Many people often wear masks to keep up appearances just to maintain their relationships – but is this truly the right way to handle them? John Lynch, author of On My Worst Day and The Cure, joins Greg Leith to discuss the beauty of being your truest and most vulnerable self in relationships. As John says in the interview, “What if there was a place so safe that the worst of me could be known, and I could discover that I would be cared for, valued, and loved more in the telling of it, not less. And Convene is daring to risk, they’re doing that”.
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Your True Self With John Lynch
John Lynch, welcome to the show. I’ve been excited about this, actually, all the way home from, strangely enough, Phoenix, where you live. You’re a pastor for 27 years. That’s longer than the average pastor, which I think is about three years in Phoenix. You’re the author of the book. I’m so old that I still call it True Face, but I know it’s now The Cure and On My Worst Day, which is in my copy more underlined than not. You’re a playwright and actor. You have three children, and I’m excited to welcome you to the show.
You’re an old school, my friend. Thank you, man. I’ve been as excited, if not more, than you just to get to hang out with you. You are a good friend of mine.
John Lynch’s Signature Two Roads Talk
We’ve shared a few breakfasts on the beach in California, your old stomping ground. I failed to mention you’re a Talbot seminary grad, and now your elevation just went very high. The minds of all the theologians listening to us. Listen, how many years ago now, 6, 7, 8 years ago, you brought down the house with a standing ovation at a Convene event. I was there. You did your classic signature two roads talk.
One of those times where something’s happening between a speaker and an audience, and everybody knows it. It’s like the movie Shakespeare in Love. They’re doing Romeo and Juliet, and all of a sudden everybody realizes, “Wait, this is something special.” I’ve done the talk, which wasn’t all that impressive, but that was an incredible evening.
I think the Holy Spirit was very present. Everybody tuning in wasn’t there. If you had to say the signature themes of two roads, and maybe if you cast it for us in the vernacular of leadership, we’re at Convene, we’re about leaders, we’re about young leaders, emerging leaders, entrepreneurial leaders, CEOs of multi-million dollar companies, CEOs of companies that are starting up in their home. They’re all leaders, and they’re feeling pressure some days, and Two Roads, I think, speaks to that with hope. Talk about that.
One of the things to talk about is that I’m going to be giving that talk in Ojai at the conference. I am so jacked to do that. I failed to mention I have the Convene t-shirt.
That’s extra credit.
In fact, I wrote this down because it may be more particular to leaders than anyone else. I wrote, “It’s not the pressure that harms us, but this debilitating tension that can sneak into the pressure.” Attention involves fear. Fear that you’re going to be revealed as a failure, and your God says, “You don’t have to carry that tension because I live in you and I can handle you. I’m crazy about you on your worst day. I can handle you.”
That tension has no place to operate. Any remaining pressure just allows me to focus better. That sets up a little bit of the two roads talk in terms of business leaders. At some point after grappling with trying to make sense of this faith and trying to perform for God, hoping that he’ll like me enough that he’ll reward me in some way or not cause harm to me after a long enough time, God finally says, “That’s enough. I want you to face how you’re living this life. I’m going to give you two choices.”
He sets up pleasing God or trusting God, “Is that how you’re going to live this life?” Most of us would probably say, “Trusting God, I don’t know what that means. I don’t even know how to handle that, but pleasing God gives me something to do, especially for an entrepreneur. It’s the least I can do after all he’s done for me.” I play that out, and I walk that path. It takes me to a place of trying so hard to be all that I should be. It sounds right.
I come up to a door that says two words on it, “Self-effort.” We know God did his part. We got to do our part. God helps those who help themselves. I open that door, and it leads me into a particular room where a banner in the back says, “Striving hard to be all God wants me to be.” As I look around the room after a while, everybody’s talking smack. Everybody’s on their game. Everybody’s, but there you can see it’s not authentic.
You can see it’s not real, and you can see nobody trusts each other. If you look closely between the seam on the mask and the face, you can tell there’s great sadness and loneliness, and isolation in the sense that “There’s nobody here that I can trust. Even though I think this is the place I’m supposed to be, one night I slip out the back and I’m back on the road again. I’m devastated because I don’t know what to do now. I don’t know how to live my life if I’m not going to be with that set of people.”
