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(Sort-of-random thoughts at 30,000 feet with a lot of free time on my hands…)
It takes minutes to make paper fly; to build something capable of carrying you long distances takes months, and a lot of helpful, smart people. The same is true with your important dreams – and your character.
You were created with the language of Forever in your heart, and nothing else will satisfy.
“I will” spoken with resolve has power, but your resolve will be tested and the limits of your willpower will be exposed.
You were not born with the wisdom and capacity to wait, but wisdom and reward waits for those who learn to.
God created the world for you, not you for the world – but He does hold you accountable for leaving it better than you found it.
A thousand opportunities dance before those whose eyes are open to see them. Ten thousand chances pass by those too lost in fear or consuming to notice them.
Summers are God’s way of showing that you don’t have to be in a classroom to learn.
I just saw a man express his gratitude by giving up his first class seat to a woman… who happened to be wearing a United States Army uniform. I wonder how I can say thank-you to somebody today.
I will always respect the one who can wait (there’s that word again) with discipline, but then decisively act with courage.
I’m not so sure that God has a plan for you so much as God has a plan period and invites you to participate joyfully in it… Or bruise yourself on it. [click to continue…]
And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that always having all sufficiency in everything, you may have an abundance for every good deed (2 Corinthians 9:8).
Regardless of the need or the deed that lurks in front of you, the choice that confronts you is a choice of scarcity or of abundance. I thought today it would be a good idea to remind you that whatever God does, He does it abundantly. Even when He’s dealing with you!
Regardless of what you may hear from the Republicans or the Democrats, the courts or the Congress, the economists or the educators, the preachers or the politicians, God is still wonderfully wealthy and lavishly generous. All you have to do to believe that is compare what you have with what you deserve.
God is measureless when it comes to the grace and provision he offers. [click to continue…]
Remember when you wanted that whatever-it-was from Santa Claus? Or your employer? Or your spouse or parents or educators or whoever… only to get it and be disappointed?
Remember when you thought, “If I could just make this amount of money, I would be content?” And you did… and you weren’t?
Remember the time you dreamed and dreamed and dreamed some more about a meaningful goal and were disappointed? But it didn’t keep you from dreaming some more?
Remember when you didn’t have your health or didn’t have any money or didn’t have anybody and it was all you could think about? Then when health or wealth or somebody showed up, it only served to point out something else you don’t have – and now all you think about is that?
All these and more are examples of something that stirs us, motivates us, alarms us or moves us in a certain direction, but never quite allows us to rest once we get where we think we’re going.
I’m talking about your Driving Force, and yes, you have one. Maybe more than one. [click to continue…]
(The Twelve Ways of Christmas, Part 8 – The Way of Sharing)
(Note: Last year I started a series of stories titled The Twelve Ways of Christmas. Hopefully this year I will complete it. If you’d like to go back to where it all began, click here.)
K-Mart. It was the one place in Oak Ridge that David Carpenter knew would still be open Christmas Eve as he observed his years-of-time-honored tradition of last-minute shopping. Having made his way down every single aisle (also an annual ritual) and tossing in unique stocking stuffers, David now stood waiting his turn in the checkout line.
Behind him, Maria Martinez laughed with her brother Aaron as the two of them had gathered some last-minute items themselves. Aaron had a handful of stocking stuffers for his two boys; Maria was delighted that her niece, Sophie, would be joining the large family celebration. She was also excited that her new job as a lab technician had finally enabled her to be as generous with her gifts as she’d always been with her 22-year-old heart. Both were oblivious to the nicely-dressed man who waited and watched in front of them.
David watched as the random assortment of items passed across the scanner. The monotone beep of the cash register intruded on the sound of Brenda Lee singing “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” on the in-store sound system. Lightly touching the end of his items, a pretty red plaid little girl’s dress with a white turtleneck shirt glided across the conveyer belt. With one part of his mind, David could see where this was headed. With another, he was lost in thought as he gazed that the tag that read in bold letters, 4-T. [click to continue…]
Have a dream? A vision of what could be, if only…? Do you have a vision of something greater to come, which you passionately long for? This past Saturday night, on what was as much a holiday weekend in Thailand as it was in the U.S., a visionary, passionate Christian leader taught me a priceless lesson about how God brings vision to reality. Here’s how I described it, straight out of my journal.
