Book of the Month - June 2023
Master of One
Jordan Raynor - ISBN: 978-0-7852-6664-8 - 2021
Author:
Jordan Raynor
Jordan Raynor is a leading voice of the faith and work movement.
Through his bestselling books (The Creator in You, Redeeming Your Time, Master of One, and Called to Create), the Mere Christians podcast, and his weekly devotionals, Jordan has helped millions of Christians in every country on earth connect the gospel to their work.
In addition to his writing, Jordan serves as the Executive Chairman of Threshold 360, a venture-backed tech startup that Jordan previously ran as CEO following a string of successful ventures of his own.
Jordan has twice been selected as a Google Fellow and served in The White House under President George W. Bush. A sixth-generation Floridian, Jordan lives in Tampa with his wife and their three young daughters. The Raynors are proud members of The Church at Odessa.
Taken from Jordan Raynor's Website
Brief Synopsis:
What is your one thing? The entrepreneur thought leader, and best-selling author of Called to Create offers a refreshing invitation: stop trying to do it all so you can thrive in your unique, God-given work.
Imagine how different your life would be if you spent your time doing the very thing that brings you the greatest joy. It’s possible, but most people spend their days making incremental advances on numerous tasks, competent at many things but exceptional at none. That’s because for too long we’ve believed the lie that more activity, more jobs, and more responsibility equals greater effectiveness. In short, we are becoming a society of “jacks-and-jills-of-all-trades and masters of none.”
But what if you could shift your focus from too many things to one?
In this thought-provoking book, you’ll discover the exponential power of pursuing a singular craft. Through practical principles, Jordan Raynor provides straightforward steps for finding and thriving in your calling. He also highlights more than a dozen real-life examples of high-impact individuals who have chosen to focus on and excel in their unique gifting, including:
• Chronicles of Narnia author C. S. Lewis
• Enron whistle-blower Sherron Watkins
• TV legend Mister Rogers
• Dallas Mavericks CEO Cynthia Marshall
• Reality TV star Chip Gaines
• NFL Hall of Fame coach Tony Dungy
• Biblical figures, a teacher, a pilot, a banker, and world-class entrepreneurs
Too many of us are overwhelmed, overcommitted, and overstressed. This book offers a better way—the path to becoming a master of one!
Insights:
“In other words, we glorify God when we imitate his character of excellence and in doing so “proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (I Peter 2:9, ESV).” - pg 29
“Clearly, the advice of making our happiness the primary aim of our work isn’t working. For the Christian, this shouldn’t come as a surprise. Why? Because this advice is out of line with Jesus’s example to serve rather than be served.” - pg 18 -19
“As we have seen in the first part of this book, the purpose of mastery in our work is not to accumulate fame and fortune for ourselves or to subsidize our lifestyle. It’s not even primarily a means to earn credibility and power or to share the gospel. The most fundamental purpose of mastery is the same as our purpose in life: to glorify God and love and serve others as ourselves.” - pg 52
Should I read it or skip it?
First, I have mixed feelings about this book. On one hand, I struggle with the concept. Having been encouraged to be a generalist, I struggle with the concept of specialists and the success they seem to have. However, specialists are successful. They achieve and some achieve greatly. However, I don’t think Mr. Raynor is saying to be a specialist at the cost of being good at skills.
Second, for most of my career, I worked under the assumption that in a church, you have to just get good at a lot of things but not really great at one thing. I felt like the senior or lead pastor needed to be good at a lot of things. So for senior or management leadership, I would need to sacrifice one skill for many skills. I was also told I was only good enough to work at churches of a certain size and would not be able to work at larger churches because my skill set was not specialized or “excellent” enough.
When I finished reading it, I knew my children would need to read this book. Their generation currently reaps the fruit of the participation trophy and they sometimes get paralyzed. I felt Mr. Raynor’s process would give them a step-by-step growth process to move forward when they get stuck.
So with all that said, I think this book is a good read for anyone but I am studying it with a small group of young adults (19-29).
