A Prayer for this Book

What am I actually hoping will happen with this book?

Of course, I hope people read it.

I hope it gets published. I hope it finds its way into the hands of leaders. I hope it opens doors and reaches farther than I could ever make it reach on my own.

But those are outcomes.

What do I actually want the book to do?

An author friend of mine has written prayers for several of his books. I’ve always loved that idea. Before a book becomes a product to launch, promote, sell, and measure, it can become something you place in God’s hands for a specific purpose.

So I’ve started working on my own prayer for this one...

Father in Heaven,

I pray this book finds leaders at exactly the right moment.

May it challenge leaders to think differently about the people who have been entrusted to them.

May it help leaders become healthier, more intentional, more courageous, and more invested in developing the people around them.

May it give someone language for something they’ve felt but haven’t been able to articulate. May an idea on one page change a conversation they have the next day. And may those small changes compound over time into something much bigger.

May teams become healthier because their leaders are healthier.

May organizations become places where people are known, challenged, developed, and given meaningful opportunities to grow.

May people look back on seasons under great leaders and realize they didn’t just accomplish something worthwhile. They became someone better along the way.

If this book can help create even a little more of that in the world, I’ll be grateful.

And Lord, I pray the writing of this book changes me too. It would be a tragedy to spend all this time writing about healthy leadership while failing to become a healthier myself.

So even as I ask you to use these ideas to form others, I place my own leadership before you.

Show me where I’m getting it wrong.

Keep developing me.

Keep making me more humble, courageous, intentional, and generous with whatever influence I’ve been given.

And above everything else, make the way I lead look more and more like Jesus.

I also pray this book gives someone else the courage to create. Maybe there’s a book in someone who will read mine someday.

Maybe there’s an idea you have deposited into someone’s life and they’ve been afraid to put into words.

May my journey encourage someone else to step out, sit down, and start writing.

May books lead to more books.

Ideas to more ideas.

Courage to more courage.

And may all of it ultimately point beyond ourselves. May it help people see and savor the goodness and beauty of you, our Creator. The Author. The Artist.

In Jesus’ name,

Amen