I find myself back out on the road, and I look at that sign that says, “Trusting God.” I’m thinking, “What in the world?” I am so messed up now because I have no idea what that even means. I start walking that path, and I see this banner, this statement that says, “Living out of who God says I am.” “What?” It sounds like one word at a time. Thank you so much. Living out of who God says I am. I keep walking, and there’s a door there too, but instead of two words, there’s just one word.
It’s the word humility. If I could have a definition for humility for us to use, it would be trusting God and others with us. It’s like I have this a-ha moment where I say, “God, I cannot do this anymore. I cannot pull this off. Either you are in me and have the power to make things happen. You’re stronger, you’re better, you’re kinder. You have more power. I’m doing this. I’m just grinding it out, and it’s killing me. Please, God, be big enough to take care of me.”
Humility is about trusting God and others with ourselves. Share on XI opened the door into that room, and it looked like the same place at first glance. I had my mask on, I’d rip it off, and I say, “I’ve got to tell you what. Everybody, listen up. I’m not doing fine. I’ve been doing fine for a long time. I’m a mess. I got so much trash. I got things you don’t know about with temptations. You wouldn’t even want me in your little room if you knew. Thank you very much. I think I’ll leave now.”
I hear this voice in the back of this room that yells out, “Wait, that’s all you got?” “I’ll take your little list, and I’ll call you and raise you five. I got so much stuff.” Anyway, he says to me, “You’re welcome here. It is a place that is messy, uneven, but it is authentic and real. I notice hereafter a while that beautiful work is getting done. Creative work.” I never thought in a room of grace, and that’s what this is.
I never thought in a room of grace that there would be any chance that it would be anything but unicorns and bunnies and really bad fourth quarter reports. To find out, when people are trusted, they live out of that. They feel known, they feel safe, they feel empowered, and they start to trust the people around them. When they get affirmed, they want to do more of what they’ve been affirmed for in the place that affirmed them.
I find this place that is the same in my home as it is in the office, where I can live out this life of taking that tension away and living in the reality that God says, “John, I’m crazy about you on your worst day.” That’s a little bit of a review of what we’ll get up in Ojai, but it’s those choices because in Hebrews 11:6 it says, “Without trust, without faith, it is impossible to please me. You can try all day long to please me, but you’ll never learn to trust, and you’ll never please me enough. If I say God, I’m going to trust you with who you say I am. You say on my worst day, I’m Christ in me.”
“Christ in me, filled with grace. You say that on my worst day. I’m going to believe it. He says, “John, not only are you trusting me, but you’d never pleased me so much in your whole life.” I know that, and I don’t feel behind at home. I don’t feel like I can parent because I’m out of step with my family. I feel the same way at the office. I don’t feel like I have to just lead with my authority and with my role and my title and I don’t have to lead just in that.
I can lead out of my person and the strength of my person and the safety and the ability to bless others and be winnable and to be able to say, “How am I affecting you?” Suddenly, you have this arena around you that is safe and authentic and genuine and highly creative and highly productive. It shocks you. You go, “How can this happen?” That’s life in the business room of grace.
Why Executive Wear Masks Instead Of Being Real
Thank you for that. It reminds me of a meeting I was in one time. Sometimes I like to go first when we’re supposed to introduce ourselves. If I’m the host at Convene, where we have people who are interested in Convene. Of course, they’re all trying to impress us with their resume. If I don’t go first, it usually looks something like this. Jimmy introduces himself and says, “I started this company at a million dollars and it went to a billion, and I have five wonderful kids and a dog and a Dodge Caravan minivan and my lawn is perfect and my children line up when I get home and one has a newspaper and one has a cigar and one has my slippers.
I’m like hunting horn, too.
Are you kidding me right now? Sometimes I like to go first and talk about my real life, where my marriage was hanging by a thread in 1983. Everybody does the me-too thing, where they say, “I have a troubled child,” or “I’m so stressed right now because this is the week that my wife is having her cancer treatment and I’m here.” Why do you think executives feel like they have to perform and pose, and wear the mask instead of being real? If you have a copy with one of those people, what would you say to them?
