Month: August 2013

Money…A Means Not an End

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Oh boy…here is a topic that seems to stir up an emotion charged response from so many people.  Whether that response is positive or negative the topic of money always comes with extreme human emotion.  So where does God stand when it comes to money?

Money is referenced over 140 times throughout the bible, not including references to other currency, and sin, in general, is the only issue that exceeds money in the number of times mentioned.  I have two verses that resonate with me:

“No one can serve two masters.  Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.  You cannot serve both God and Money.”

                                                                                                                                Matthew 6:24

“For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.  Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many grief’s.”

                                                                                                                                1 Timothy 6:10

As with everything in our lives, it is a choice…..we can choose to focus all of our attention on where we stand financially or we can work on trying to balance our attention.  If we choose to praise God first and trust in him he will provide for us as he knows what we need.  The key to this is he is not looking to fulfill your wants but your needs and not on your time table but in time within his plan for your life.

I have tried the shortcut early in my faith journey…I would say to God, “please bless me with this amount of money and I promise I will do good things with it”.  God knew my heart at that time and knew I wasn’t ready.  In fact, you have heard about lottery winners who have had horrible lives after winning a substantial amount of money in one shot…..that is not God but evil providing those winnings as the evil forces of this world know how easy it is to distract us from looking toward God and will use everything it has to keep us away from God.

If you sit down and really look at your financial situation and look at the needs of your life…shelter, food, water, clothes…and lift it up to God and truly trust in him you will be blessed.  If you are blessed with more than you need than begin to share it.  You were blessed to be a blessing.  If you think you don’t have enough to share start small by buying a coffee or a meal for the car behind you at the drive thru window.  If you need more ideas there is a great blog at http://projectlighttolife.wordpress.com/ that I follow and the author Christine has several amazing ideas about how to be a blessing to others.

In closing, don’t let money control your life…don’t let it be the master of your journey.  Appreciate what you do have and begin to find ways to share with others.  Find ways to put money to work for you and for God by giving and it will come back to you over and over again.

Peace.

Reflect, Restore, Renew

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The following is taken from my Devotional bible and was written by a man named Bob Benson.  I share it because it is an excellent summary regarding the presence of God in our lives.  Also, because Bob Benson who was one of the Christian world’s leading publishing executives and the author of six books, he succumbed to cancer in March of…..1986.  Yet here I am in August of 2013 and his words still provide a blessing to me this day…maybe they will to you to.  Well done Bob Benson…Well done.

When life caves in, you do not need reasons, you need comfort.  You do not need some answers; you need someone.  And Jesus does not come to us with an explanation; he comes to us with his presence.

We are always seeking the reason.  We want to know why.  Like Job, we finally want God to tell us just what is going on….

But God does not reveal his plan, he reveals himself.  He comes to us as warmth when we are cold, fellowship when we are alone, strength when we are weak, peace when we are troubled, courage when we are afraid, songs when we are sad, and bread when we are hungry.

He is with us on our journeys.  He is there when we are home.  He sits with us at our table.  He knows about funerals and weddings and commencements and hospitals and jails and unemployment and labor and laughter and rest and tears.  He knows because he is with us.  He comes to us again and again.

                                                                                                –          Bob Benson

Peace to you today.

Patience and Persistence

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Sometimes we all wish God worked like a drive-thru…quick, cheap and efficient?  We could just pull in and get whatever we needed whenever we needed it.  Those thoughts come directly from the world we live in.  Everything in this world seems focused on the quick, convenient, fast and easy…we want more we want more.

My toughest moments in my faith journey…times when I have felt a letdown or disappointment have occurred because I lacked Patience and Persistence.

Patience – defined as “bearing pain or trials without complaint”; “showing self-control”

Persistence – defined as “to go on resolutely or stubbornly in spite of difficulties”

These are two qualities that are not promoted in our world yet when we focus on them we usually are closer to living God’s plan for our life rather than our own plan.  I have always been a better husband, father, son, brother or friend when I practice patience and persistence.

In my spiritual life I define Patience as waiting for the Lord.  He is always there and he always working his plan in your life even when you think nothing is happening.  Every interaction with another person is an opportunity and a blessing.  When we are patient we can smile and make eye contact with the grocery store or convenience store clerk.  When passing by someone we know we can say “Hi” with a smile instead of “Hey, How you doing?” as we speed past not waiting for a response because we didn’t really want to know how they were doing at that moment.  When we are patient as a friend we really listen to what our friend is saying and not thinking about what we are going to say next in conversation.  When we are patient we will be willing to sacrifice some of our own wants and needs to help others.

