you’re desparate to pray and hear from God.
- Choosing excellence.
- Christians have become known for being nice, but mediocre.
- We must lead and love effectively, not half-heartedly.
- Choosing joy.
- When spiritual health is down, laughter is the first to go.
- There’s something wrong if Jesus’s yoke is light, but ours is heavy.
- The Joy of the Lord is our strength.
- Effective leadership comes from 4 choices:
- My prayer is that God will rescue us from all things petty and fearful… so we can experience God working through us.
Thank you so much for live-blogging Mr. Haugen’s session!
Your notes are GREAT, and I am so glad you got to hear him speak in person. (I don’t know you, but I’m happy for anyone who gets to hear him share his ministry and what he knows of the justice of God.)
I’m cooking right now, and my copy of Just Courage is upstairs… somewhere. But Biblegateway.com’s results give many in Isaiah and three in Micah, but I don’t think all versions translate “justice” with the same word.
If you have time, please comment on what the general response from your fellow attendees was?
Thanks again,
Blessings, Helen Martin
Thanks so much for taking such careful notes, Paul. I work for IJM and was at the summit. You’ve done an amazing job of capturing the talk. The specific scripture references were:
Psalm 10
Micah 6:8
Isaiah 1:17
If you are interested, you can sign up on IJM’s listserve here:
http://www.ijm.org/leadershipsummit
And we will send you a manuscript of Gary’s talk.
Great blog!
Jim
Jim, thanks for posting the scripture references I missed. It was very inspiring to hear about the great work you guys are doing at IJM.
Joe & I saw him speak at the AIDS conference in California. We really liked him. Enjoyed reading your notes. Especially the part about God’s backup plan. US