They’re not alone. You ought to go to a pastor’s conference. You want to see the mask on Titan, how my church has grown. I make the statement, “The more influence we have, the more we’re tempted to hide our true selves, fearing that we’ll lose that influence.” We are afraid that if I ever took off that mask, I would lose my authority. I would lose my strength. I would lose my place. That’s what we’ve been taught.
There are no together people, are there? That took me a long time to learn. I thought there was this gnostic set of really on their game people, and they look like it, but there is none of us. All of us have our stuff. Just some of us have better teeth and sharper-looking clothes. All of us. Sharper looking shoes for sure. That to me is the definer. I love this statement. I think we wrote it back in Bo’s Cafe, maybe.
All of us are awakening to the reality that I cannot control my life the way I thought I could. I’m stuck with unresolved issues whose symptoms I’m trying to fix, and all without the help of anyone else. I don’t even know what the issues are. I’m just trying to fix symptoms so I don’t embarrass myself. I’m doing it all by myself in private. This is why I love Convene.
This next statement that I’m going to make, “I don’t know of any group anywhere who does this better for business people than Convene.” Listen to this. After that last statement, what if there was a place somewhere, not with 200 people, where nobody at the DMV cares what you’re doing? What if there was a place so safe that the worst of me could be known and I would discover that I would be cared for, valued, and loved more in the telling of it, not less.
What if there was such a place? Convene is daring to risk, and they’re all over the country, everywhere. They’re not in Trenton, New Jersey, I don’t think, but other than that, you can go anywhere. They’re doing that. They’re taking that risk, and they’re finding one of the great, terrible things of isolation is that it causes us to make decisions out of circumstance instead of our convictions to have this safe place where the worst of me could be known.
Here’s a mind-blowing statement for me, “All of us were created by God with limitations.” You think, “Why would you do that? If you love me, why would you create me with limitations?” The answer is “So that I would be loved.” If love is the process of meeting needs, then unless I let you, unless I have some people in my world, I don’t get loved. I can get admired, respected, but I don’t get known and loved.
The beautiful thing in a convened group is that suddenly, now there are these people who know my story, and I discover I’m respected more. I’ve enjoyed more. I’m valued more. I’ve listened to more, and I’m standing with more, and it just blows our minds. That’s my plug for this group because it is stunning to watch it happen and to watch the stories of goodness that follow those groups.
Experiencing Real Learning In A Community
Thank you. I was in a city that will remain nameless, and that happened. It happened with a gentleman whom we spent an hour and a half working on his scenario, which was difficult. There were questions that were asked that were very tense and truthful. Unearthing little by little.
You don’t know where this is going to go. You could go south in so many ways.
It’s quite different, quite in my view, better than we’re going to talk about the seventeen leadership principles that will make you a great leader, or the five things if you do by tomorrow, you’ll have a better team, or the three things if you do by Saturday, and everything will be perfect. Sometimes it’s, “I hired this person and they’re not working out and I feel terrible and I have a board meeting tomorrow,’ or “I thought that the program that I was about to do would turn our company around and it didn’t.”
It’s powerful to be in a group of people who care about each other and live together. I like to say real learning happens over time in a community. There’s this guy that we know from a couple of thousand years ago, Jesus, who also believed that because he hung out with twelve people for a long time, three years. He said, “We’re going to eat together, we’re going to fix our sandals together, we’re going to wash each other’s feet, we’re going to do life together.” He’s our model.
I think of something that happened to me. One Sunday, as a preacher who changed how I see. In the middle of a message, coming to this particular community, this church, I said, “How long did it take before you knew that you were safe?” Maybe it’s not a fair question. Maybe you don’t feel safe yet. Maybe you just got here, but just give me a number. I never do this, but I said, “Did it take two years?” I said, “Raise your hand.” Nobody raised their hand. A year and a half, nobody raised their hand. For six months, nobody raised their hand.