Persistence can be defined as never giving up of God.  Things will not go the way you want or just the way you planned but maybe you ran ahead of God and it wasn’t time for you to get that job or start that adventure.  Maybe he knows you have some more trials coming ahead.  It is not punishment, that is not how God works.  He has a plan for how he wants you to use the gifts he gave you and he knows the events you are going to encounter in life.  Your job is to learn from trials and pray about them and listen for God to respond.  For example, if you need the courage to ask someone for forgiveness or you need to forgive someone for something…pray about it daily and be watchful for that opportunity to be forgiven or to forgive…it will come.  Just be persistent about your prayer.

In closing, one of my favorite Bible verses speaks to these qualities it is this:

“I am confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.  Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord”

                                                                                                                     Psalm 27:13-14

Peace.

Look At the People God Uses

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While I was thinking about starting to write this blog, I often thought, “What could I have to offer?” or “Why would God want me to speak about him to others?”  This kind of thinking is exactly what the Evil in the world wants us to believe.  Then I read about people in the Bible or I read what authors like Max Lucado, Charles Swindoll or Rick Warren and Billy Graham have to say about the people God uses and I begin to realize this is exactly what God wants me to do.

As we learn about faith and God’s love for each and every person in the world through life experiences and through the experiences others have written about, it turns out we all have something to offer the world.  We all have our own life.  We all have had an experience or heard about someone’s experience that was horrific and then it became extraordinary.  It all depends on your perspective.

From the Bible we have the stories of…

Noah

Abraham

Moses

David

Joseph

Plus many more….

All of these people had suffered through some tragedy of sin and had extraordinary things occur afterward because of God’s love and God’s grace.  Through some of my own life experiences that I have mentioned in earlier posts I have learned to ask, “What does God want me to learn?” or “How does God want me to use this experience to help others?”  Rather than asking “Why is God doing this to me?”

God doesn’t “do” sinful things to us…the human race has created and brought about sin all by ourselves.  It was our choice.  God knew we aren’t strong enough to overcome sin so he did the one thing he could…he sent us his Son.  The human race killed him…so God resurrected him to save us all.

So if you are wondering “What do I have to offer anyone?” try asking God and be patient for his answer….he created you, he knows the gifts he gave you.  You could start by reflecting on events in your life and this time when you think about them ask yourself, “What did God want me to learn from that experience?”  Remember he is about love, grace, mercy and forgiveness.

Peace.

We All Have A Choice

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We All Have A Choice

Which way to go?  What is the right path?  What if this or that happens?  Maybe I should wait to decide?  Life is full of choices each and every day.  From many experiences in my life I am beginning to learn to ask different questions like…What is God up to in my life?  or  How does God want to use me today?

I usually run into trouble when I start thinking too much about a decision on my own and I have been a slow learner when it comes to “consult God first and leave it in his hands”.  What I have found is life decisions seem to be easier when I look to God first and ask for wisdom and guidance regarding a situation rather than try to process every “If then” and “What if” I can think of on my own.

I can’t stop thinking about what the apostle Paul said in 2 Corinthians 12:10 “That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties.  For when I am weak, than I am strong”.

To me that says when I rely on God first, when I surrender to his will and not my own, that is when I can be at my best in this world.

In life it all comes down to this….we all have a choice on how we are going to live our lives…are we going to consult the Creator?  The one who made us, who loves us no matter what?  Or are we going to continue to stumble along the path of the fallen world and live writhing in sin without regard for what God intended for us?  (Been there done that)

We all have been given the same thing…..life and some amount of time to live it…what we choose to do with it is up to us.

May God’s peace be with you.

Living In The Present

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Living in the Present.  What does that mean?  I think it begins with making sure you are “present” in whatever you are doing.

To me, being “present” means focused attention.  The world is filled with distractions and when we choose to allow those distractions to take our attention away from everything else by trying to change the past or worrying too much about the future we end up missing what is right in front of us…..the beauty of creation, a child smiling and laughing or a child who needs help, a friend who encourages us or a stranger who we should pray for.  We should stop replaying what happened yesterday or what might occur tomorrow in our minds and live today to the fullest.

