Reflections from the Global Leadership Summit

I've been reviewing some of my notes from the GLS that I attended last week and thought I'd share a few of the great one-liners that I heard.

These first three come from Bill Hybels whose church, Willow Creek, organizes the event each year.
“Swing hard or surrender your bat.”
“Churches are in the life transformation business.”
“Don’t go out with a whimper.”

The next comes from Corey Booker, mayor of Newark, New Jersey who sounds more like an evangelist.  I think he attributed the quote to Abraham Lincoln, but I'm not 100% sure on that. 

“Everyone is born an individual, but sadly most die as copies.”

The next four all come from a message by Steven Furtick, pastor of the Elevation Church in Charlotte, N.C.  His text was 2 Kgs. 3:9-20 about Elisha’s meeting with King Jehoshaphat. The context was a desperate need for water for the army and the cattle. Elisha’s word from the Lord was, “Make this valley full of trenches.” Steven’s paraphrase, “If you want to see the land filled with water, dig some ditches.”
His other one-liners that I noted were these:
“Just having good ideas doesn’t make you a visionary but a daydreamer.”
“If the size of your vision isn’t intimidating to you, it’s probably insulting to God.”
Speaking of our tendency to be discouraged as we compare ourselves to others, he said, “We compare our behind the scenes work with others’ highlight reels.”

The final set of these come from Erwin McManus from Mosaic Church in Los Angeles.
“The extraordinary nature that God puts in each person at birth is beaten out of us by life and most die very ordinary.”
“Our churches are full of folks who are filled with dreams that will die in them if we don't liberate them.”
“You at your best are not in the slightest way intimidating to God.”
“We must tell the human story with authenticity.”
“Whoever tells the best story shapes the culture.”