Article from "Great Leaders Lead Like Jesus" December issue.

Our article for this month is a reminder that God is more interested in who we are and are becoming than what we do. At this busy time of the year, it's always good to reflect on being rather than doing.

Lead Like Jesus believes that anytime, anyone influences the thoughts, actions or behaviors of another that they are engaging in leadership. So as a parent or a CEO, a coach or a doctor, YOU are a leader. Whether as a life role or organizational leader, approaching each new day as a series of things to do can be a nasty habit. We are not only tempted to start working on the list we went to bed with but to quickly include the new onslaught of E-mail, voice mails, faxes, etc. that may have accumulated during the night or to be quickly derailed by the ever necessary tasks of home, family and volunteer responsibilities. It is easy to surrender our sense of self-worth to the score card of our never ending to-do lists.

Wrapping a little pre-emptive prayer around our own pre-determined personal agendas may seem as prudent as re-charging the cell phone overnight. But, it may have little to do with making the day any more significant or satisfying.

No matter how urgent or high-purposed your to-do list may seem, when the price paid for it's completion is a gradual loss of a sense of being and meaning separate from performance, you have made a bad choice. Remember, Satan would love for you to buy into his philosophy that your self-worth is equal to your performance plus the opinion of others.

A partial antidote to the "I am my to-do list" syndrome, is to develop your Daily To-Be List before you finalize your To-Do List. The thought that we were created as Human Beings not Human Doings reminds us that God loves us and relates to us on the being not the doing level.

If He did it the other way round, we would never have any confidence that we have done enough or done the right stuff to relax in His company. We also might end up adding a few things to our to-do list to feed our own ego's and appetites that weren't on God's agenda in the first place.

Here is a plan for developing a Daily To-Be List that will help you sort out the priorities of the day during a time when the pressure of To-Do became overwhelming. There is great peace and confidence in the process because of God's grace that He always provides.

Here are a few starters for your To-Be List:

• Be still and know that I am God (Psalm 46:10)

• Be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to anger (James 1:19)

• Be holy because I am holy (I Peter1:16 )

• Be joyful always, pray continually give thanks continually in all circumstances(1 Thessalonians 5:17)

• Be at peace with one another (Mark 9:50 )

• Be transformed by the renewing of your mind (Romans 12:2)