Saturday night Dui and his wife Gift invited us to join them for what he called a home Bible study. Pastor Preecha and Nit joined us as well. When the van came to pick us up, it was already loaded with an army of others – Dui’s father and stepmother, brother and sister-in-law, and a couple of kids. As we made our way, we stopped at a roadside chicken roaster’s stand, where a woman had five cooked chickens on a rotissarie. Gift picked the best looking one, the middle one, and the lady whacked it off and gave it to her. That, Dui said, was going to be our dinner. [click to continue…]
by Andy Wood on June 19, 2009
in Allocating Your Resources,Consumers,Enlarging Your Capacity,Five LV Laws,Insight,Life Currency,Love,LV Alter-egos,LV Cycle,LV Stories,Money,Principle of Increase,Principle of Legacy
Things got a little weird that day at the Taco Bell in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. A customer tried to pass two 1928 five-dollar bills as cash to pay for his meal. The clerks had never seen such old money before, presumed it to be counterfeit, and called the police. Here’s the sad part – as currency, the cash was legit. As collectors’ items, they had to be worth way more than a bean burrito combo or a chalupa.
What a waste, right? Right up there with Esau, selling his birthright for a bowl of peas. Or the prodigal son, wasting his inheritance on a never-ending party.
But another part of my brain wants to defend our fast food shopper. After all, maybe he was hungry, and that was the only cash he had. Maybe he had no idea what he had! I’ve learned that if you don’t know the value of what you possess, it really doesn’t matter to you what you waste it on. Esau and the prodigal learned that, too – the hard way.
Anyway, what’s so different about the taco king? [click to continue…]
by Andy Wood on April 17, 2009
in Allocating Your Resources,Consumers,Enlarging Your Capacity,Executing Your Plan,Exploring the Possibilities,Five LV Laws,Following Your Passion,Gamblers,Hoarders,Life Currency,Love,LV Alter-egos,LV Cycle,Money,Pleasers,Principle of Abundance,Protecting Your Investment,Waiting
This week a friend sent me a poignant and compelling image that describes what it’s like to live in a climate or with a spirit of fear. But the image is so strong, I think it describes anybody who feels as though they are in a no-win situation.
I feel like a grasshopper on the ocean hanging onto a leaf. I cling to the leaf to keep from drowning. If I eat the leaf to keep from starving, I lose my life preserver, and drown.
I’ll tell you later what he learned in the process. But can you relate? [click to continue…]
In the previous post I talked about the principle of planting abundantly. Today I want to tell you about somebody who did it.
I married an MK. That’s “missionary’s kid,” in case you’re uninitiated. It was enough of a culture shock to marry a Texan, but to say “I do” to somebody who could have repeated her vows in Thai if she wanted was really special. For 26 years I have heard the stories, met most of the major players, and lived vicariously through the memories, the loves, and the laughter of a family whose lives are invested to this day in Jesus’ mandate to take the gospel to the world.
All of that came calling the day after Christmas 2004. To this day Robin refers to the event as if it were a proper name – an evil killer who has somehow become an unwanted part of the family.
His name: Tsunami. [click to continue…]
by Andy Wood on December 10, 2008
in Ability,Enlarging Your Capacity,Five LV Laws,Hoarders,Insight,Life Currency,LV Alter-egos,LV Cycle,Money,Principle of Abundance
Why do you have the resources, abilities, relationships and intelligence that you do? Why do you lack the brain, the pain, the financial gain that others have?
It all comes back to the Trust.
What you “have” isn’t yours any more than what somebody else “has” is theirs. It all – even your life – belongs to God. He purchased it completely with the death and resurrection of His Son. But He has entrusted the management decisions to you. Incidentally, the primary management decision you must make is what you will do with the death and resurrection of His Son!
Jesus’ story of the talents illustrates the point. (You can read my paraphrase/summary here.) Each of the servants received part of the master’s possessions to manage for him while he was away. That represents your life and all it entails. [click to continue…]
(A Turning Point Story)
Glavine
It was something out of a Looney Toons episode. The kind of thing you’ve heard about happening, never assumed would happen to you.
It happened to me.
I had gone away on a far journey and entrusted all my worldly goods to my wife and three kids, telling them we’d settle accounts when I got home.
Well, not exactly.
September 13, 2001 – Do the calendar math. It was a surreal and vulnerable time. I was actually out of town on a consulting trip, when I got a call fairly early in the morning. My twin daughters were calling, breathless with excitement. Somebody had gotten the bright idea to leave a cardboard box in front of our house with two kittens inside.
“Daddy, can we keep ‘em, pleeze? We’ll take care of them, and feed them, and clean up after them. We promise.”
I wanted to kill them. [click to continue…]
(Sort-of-random thoughts at 30,000 feet with a lot of free time on my hands…)