So how do we get there?

Answer….The Word of God.

I have struggled for many years concerned about what I should have said in a previous conversation or worrying about how I would handle things in a future interaction.  I would beat myself up for not doing something or worry constantly about what was to come…..as if I really was the one in control of such things. 

Then during a difficult time in our life financially, about 3-4 years ago, I was really down about the way things were going and when I thought they were just about to drop off a cliff completely…we were saved by the Grace of God.  My wife and I had completed all the paperwork to file for bankruptcy and left it with a lawyer…..we thought this was our only option…we thought we might lose our home we really didn’t know how things would turn out…meanwhile I had been looking for work.  One promising position was progressing well and they needed to complete the background check……if that report showed a bankruptcy I would not get the job….a few days had passed since we left the attorney’s office.  I figured I would call the lawyer to see if by chance he had not yet filed the papers, I figured there was no chance….and then God stepped in…..I called and asked “have you filed our papers with the court?”, he responded… “No not yet”……..oh my goodness, I couldn’t believe it.  I immediately put a stop to the process and I got the job and we have been working our way to the best financial position we have ever been in.  After that phone call and seeing the grace of God in our life, I decided I needed to start dedicating some time every morning to devotions and the Bible…..my reasoning, if I have time to read the newspaper I better have time to spend with God every day.

This was something I needed to commit to priority wise so I bought a Billy Graham devotional book and put it with my devotional bible I received from my parents 16 years prior and I began reading and praying for a few minutes every day I could.  This time has become something I look forward to each day…it sets my mind and thoughts up with an encouraging perspective, mindful of how God wants us to think and act and the more I stay focused on that the more peace and contentment I find in life.

For me, the hardest part and the biggest obstacle in becoming a man of faith has been ME!  Once I confess to God that I am only human, I am a sinner and I trust him because as it says in the gospel of John 3:16….For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.  After reading so many different parts of the Bible about God’s grace, God’s love and God’s mercy I am so thankful for all that he has done for me that I have to do my best to live for Him.

Peace.

Music, Faith and Focus

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One of the most important tools I use to keep my faith top of mind most often is music.  Faith based music provides an encouraging and uplifting way to focus on the messages of faith.  As I have stated in earlier posts, around Christmas of 1998 I was looking for something different on the radio and I came across a Christian radio station that was playing faith based Christmas music.  It was during the Christmas season that year that I began a transformation.

I didn’t know it at that time but God was definitely beginning to chisel away the old me who was only concerned with where I was working, how much money I was making, what others could do to help me, etc.  I was like many people focused more on self and less on God.  It is so easy to do…..the world we live in constantly encourages us to only be concerned about me, myself and I.  Even after Christmas I continued to listen to this station.  I had thoughts like “what would this person think if they knew what I was listening to?”  As I enjoyed the hymns on the radio in the car to and from work I heard artists like Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith, Steven Curtis Chapman and BeBe and CeCe Winans.  They sang songs with messages from the Bible.  Some top songs from that time were:

Angels – by Amy Grant

The Throne – by Michael W. Smith

More To This Life – by Steven Curtis Chapman

Heaven – BeBe and CeCe Winans

I really began to enjoy hearing these messages every day.  I have continued to listen to the same station everywhere I can for the last 15 years.  I always have it on in my office, in my car and at home (whenever the kids don’t have the radio control).  The kids know many Christian songs and call the station Dad’s radio station.  At some point, I don’t know when, my wife started listening daily.  The impact this constant reminder has had in my life and in the life of my family is immeasurable.

The enemy uses so many resources in this world to distract us from God and God’s plan for our lives through other music, TV, movies and news that we all need something to bring us back to God.  I was just thinking at church recently ‘I remember when I would only spend about an hour a week focusing on God in worship’…..I imagine my life would be very different today if I was still only giving God about an hour a week.  That means I would be spending way too much time worrying about things I can’t control, working too much trying to climb the corporate ladder, feeling rejected and dejected when things didn’t go my way.

Hearing the messages of faith through Christian music every day for me has been an essential way to stay focused on what really matters…..how I treat others and how I can serve God in our community.  I encourage you to find your source of inspiration to stay focused on God each day.  It will probably be trying something new but give it a shot and see what God has planned for you.

Peace to you.