Two weeks. Nobody raised their hand. I got down to five or fewer minutes, and everybody that I could see in the room raised their hand. Isn’t that something? There’s something palpable and tangible about when we with someone else commit to each other. It creates something in our office to have a team that is willing to stay and work through hard things. You can sense it, feel it, smell it, just like the community with the twelve with Jesus, as it spread out, they went, “What are you guys? This is legit. This is real.” With Peter and Pentecost, everybody just says, “You guys, what is happening here?” It’s that beautiful wonder that Jesus modeled for.
There is something palpable and tangible when people commit to each other. Share on XWhy Having Worst Days Is Simply Normal
Your book has been republished on your worst day, and that’s an incredible book. What would be on your worst day that would speak to a leader who might be trying to minimize and hide their worst day? You wrote a whole book about it. I was talking to a leader the other day who had a very tough situation with one of the things that was happening in their life.
I’ll make this very oblique. I called them and I said, “How’s it going? I know that this really bad thing happened.” They said, “I haven’t had time to think about it. I haven’t had time to feel anything about it. I’m just compartmentalizing it, sticking it away. I’m hoping it will go away because I have no time to deal with it.” You wrote a whole book about it. The worst day things.
First of all, I wanted to write this book to show that it’s normative to have worst days. I’m not this emotional exception. All of us, just some of us, like you say, we stuff it and hide it away. We cry in commercials, and we just tough it away, and it doesn’t work for us. It eventually breaks. Eventually, in some way implodes. It’s like playing a game of whack-a-mole. You can put one down, sublimate one down, but another comes up. I wanted to show. If we can be vulnerable, authentic, and beautiful, things can happen.
If I hide it away, I get sick. I am sick to the degree of my hiddenness. Isn’t that crazy? How do I create those places, those pockets? I have men, especially, I love having them give their favorite stories On My Worst Day, and then explain why. It peels away layers, and they’re able to get down to places that they maybe have never talked to anyone about before. That’s why I wrote it.
Especially for a business person, it’s important, maybe to hear this, I said, “That you’re going to have worse days simply because you’re on this planet, not because there is necessarily anything wrong with who you are.” That’s a huge get for me. Another is that God makes no mistakes regarding you, ever. He never says, “Oops.” He loves you more than you love yourself.
God makes no mistakes regarding you. He loves You more than you love yourself. Share on XThis incredible thing about redemption, 2 Corinthians 4:16 says, “Every day, every moment, every hour, from the second that thing got broken or hurt or devastated or misplaced or lost or a relationship went away or someone had to be let go, and it was not good and it was ugly. From the moment that happens, God on your behalf goes to work to redeem. There’s never a moment that he sleeps on it. There’s never a moment, whether you feel you’re worthy of it or deserve it, or want it, he doesn’t stop.”
This book, what it does is I have at different points along the way. I show God showed up, God tied this thread together, God healed this. It is powerful to know that that’s happening with me in all my stories, in all my things, so that I don’t lose heart. Also, I wanted to show that you’re right on time. That’s an important statement for me to make. I said that “He cares about me more than I care about me. He thinks about me more every day than there are sands in the seas.”
Maybe this is the biggest get for me is I tried to write the voice of Jesus, of how I imagine. Now that I know who he is and now I know that he loves me so dearly, I tried to imagine what he would say to me in different situations along the way. I realized in those ugly, hard, frightening places where I didn’t know where he was, he says, “I was standing right there with you, experiencing it with you. Nothing did I not go through that you had to go through. I was sometimes standing in the arena when you couldn’t.”
I wanted all those things to come out, especially for us men and women, too. Women really tell me that they relate greatly to the book. I think they do this stereotype. I think they do this more naturally than we are culturally conditioned to do. That’s why I wrote it. I wanted people to be able to enter with their own stories and go, “Wait, here’s this guy who’s telling his worst days. Maybe I can have the safety to talk about, think about what God’s doing on my worst day.
How A Business Executive Should Approach Failures
There was a day for me about 30 years ago when, lost a big chunk of money more than I could afford to lose at the time. I was at the time spending time with Leighton Ford, Billy Graham’s brother-in-law, and his activity that he liked to take people through at the time was to put the Rembrandt picture of the problem in the front of the room in large format. We would have to stare at the picture for 30 minutes.
