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.

Mission Trip Day 8 – The Challenge Is To Take It With You

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This is our last night together.  Our group has bonded very well this week.  We have laughed together, sang songs of worship, served the homeless in shelters and out on the street directly.  We have cried together, shared stories of our encounters with people in need.  We have been silly together and have genuinely been shown kindness from several people along the way.

When you make a commitment to step away from your daily grind and focus only on where you are and what you can do to help others it gives you an opportunity to learn so much about yourself and what gifts God has given to you.  This Mission trip experience is unique and wonderful and the best way to honor what we have done together is to make the next commitment to use what we have learned in our home community.

This is one of the biggest challenges of faith and one of the many reasons I started this blog in the first place.

The youth in our church are so amazing.  They are so much better than me and my friends were at that age.  They are kind, generous, enthusiastic and totally filled with the Holy Spirit.  I am so impressed with their ability to step up to challenges of faith.  I hope we all take this time together and truly change the way we live our lives when we return.  It is too easy to slip back into our old habits and fill our schedules with busy time and forget we need to leave time for the Holy Spirit to work in our lives.

Heavenly Father, I pray that you lift up this week we have had together as a reminder to us that we need to continue what you have shown us.  I ask that you give us the courage to make a change in how we live our lives.  Lord, thank you for the blessings you have placed in us and around us, please guide us to the next challenge of our faith and strengthen us to do your will…I pray all of this in Jesus name, Amen.

Mission Trip Day 7 – Meet A Need

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If you read about or see people working in ministry in some way and wonder “what can I do?”…there are several different types of organizations all over the world that work to help others.  Every city has multiple organizations that work towards helping the hungry or homeless or those with addictions or tutoring for students, etc.  The key to figuring out what to do is ask God to help you identify or guide you to the gifts/talents he has blessed you with.

We can never forget that God created each and everyone of us with certian gifts and if we are paying attention we can learn what those gifts are and use them to help others in some way.  Even if you have never done anything before or you think “well I don’t have anything to offer.” It is just not true because God did provide you gifts to use in this world that will help others and the only way to know exactly what those are is to try new things and see how they fit who you are.

So go ahead…think about the things you enjoying doing and look for an organization that needs volunteers in that speciality.

The most important lessoned I have learned this week is this…..I have been blessed by God and all he needs me to do is go out and try to Meet A Need in our world based on the gifts he gave me!

How great is our God?!

Mission Trip Day 6 – ‘I’ Can Only Help One But ‘We’ Can Help Many

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As we have continued serving this week we have been exploring several themes and bible verses related to our work.  Today I find myself thinking about Luke 10 verse 2 in my original MT post that states…

“He told them, the harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.  Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”

When an individual works to help another that is good and both the giver and the receiver feel good about things.  When more than one person gets involved in helping others the increase in value is exponential.   The world can be a difficult place and many people have to get involved in serving others in order for long term or sustainable change to occur.  This is not to say that one to one ministry is not good it is good and often needed but in order to move from charity which is good and helpful for the short term to justice which is investing in long term change many “workers” are needed.

I know we have made a difference in the lives of many people both directly and indirectly and I hope and pray that we can bring this momentum back to our home city and find a way to invest in long term help for people in our community…after all that is exactly what our Heavenly Father has asked us to do.

Peace.
  

Mission Trip Day 5 – Open The Eyes of Our Hearts Lord

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We all spend so much time in our daily life worrying about this and that or scurrying here and there.  All the while the single greatest command God gave is “Love one another”…..I spent time tonight experiencing an Immersion into the city with three incredible youth from our church.  The assignment…we were given $8 and a mass transit pass total for the four of us to eat and get around a specific neighborhood.  We were to find dinner somehow some way and as we walked through the neighborhood we were encouraged to talk with people to learn about the city.  Tonight we didn’t necessarily “follow” the path suggested for us and because of that the holy spirit was able to guide us and lead us to a woman I will call Mary.

We encountered Mary sitting on a camp chair on the sidewalk in the middle of an affluent neighborhood…..we stopped and talked to her about the city and how things have changed in her life.   She told us she has been homeless since the war ended, which war we don’t know.  She explained how she had been beaten by people in order to steal her things and her food.  She told us about her friends in the neighborhood and she even told us what areas of the city to avoid for our safety!  Imagine a woman who has been living on the streets and suffering worried about our safety.  We should all consider being so generous.  The youth had decided that we should find some food and share our meal with Mary.  Again, we had $8 to buy our meal.  The only place we found was a drug store and for a total of $6.91 we bought a package of buns, a packet of deli turkey meat, a 2-liter bottle of ginger ale (Mary’s request) and a large bag of chips.  We returned to Mary.  The four of us each had a bun with some turkey on it and everything else, including more buns and turkey we gave to Mary.  We asked her if she would pray with us and she agreed and provided the names of others we should include in our prayer.   Eventually we needed to be returning from our assignment so we said goodbye to Mary and began the journey back.

