Month: March 2013

I am not a Catholic, but I understand that it’s important who the Pope is.  From the little that I have read, it seems that the conclave picked a good man. By all accounts, he is a very simple man, with great humility, love for the poor, and experience in leading the church in a country known for it’s corruption. In short, Francis seems to be a “good man.” At this point in history, it’s important that the Pope be a good man. More generally, it’s important that all prominent Christians be good men. The church  (the entire church not just the Catholic branch) has an image problem. Many in leadership have had public fallings and others have attempted to cover up instances of human failing. There is a perception that the church is out of touch and not relevant to our times, when, in fact, the church is more necessary to a decent world that at any other time in our history. In times like these it is critically important that when the world sees the church, they see Jesus. It begins with having “good men” in positions of leadership. It goes much further than that. Many don’t […]

I am convinced that it’s not the “big” sins that do us in, that hinder our mission and stall our spiritual growth. It is, rather, the common ordinary sins which become  habit that we need to focus on.  It might be helpful to consider what “sin” is. We don’t talk about it very much these days. I like the definition that says it’s “missing the mark.” I also like to think of it as anything that hinders our relationship with God and with each other or that negatively affects our mission.  The reason the little sins are so potent is that we can come to believe that they aren’t sin at all. Spend an evening watching network television, forget the “premium channels” and look for sin as defined above. I guarantee that if you pointed out to most folks that these activities are “sin” you would be greeted with blank stares. The “little things” we do that “miss the mark” waste our time and misdirect our focus and, in the end, ruin us. On a long journey it just takes being off course a single degree to insure the we never reach our intended destination. Spend today categorizing all […]

Someone posted this on Facebook last night. These are some pretty good guidelines, at least when you first read them. After further prayer and thought, they need a little work.  In case you are having trouble reading them here they are with my afterthoughts in bold: 1. Make PEACE with your PAST so it doesn’t spoil your present. Your past does not define your future – your actions and beliefs do. I would add if your past is forgiven by God it should be forgotten by you.  2. What others THINK of  you is none of your business. It’s how much you value yourself and how important you think you are. I would add that it’s really that fact that God values your that makes life worth living.  3. Time HEALS almost everything give time, time. Pain will be less hurting. Scars makes us who we are, they explain our life and why we are the way we are. They challenge us and force us to be stronger. This is true only if we have the Holy Spirit working within changing, challenging and empowering.  4. No one is the reason for your own HAPPINESS, except you yourself. Waste no […]

March is both my favorite and least favorite month of the year.  I enjoy it because of the college basketball madness that leads up to and includes the NCAA tournament. I enjoy basketball and there’s lots of it this month as Conference Tournaments begin and finally the “Big Dance” itself. For some teams it’s a nail biter as whether they are “in” or “out.” For others its a fight for the best seeding. There is always some Cinderella that makes an unexpected run in March.  When in doubt, I pull for the underdog. It’s fun to see the unexpected prevail and the “big guys” take a fall. On the other hand in the middle of March is my birthday. That stopped being a fun thing a long time ago. When we are young, birthdays are exciting. They signal the opening of exciting new chapters in life. Now I can go to school. Now I can date. Now I can drive. These chapters also signal new responsibilities but the young tend to focus more on the exciting possibilities and less on the new responsibilities.  But at some point birthdays turn into a time of evaluation. There is some small excitement […]

I don’t handle disappointment very well. Something I had been looking forward to, just didn’t work out yesterday. It wasn’t a huge deal, but it ruined my day. Other people also had their day messed up, but they seemed to handle it just fine. Maybe that’s a gift of youth. I guess the word, “disappointment” is interesting. It’s a  “dissed” appointment. Something we arrange, just doesn’t work out. As Christians perhaps we should be disappointed less than other folks. After all, we are not in charge of our lives and we don’t have our hands on the steering wheel. At least, we shouldn’t. We should take pleasure in being “surprised by joy.” I wish I could get to the point of waking up every morning and thinking, “Jee I wonder what will happen today.” I’m just not there yet. I wake up and my mind reviews things. What day of the week is it? What work projects need to be attended to today? What family members will I see? Do we need to pick up the grand kids at school? Are we babysitting? If I have things I really don’t want to do or face, I calculate whether I […]

Jesus came to earth as a man, suffered, died and rose again…one time. There are certainly universal aspects to His saving work. However, each of us is saved individually. We have our own unique relationship and experience with God. Although each of our relationships has the common elements: Jesus, sin, repentance, redemption and sanctification, each of us has our own story. While we have sin in common, our sins are different. While for each of us, Jesus is the answer, we reach Him in different ways. We have different struggles, different challenges and we experience victory through Him in different ways.  This is more than just the differences in our cultures and denominations. God is complex beyond our understandings. We each experience just a sliver of His entirety. This is why it is so important for us to be in intimate fellowship with others who are in fellowship with Him. We learn from our direct experience of Him, but we also learn from the experiences of others. The broader our Christian connections, the greater is our experience of God.  Learning how Jesus has impacted the lives of other Christians, expands our understanding of how much more He can mean […]

My military career ended many years ago. However, I can still remember standing in formation with the company commander’s order of “Eyes Forward” ringing in my ears. There were many rules for formation; but the primary one was to keep looking forward, no looking to the side or, heaven forbid, behind you. This is generally great advice for life. We waste too much time and energy looking back or looking at others. As Christians, we know we should keep our “eyes on Jesus.” That’s a difficult rule to execute.  Do you have trouble looking back? Does your past continue to haunt your present? I have used the analogy of the automobile which has a huge windshield through which we look forward and small rear view mirrors for occasional glances backward. If we spend too much time looking in the rear view mirror, we may crash.  I think some people are haunted by their past because they haven’t dealt with it. It’s usually an issue of forgiveness. We all have things in the past we need to forgive. Primarily we need to forgive ourselves. For those sins we have committed we need to confess them to the Lord and RECEIVE […]

I noticed while watching The Bible on Sunday night that God seems to keep His people at a point of dependency.  Of course, we are always dependent on Him. We just don’t always recognize it. It’s the reason a rich man has such a tough walk in the Kingdom of Heaven. He can easily get the idea that his riches can be relied on. The politician can rest on his power. The famous athlete or actor can sit on his fame.  It makes it easy to forget that on Christ we depend. A parent knows that wonderful feeling when a child looks up to him for his safety, food, and peace of mind. He also knows the difficulty when it becomes time to place his dependency elsewhere. As parents, we often fail in that we don’t teach our kids to depend on God. We make them dependent on us or dependent on something else the world seems to offer.  Where are you in your walk? Are things going to well that you are feeling pretty self-reliant? Be careful. He might have to change your circumstances or send a storm into your life to turn you back to Him.  Does […]