John Albert Thomas Solo Piano

There's Something In Here!

WOW! What a weekend! I guess I’ll end it with the beginning in mind.

Becky and I went to Franklin, TN where Dan Miller and his team hosted a two-day workshop chocked full of incredibly useful information about how to turn my ideas into thriving businesses.  I went mainly to find out how to build my music career, but little did I know that Becky and I were about to strike the motherload of self-discovery. From the moment we left Franklin till we arrived in Memphis, Becky and I talked and wrote non-stop about our business idea and plan. Let me explain.

For years I lived a melancholy existence cooped up behind a computer screen in the corporate world. Day after day I would dream up business ideas that would allow me to exit that existence and spread my entrepreneurial wings. I would shoot off a few emails to friends to get their feedback on my ideas to look for weaknesses. I would always end this exercise with a single thought or statement: “That’s a great idea. I don’t want to do it, but someone should!” Then I would settle back into corporate reality and grow more depressed. (Can I just say how patient my dear wife, Becky, has been with me all this time!)

What made it worse was that I love to compose piano music. I started composing at age 12 and received my college degree in music theory and composition. My piano works are manifestations of creativity in three or four minutes of sound. Over the years I released two solo piano albums, but they never took off. I always thought that God wanted me to be a professional solo piano composer. Last fall, during a church service, I surrendered my musical aspirations to Him completely.

Then in January, on a mission trip to Mexico, I told my pastor of my struggle to find God’s will for my life. He told me something very wise, “Sometimes, when we are seeking God’s will, He lets us struggle. It prepares us for the answer. Try to see your struggle as a positive thing.” Early the next morning, I turned in my journal to a blank page, set my pen down and pushed it across the table. I prayed, “Here, Father. You write it.” I finally let go of my expectations and stopped telling God what to do. I started to TRUST Him.

I came back and life changed. I realized that I couldn’t live a lie in the corporate world anymore. I started listening to Dan Miller’s podcasts and heard about the Roundtable. I knew that Becky and I needed to go to build our dream together. We were at a crossroads and we needed wise counsel from those who had moved from the corporate world into entrepreneurship successfully. I needed a plan to build my music business, or silver business, or nobody’s business.

Becky and I drove up to “The Sanctuary” as they affectionately call it and discovered that Dan and his wife Joanne had successfully built a place where home and business are woven together, secluded from the world, warm with hospitality and thoughtful ministry. No wonder they call it “The Sanctuary”. We had envisioned such a place for ourselves just a year ago. It was a beautiful setting, and we were greeted graciously by our generous hosts.

Two days of interaction worked relentlessly to chip away the dirt of self-doubt, inadequacy, and false assumptions. As I shed the shell of the man I was, I began to see that there’s something in here! All those years of struggle in corporate life finally made sense to me!

As fellow attendees expressed their struggle with how to take their business to the next level, my mind began to fill with business idea after business idea, like pieces of a puzzle coming together. Part of me didn’t want to say anything because I didn’t want to appear conceited, but if I had information that might really help then I needed to share it. That’s why we all went there, right?

The more I shared, the more I discovered that my ideas might be worth something. What if they could be used to double someone’s business? Or accelerate their economic model? I asked Chuck Bowen about the possibilities. I told him that I love coming up with business ideas, but I have so many of them I cannot build them all myself. He suggested that I could generate business ideas and then hand them off to others to make them happen. He suggested that I had a lot of creativity bottled up inside, and he’s absolutely right. By the end of the weekend, someone gave me a new nickname, “The Idea Guy.” That solidified in my mind what I need to do.

After a sad but satisfied ending to a great weekend, Becky and I went back to our hotel and brainstormed the concept of being an “idea guy”. How do I get there? What is my product? Who is my client? What makes me unique? All the things we learned over the weekend. We finally crashed.

Sunday morning we drove back to Memphis, TN. From the moment we left the hotel to the moment we drove up to our house we talked and wrote every idea down on paper, page after page of great ideas. I became my own Idea Guy. It flowed. It made sense. It’s doable. And best of all, my wife was right there by my side taking ownership. For the first time it was not MY thing. It was OUR thing. THAT’s the life I want. And so, over the coming days, we will digest and plan the entrepreneurial existence that we are wired to live.

Incalculable thanks to Dan, Joanne, Ashley, Kevin, Chuck, Kent, Deby and everyone who made the weekend a life-changing experience for me and my family. I hope to see them next year, or preferably sooner! Shoot…I’ll see them often on 48days.net.

From Angst

Angst.  It’s the word that Becky used last night to describe my state of being over the past few years.  She said it made me emotionally absent.  I had to agree.

Before I trekked to Baborigame in southwestern Mexico last week, which I will describe in later posts, I struggled night and day with angst.  The underlying cause for this was once again discontentment.  This discontentment was both divine and demonic.  (Before thinking such a statement is sacrilegious, please read Job.)  Let me explain.