Through our entire time with Mary the one thing I can’t get out of my mind is the reactions and facial expressions of the hundreds of people passing by while we spent our time chatting and eating with Mary.  So many of them looked so surprised or shocked and how sad is that…..it makes me realize we all need to do a better job of opening the eyes of our hearts to the people in our world that need our help, myself included.  We can’t help them all but our little group spent a wonderful evening talking and sharing a meal with a woman that the world around her has no idea even exists.  Help us Lord, help us see the Mary’s of our broken world.

Peace.

Mission Trip Day 4 – Your Actions Do Make a Difference

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Today we spent our morning time being present with the kids at the homeless shelter.  They were so happy to see us and we are really developing a connection with them.  They were very engaged with the games we played and the songs we sang.  Each day you see more and more of their generous hearts that they have been guarding so often in their lives.  I look forward to continuing to lift them up to the Lord and tell them how truly special they really are to the world.

In the afternoon we helped to distribute food at a food pantry for individuals with food insecurities.  This same facility also serves a hot meal to the homeless once a week as well.  As people passed by choosing from available items you saw how grateful they were to be receiving help and even towards the end when certain foods were gone and there were more people in line…..we didn’t have enough for everybody, my heart was breaking.  So we offered them all we had left at our part of the food pantry…..extra plastic grocery bags.  The amazing thing is…..they were glad to at least get that to keep things in later tonight or tomorrow or the next day.

The lesson I’m taking with me from today is this…do whatever you can, for whoever can, whenever you can, wherever you are…because whatever you can do it will be something someone else needs and never forget your actions DO make a difference in this world.

Peace to you.

Mission Trip Day 3 – There is Hope

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Today we met some kids we will be spending the week with in the mornings.  As we spend time with them daily, trying our best to be a light to those who may be living in a dark world.  They thrive on our positivity they glow when we sing songs with them and they get very excited when we work on crafts together.  We are there just to be with them and that is a ok with them.

Then we spent the afternoon at a “transformation” center.  This is a facility that provides food and shelter to those that have suffered to the point of losing everything.  It takes care of there daily needs and helps them learn skills in order to get their feet on the ground and begin a new life.  That is a place I see as truly making a difference in the community.  God is truly blessing those who work to create this type of change for someone who has suffered.  I pray for all the people we met today that they will feel God present in there life through the actions of others.

There is Hope……

Mission Trip Day 1&2 – We Are All Children of God

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No matter what your circumstances are God knows you and loves you…

It doesn’t matter where you live…it doesn’t matter whether you can buy whatever you want or if you don’t know where your next meal is coming from…it doesn’t matter if your house has all kinds of cool gadgets or you are looking for a place to lay your head…..what matters is this:

“Rejoice in the Lord always.  I will say it again: Rejoice!  Let your gentleness be evident to all.  The Lord is near.  Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.  And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
                                                                                     Phillipians 4:4-7

If we turn to our Lord and Savior first and stop trying to live up to some human invented standard for life we will find peace.  Do it now take one thing in life that is a concern or trouble or painful and give it to God…he knows your pain and he wants to help.

Peace.

Leaving For a Mission Trip Today

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I am heading out with a few other adults and 20 or so senior high youth from our church today to go and serve others in need.  We are hitting the road driving to a city much larger than our own but it could be any city, including our own, that has people in need.  Our bible verses surrounding us for this trip come from Luke 10:1-12…

“After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go.  He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.  Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.  Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. Do not take a purse or bag or sandals and do not greet anyone on the road.  When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house’.  If a man of peace is there, your peace will rest on him; if not, it will return to you.  Stay in that house, eating and drinking whatever they give you, for the worker deserves his wages.  Do not move around from house to house.  When you enter a town and are welcomed, eat what is set before you.  Heal the sick that are there and tell them, ‘The kingdom of God is near you.’  But when you enter a town and are not welcomed, go into its streets and say, ‘Even the dust of your town that sticks to our feet we wipe off against you.  Yet be sure of this: The kingdom of God is near.  I tell you it will be more bearable on that day for Sodom than for that town.”

I have come to understand that the only way we can grow in our spiritual life is to try new things and challenge ourselves regarding faith.  There was a time in my life that a mission trip was the last thing on my mind and yet that probably means God was the last thing on my mind as well.  I am glad that times have changed…

I pray for our group on the trip that we can all grow in faith and grow closer to God and that all people we encounter will see the love of God through our actions.

I will post as often as I can as we go to share my thoughts and reflections…Peace to you.