Thirty minutes is a long time to stare at a picture. Of course, one of the authors who wrote about his experience stared at the picture for a couple of days in the art museum, which is in Russia. Anyway, here’s the father with his hands on the prodigal’s shoulders. The prodigal is bowed down with his bald, shaved head, which is not a good thing in the culture of the day. His shoes that one of which is worn through, his garments are tattered, and the father’s hands are on the son because the son has returned.
Here’s the thing. I had to answer the question. What do you think the father would say to you if you were the prodigal, the guy who lost $40,000 in the stock trade? That was me. Here’s what God would say to me in my mindset of 30 years ago. “I told you not to put all your money in one stock. Didn’t you listen? Didn’t you hear me? Your dad told you not to do that.
Why did you do that? See, I told you this is not good. How are your kids going to go to college now? What are you going to do about fixing this? How are you going to get this back? You are sure disappointing me.” Now, all of what I just said is, of course, wrong. If you could replace my story with any business executive’s story of a mistake, a failure, what would you say to them?
It’s interesting. It’s so good what you’re doing because as a Jesus follower, I have the permission when I hear something that says “You’re not enough, you failed, you’re messed up, you’ll never catch up, you violated this,” I can know for certain that’s never the voice of Jesus. I love that in Matthew 11, it’s the only time when he describes what he’s like. He says, “I am gentle and humble and kind.”
His voice to me, I will always know it because it’s gentle and humble and kind. He would say, “Greg, you didn’t do anything morally wrong, kid. You just were in the wrong place at the wrong time. By the way, I’m back here pulling all the strings, and you don’t know what it’s going to look like yet, but you’re going to have such an incredible life.”
“If I could just show you a few years ahead, this life that I have planned for you and your kids and vacations and the beauty of what you get to do with other executives, that you wouldn’t be able to handle it. I love you so much.” That’s what he would say. I think one of the things that painting does is that it does that magnificent book in. For so long, I think we’ve been trying to love Jesus and love him well.
Jesus says, “Thank you. I really appreciate it. Don’t get me wrong, but would you let me love you? I really appreciate you loving me, but at some point, it’s going to have diminishing returns unless you let me love you. That would just mean allowing me to do what that father did to the son. The son had to let him.”
You will experience diminishing returns until you let God love you. Share on XThat’s magical when we figure that out because all of us, then in our roles, we’re not striving, we’re not performing, we’re not thinking that we’re on a short leash, and it’s all going to get pulled out on us. We’re not thinking all those lies. Instead, I get to know that I am accepted, delighted in, valued, wanted, created before the world began, exactly the way I am, for the exact group of people that God’s going to put me around to get to influence. Isn’t that crazy?
He says, “I wanted there to be a John Lynch on this planet at this time for some people that he can reach that nobody else will.” That’s true with every single one of us. He’s that crazy about us. I can walk into any situation as an executive and say, “I’m enough. I’m not set up for failure.” He’s not going, “I’ll tell you what, I’m going to have to expose you here. I’m on to you.” He never does that. He never plays that game. He’s never going to hit us with a 2 by 4. He’s never that. He says, “I’m kind. I’m gentle. I am humble in heart. You can find rest for your souls.”
Get In Touch With John
John Lynch, I think you are one of the most powerful voices on earth today about grace. You hit it out of the park every time about grace, and the world needs to hear it. I just want to applaud the work that you’re doing and say thank you. I look forward to seeing you in Ohio, California.
I love that you’re getting out to Phoenix these days.
I’m going to come see you even before that, and we’ll have to wear a different color shirt instead of black for our next meeting. Thanks for joining us on the show. We’re very grateful and check out John’s book, On My Worst Day, or his previous book, The Cure and Bo’s Cafe. Thanks for being with us.
What a privilege. Thank you, Greg.
Important Links
- John Lynch
- John Lynch on Facebook
- John Lynch on Instagram
- John Lynch on X
- The Cure
- On My Worst Day
- Bo’s Cafe
