Category: The Spiritual

I recently read an article giving advice on how to deal with this election with your children. It’s a great article. Then it dawned on me that most of us are being child like in our treatment of the election. The candidates are acting like children. I guess we shouldn’t expect to be any better. I am angry about the choice we have for President in November. I’m a Republican and my party rejected men with high moral standards and went with an egotistical, no class reality star. My Democratic friends couldn’t find anyone better than Hillary, who wouldn’t know the truth if it bit her and who believes that a child has no rights and can be murdered until the moment of birth and that I should have to pay for it.  I realize that those are my issues and don’t project then on everyone else. It’s my anger and that’s what it’s based on. Maybe I need a perspective reset. Maybe we all do. 1. Fear Not. Most voters aren’t thrilled about their candidate, they are “afraid” of what will happen if the other candidate wins. I’m okay with having no faith in the government, but the […]

  This election will be decided in a handful of states and mine is not one of them. Louisiana Christians in particular would be better off spending the time and energy promoting Jesus as the only solution to what ails us and preparing for the awful situation which will prevail in this country when the election is over. Going to the polls this November will be like going to a Saints game; we should be wearing bags over our heads to avoid being identified. A recent Fox News poll found that 57% of voters say that fear that the other candidate might win is behind their choice. In other words, most voters are voting against someone instead of for someone. It’s not just that we don’t like the opposition. We are actually fearful of what they will do. After the election, we will be more sharply divided than ever. We will have a President that most did not really wanted. More than a third of us will believe the new President isn’t honest or trustworthy. More than half of us will have a negative opinion of our new leader.  Many of us will be in fear of what our government […]

  The sad thing about self-pity is the “self” part.  When we’re down, the cause is usually too much time looking in the mirror. It becomes all about me, my life, my pain, my problems, my situation. The problem with mirrors are that they seem to be accurate, but aren’t. Objects in the mirror are actually closer and uglier than they seem. The point is that we can’t trust the mirror that leads us to self-pity. In the mirror, the problems are never are distorted. They seem bigger, more insurmountable, unsolvable. Mirrors tend to focus our attention on details. We lose sight of the big picture. All we can see is the problem. We can’t see all that is good in our lives when gazing through the problem mirror. Mirrors have narrow focus. If we could just look around a bit we could see that our problems are nothing. We are the man with no shoes, forgetting about the man with no feet. We can’t afford what we want, forgetting about the millions who can’t afford to eat. We are ill in our bodies, forgetting those who are dead in sin. Instead of looking at mirrors, we need to gaze […]

Wouldn’t life be great, abundant even, if we could get in sync with God’s will and His timing? Much of the heresy in the church today arises from false teaching about God’s will and timing. We are told that God wants what’s best for His children. That’s true. He knows what is best; we don’t. What’s worse some believe that we can change His mind about what’s best or when things should happen. Much of our prayer time is spent explaining to God what He needs to do and when He needs to do it. God must smile and shake His head a lot. Abundant life isn’t a comfortable past and a “secure” future. It is the expectant joy in experiencing the surprising opportunities God presents us with each day. Life is exciting and satisfying not when God provides what we order up each day, but we experience what he supplies every day.

I have become irregular in my postings.  I think it’s because I’ve been so irritated. I find I am more easily irritated lately. I realize that there were plenty of obvious irritations recently, the elections, the effects of the flood which never seem to end, the heat, the humidity, the incredibly stupid fall television shows. I am hoping when the election and summer heat is over and the cool of fall and the holidays arrive, everything will be better. I think I may be fooling myself. For example, social media isn’t going to go away with a change in the seasons. I find social media is a great source of irritation: People who think that Hillary will be a swell president. People who think that Trump is great and not just the least offensive alternative. I am so sick of seeing posts that promise that “this changes everything” or “Hillary is done.” or “Trump is toast.” Even when the election is over I’ll have to hear how great and how awful whoever wins is. Social media is populated by people who feel it’s a great idea to tell me to “share” if I love Jesus, support the police, or  hate […]

Generally I have  not been a fan of weddings and funerals. I don’t like getting dressed up. I don’t like pretending to know people. I do enjoy avoiding getting people off the hook by saying who I am and how I am related to the guests of honor. Let ’em guess. I mean generally these events are not about me and so are no big deal. I enjoyed my wedding, the best I can remember. I’ll likely miss my own funeral. I had to attend a wedding and a funeral this weekend and I was determined to make the best of it. With the proper attitude the funeral turned out to be a blessing. I didn’t really know the deceased, but she obviously was a loving person who knew and served the Lord. The event helped me refocus on what’s important: service and family. The length of the race is unknown; got to just keep on running. The wedding turned out to be fun.  It was great to see an old family friend so happy. The service was nice and the food was great. There are truly beautiful women in my family who are a joy and blessing to […]

Watching the news this week, I found myself commenting how terrible it is that some have used a tragic death as an excuse to riot and loot. This got me thinking about excuses and how easy it is to fall back on them. If the Saints or Cajuns or Florida Gators lose on the weekend, I can make that an excuse to have a bad attitude to start the week. When my wife cooks a great meal, the excuse to overeat comes very easily. I felt very justified in getting angry when a woman in front of me in the check out line at Wal-Mart had way too many items to be in the 20 item line. I even counted her items under my breath as she checked out . Turned out she had 19. Our excuses are usually not valid or even factually accurate. There are way too many excuses floating around. A lack of good choices is no reason not to vote. A tough day is no reason to be unkind when we get home. A few bad eggs is no excuse to condemn everyone of the same color, faith, or philosophy. Probably most important of all […]

All of us have times when things aren’t happening. We usually say we are “waiting” for something to happen. Sometimes, we are just covering up our procrastination. Waiting is an honorable thing. We are waiting when we have done everything we can and the next move has to come from someone else. When that someone else is God, we are in a good place. Scripture often proclaims the appropriateness of waiting on the Lord.  When waiting our eyes are on God. Our strength is renewed. Peace reigns. Waiting often means that something has started. Things have been done. There is movement toward a goal. Waiting implies that we know the next thing that needs to happen and we are prepared to act when it does. When we wait we are prepared, ready and faithful that God knows best about timing. Procrastination occurs when the ball is in our court and we search for reasons not to take the next step. It focuses on our lack of preparation, readiness or faith. We doubt that anything is really in process. We consider that maybe we have taken a wrong turn or misinterpreted a word from God.  We spend a lot of time looking […]