For years I would go to work and sit behind a computer screen, clocking hours, counting on the next paycheck to cover our monthly expenses.  This is a good reason to go to work, but not a perfectly good reason.  For years I have had little-to-no desire to be doing what I’m doing.  I’m good at what I do, but it’s not my passion.  My passion is music and ministry.  So I lived day in and day out with a spirit of discontentment, frustrated that I wasn’t doing what I felt God created me to do.

Every month or two I would quite naturally go through brainstorming sessions whenever a “cool idea” of making money popped into my head.  It was usually something creative that would fascilitate the transition from the computer world to a life of residual income where I could be free to focus on music and ministry.  I’d bounce the ideas off of my very patient friends, who would critique the ideas.  Were they John’s ideas, or were they God’s ideas?  I could never tell.  Every idea would come and go, and the next day I’d go back to my computer work to cover my monthly expenses.  And the angst would grow each time I went through this process.

Then came Mexico.  I worked with my pastor, John Horne, on a job site and I told him of my struggles with wanting to be in music and ministry.  And he told me something that I’ll never forget.  He said that sometimes, when we are seeking God’s will, He lets us struggle.  It prepares us for the answer.  Try to see your struggle as a positive thing.

I told him how I had idea after idea and I just couldn’t do them all.  He went on to say that God could funnel those ideas such that any or every one of them contributes to the answer.

That’s when the paradigm shift began.  The rest of the day and again at 4:30 a.m. the next morning.  At 4:30, I woke up and I felt that God wanted me to go outside.  I argued a little because it was below freezing.  I did it anyway and I looked up.  The moon shone brightly and millions of stars were shining.  He reminded me of His promise to Abraham, that his descendents by faith would be as numerous as the stars.   God showed me the source of my angst.

I went back inside and warmed myself by the pot-belly stove.  I cried and prayed.  At 6:30 a.m. I said, “Father, I’m tired of trying to figure out your will.”  I turned my notebook over to a blank page and laid my pen on it.  I shoved it across the table and said, “Father, you write it.”  I went up and tried to go back to sleep.

So what was my source of angst?  Simply this, I didn’t trust God. I didn’t trust Him to show me His will in His time and His way…at the best time and in the best way.  I didn’t trust Him enough to wait patiently and peacefully, with contentment.

So I came back to Memphis a changed man.  Everywhere I am is His mission field.  My job, my neighborhood, my church and my home.  It is enough to simply “trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.”

Last night, Becky used the word angst to describe what I was like before the trip.  But now the “old John” is back.  Instead of angst, she said, I now seem to have a peaceful and hopeful expectation.  I had to agree.

In His time and in His way He will reveal all things.

“We can make our plans, but the LORD determines our steps.”  (Proverbs 16:9, NLT)

Steel for Breakfast

This morning on the way to work I almost got squashed by an overturning tractor trailer carrying a roll of steel. I was in the middle lane on I40 (westbound) when the rig was getting on the highway at Rt. 64, which boasts a very tight curve. The trucker must have taken the turn too fast. Praise God I was still about 10 car lengths behind where it was merging. It was like watching a movie in slow motion. Fortunately, only the driver was injured, and only his truck was damaged, and the roll of steel landed on its side. The cab of the truck was on its side and the driver climbed out pretty shaken, blood dripping from his arm. A college kid made phone calls for him, and I had the opportunity to pray with him.

It was so sad to see how scared I was to simply pray with what could have been a dying man. There was a spiritual battle inside of me. I felt the Holy Spirit prodding me to pray with him, but over the years, somehow, I have turned into a coward when it comes to proactively expressing my faith in public. In a church environment I feel safe, but in public I am insecure. In the end, I have been a hypocrite in matters of evangelism. I talk about it, but I don’t really do it. I have told myself that I care for the lost, but I haven’t cared enough to tell them how to find peace with God through Jesus Christ. But this time the Holy Spirit prodded me further with thoughts like this: John, you asked me for courage. Right now I’m just asking you to pray with him. If you can’t do what I ask you to do here and now, when will you do it? Nobody else is going to do it. You have the only thing that will give him peace. Here’s your opportunity.”

And so after much wrestling, I finally asked Bobby, the truck driver who was visibly shaken and afraid of losing his job, to let me pray for him. He didn’t resist. I laid my hand on his shoulder (the one not bleeding) and prayed for him. I prayed for his physical and emotional healing. I prayed that he wouldn’t lose his job. I prayed for peace in the situation, the kind of peace that only God can give. I asked those things in the name of Jesus. And my work was done. I did what the Holy Spirit prompted me to do. I said the words He prompted me to say. I was His messenger to Bobby this morning, hopefully not the last.

I looked around and each emergency worker was fulfilling his role. One checking for gas leaks, one directing traffic, two putting Bobby on a stretcher, one taking down eyewitness accounts, and now one interceding for Bobby before the Father in the name of Jesus Christ. It is a sobering, humbling and powerful commission to be called into the service of our Lord. Each day He calls us to “take up your cross and follow Me.” This morning Bobby needed a Savior. I needed a Lord.

I pray that God would finish the work He started in Bobby’s life. I ask you to do the same.