One of my favorite biblical characters is Nehemiah, because his story reads like a leadership 101 case study. His story picks up as the king’s cupbearer which afforded him both opportunity and proximity to power. He uses his access to convince the king to let him go and help his people rebuild their walls which represented more than just a physical rebuilding. His leadership actually kickstarted a spiritual revival. It was more than being in the right place at the right time, he had a God given purpose and he was determined to see it through to completion.

The problem is, there were a lot of people invested in Nehemiah’s project failing. A population with no physical walls of protection were vulnerable to all kinds of exploitation in those days and Nehemiah’s life’s work would cut into their success. So naturally, he accumulated enemies who made it their sole purpose to distract him from the work. Their thinking was, if we can distract the leader, then the whole project would collapse. They wanted to kill the momentum at it’s source.

What they didn’t expect though was Nehemiah’s response. Each time they would try to lure him away from leading the people in their effort his response was the same. Tell those who are trying to distract me, I am doing a great work, and I cannot come down. That became his rallying cry for a people who were now finally starting to see progress after generations of despair. When they finally completed the project, not only were their walls rebuilt but so was their faith.

This is one of my favorite lessons in leadership because of that one line: I am doing a great work, and I cannot come down. In seasons of my life over the last few decades as a husband and a father I have come back to it as a reminder. When things get difficult in parenting or in my relationships, I remind myself of the work. And then I look around and observe the momentum, I can see how things are coming together. I can’t afford to be distracted, there’s too much progress at stake.

Which brings me to these 2 photos.

Since we became parents we’ve done annual family photos, which means we’ve been doing this for 15 years now. Each year, with each additional child the process becomes a little harder. Yet, we still do it. Who knows how long it’ll last (probably as long as the girls cooperate). But what I do know is that I love doing family photos. I know, it’s kind of strange. But here’s why:

Notice how Samantha and our family photographer are trying to get the girls to pull it together. All anyone wanted to do that day was play and joke around. (Protip: we actually encourage the playfulness, especially for a longer shoot. Sometimes I play music to get a vibe going.) But in this case we were trying to get them to cooperate and well, their playfulness had become a distraction.

Sometimes the distractions come from within, sometimes it’s external. Either way, your job is to recognize it for what it is: designed to pull you away from your purpose. Stay focused, you’ve got a job to do.

This is what it looks like when it all comes together though. All the hard work and dedication can ultimately produce moments like these. Every year I like to take few “behind the scenes” shots of the photo shoot in process just as a reminder of all that went into it. These photos are reminders for me that we are doing a great work, building a legacy in real time. And I can’t come down.

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