Week 12: March 23-29
Week 12: March 23 – 29
You have finished
your quest and made it home safely… now what?
Be grateful. “Do
you have regrets? Have you compromised in ways you should not have? In what
ways did you make yourself proud? Is your success that sort that endures?
What would you
like to do next? You are a striver, an achiever. You will soon set forth again.”
·
“Apparently
the Creator of heaven and earth “and all things that in them are” was , at
least in His adult life, homeless.”
·
The
Lord commanded us: “look to the poor and… needy, and administer to their relief
that they shall not suffer.” Note the “They shall not suffer.” Imagine
the Lord using that phrase in his stern Dad voice.
·
What
can one man or woman do? “She hath done what she could.”
·
Story
of Mother Teresa and a reporter who told her that statistically she couldn’t do
much. She told him her work was about love, not statistics. “Soberly, the
journalist concluded that Christianity is obviously not a statistical
endeavor. He reasoned that if there would be more joy in heaven over one sinner
who repents than over the ninety and nine who need no repentance, then
apparently God is not overly preoccupied with percentages.
·
Are
we not all beggars? Don’t we all cry out for help and hope and answers to
prayers? Don’t we all beg for forgiveness for mistakes we have made and
troubles we have caused?
·
Two
step formula:
·
1.
We obtain a remission of our sins by pleading to God, who
compassionately responds
·
2.
We retain a remission of our sins by compassionately responding to the
poor who plead to us.
Microlending:
a Poverty-Free World
As a professor,
he studied the poor people who lived around the campus. He was shocked by their
lack and “how much hard work each poor person is putting in just for mere
survival.” He made a list of 42 people who were in need and the total loans for
all of them was $27. He gave them the money as loans from his pocket.
He founded a
bank, Grameen Bank, which lends money to 2.3 million poor borrowers in 39,000
villages of Bangladesh. The repayment rate is more than 97%.
He things credit
should be a right, not a privilege. By allowing poor people access to credit,
they can build and create things that would otherwise be out of reach. And they
usually succeed, make their lives better, and end up paying the money back too.
Action Hero
Sarah Endline:
She loved candy
and started with that love to make Sweet Riot.
A New Breed of
Entrepreneur
We live in an
amazing time where young people can “make a terrific commercial success, and
then while they were still young, turn their attention to the big problems of
humanity.”
Tells the story
of Small Pox- It is now eradicated. It has killed billions of people- not an
exaggeration. We have managed to stop it and we are just getting started.
Make It
Personal and Make It Work
Tells story of
how she worked for various organizations that were making a change in the
world.
“Help us build a
community. Help us connect the world. Help us make information accessible, that
compelling.”
Entrepreneurship
and Consecration:
Shetobreyon
Principle: In the days of service, all things were founded, in the days of
special privilege, they deteriorated, and in the days of vanity they are
destroyed.
“When you begin
to make service to meet others needs your constant practice, you are beginning
a program that will make you successful in your chosen field, and your needs
will begin automatically to take care of themselves.”
What’s a
Business For?
1. Why are virtue and integrity so vital to an economy?
If we do not
value virtue and integrity in business, then no one would do business with us
over time. We call people like that scam-artists. And they do exist, but most
people only fall for the scam once. It is not a sustainable business model for
any company. We, as a community, value companies who honor certain rules and
regulations. We trust brands and companies and pay more for that trust usually.
In business, being the trustworthy company is a compelling way to keep
customers. Being a company that reaches past their profits and tries to change
the something in their society is even better.
2. “Real
justification” for the existence of businesses?
The purpose of a
business is not to make a profit. It is to make a profit so that the business
can do something more or better. That “something” becomes the real
justification for the business. Just as we eat to live, but when we only live
to eat – it is considered glutenous and gross. Businesses should be more than
the bottom line for shareholders. Businesses should make profits, just as we
need to eat, but that is not all businesses should be doing.
3. Two solutions
proposed by Handy that I agree with and why?
A. He proposed that
companies can make money by serving the poor through improved technologies that
make things cheaper. Like offering ice cream in India for just two cents a
portion because the business rethought the technology of refrigeration. With
advances in technology, it becomes cheaper to do marvelous things.
B. Handy proposed
that we make businesses into communities whose members have individual needs as
well as individual skills and talents. They are not robots. If we treat
employees likes monks who forsake all else, then we are robbing our workforce
of their humanity, and possibly their lives. If all the employees do is work,
then they don’t develop connections with others, they don’t marry, have
children, and our next generation is gone. Maybe that seems an
overexaggeration, but it is not crazy. I remember reading about a company in
Oregon that tried an experiment. The CEO decided to not give himself a raise
when profits hit an all-time high, but gave every employee a raise in the
company instead. Six months later, half his workforce had a child on the way or
was getting married. The money led to a growing of their families and that is
how businesses should affect community. For growth and better lives, not
shareholder profits.
Comments
Post a Comment