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Lord, what are mortals, that you notice them;
mere mortals, that you pay attention to us?
We are like a puff of wind;
our days are like a passing shadow (Psalm 144:3-4).
As this shadow passes across another year, what’s obvious on the playground becomes clearer in life: the further away from that initial push, the shorter the passes are.
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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…]
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One of Friday's Lovely Moments -Cohen's first haircut, and I got to BE the front-row seat.
Nobody has to convince you that life is busy and blazes by at the speed of, well, life. Expressions like, “Where did all the time go?” are the stuff of every-day conversation.
Sometimes that can feel painfully lonely as we emerge from the grindstone and wonder where everybody went.
Sometimes that can feel out of control as we are swept away by the rhythm and melody of somebody else’s music.
And yet…
And yet…
Even in the craziness, the busyness, and the where’d-it-all-go, life has a way of presenting what Roger Breland calls a Lovely Moment – those experiences where even if for a brief pause, life seems to come up for air and fill your heart.
Sometimes the Lovely Moment arrives in the form of a long-anticipated event, like your wedding day, graduation, or the birth of a child or grandchild.
Sometimes the Lovely Moment comes as a complete surprise, when suddenly you realize how full your heart is because of a special memory, a future conversation played out in your mind, the joyful news of a friend, or a reminder somehow that you’re being thought of.
The Lovely Moment can be an elusive thing, but only because we’re too busy, too wounded, too stressed, or too blinded to open our eyes and see them. The truth is, Lovely Moments are in abundant supply… [click to continue…]
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(Time Leadership, Part 2)
What kept Jesus on the cross?
That’s been the subject of many a sermon or song. And the answer is always the same, ranging somewhere between the ugliness of our sin and the beauty of His love.
You know He could have come down, don’t you? When He was mocked and taunted, Jesus could have called a legion of angels and put an end to the whole shebang.
But He didn’t. So what kept Him there?
Hint: the answer to the question is not, “love.” [click to continue…]
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In the course of this short year so far, I have been reminded suddenly, and sometimes rudely, how short life can be, and how there are no guarantees of the things or people we tend to take for granted in this world.
I have also been reminded that life is filled with the potential to make mistakes. Sometimes those mistakes arise out of misguided values. Sometimes out of boneheaded stubbornness. Sometimes mistakes arise out of good things taken too far in self-serving directions. Often those mistakes come when we lose our sense of balance.
I’ve thought a lot lately about how short life is, and frankly, sometimes how much shorter that I wish it could be. Hillsong United’s “Soon” sure sounds appealing: [click to continue…]
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Watching TV for the last 70 years has given us a steady stream of midwestern news reporters, California actors, a Motown pop culture, and other invasions of Yankee influence. Of course, we Southerners have made a few inroads of our own; I don’t think we can fool many northerners into thinking that grits grows on trees any more.
Bottom line is, our nation is slowly losing its regionalism. By and large, that’s O.K. Oh, you can still tell generally where a person hails from by hearing them talk. But sadly, some of our most picturesque phrases and words have all but disappeared. Not long ago I actually heard a young mother at the hospital asking her daughter if she could “tote” her food tray. [click to continue…]
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For Scotty Thomas, Christmas was cruel. What other word can you use to describe living in a house where Dad enforced a hard-nosed rule: Christmas presents were for Christmas day?
“But can’t I open just ONE?” Scotty would ask.
“No,” his dad would say, smiling.
“I think I know what this one is,” Scotty would say, shaking a wrapped present under the tree.
“Think all you want,” Dad would reply. “You may be right. You may be wrong.” Inevitably for Scotty, it was a little of both.
Like any good 8-year-old, Scotty also had razor-sharp radar for any kid who seemed to get a better deal. Jeremy Walker got to open the give from his sister a day early. Jeff Dunaway opened family gifts the weekend before Christmas day. But Scotty’s appeals landed on stone.
As Scotty grew older and wiser (age 10 now), he became more sophisticated in his approach. If he couldn’t win by appeal, he would conquer by steal. Scotty set out on a mission to find hidden “treasures.”
Snooping through his dad’s workshop and in the attic, Scotty hit the mother lode a full 10 days before Christmas. A new bicycle, video games, a skateboard, some table games, a basketball, a couple of posters for his room, a wristwatch… this was going to be an amazing Christmas.
It turned into the worst 10 days of Scotty’s young life. [click to continue…]
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“So much of our time is spent in preparation, so much in routine, and so much in retrospect, that the amount of each person’s genius is confined to a very few hours.” -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Whatever happened to Green Stamps? They’re an indelible memory of my childhood. In case you missed it, the Sperry & Hutchinson Company, began offering stamps to retailers back in 1896. Grocery stores, gas stations and the like bought the stamps from S&H and gave them as bonuses with every purchase, based on the amount you bought. In their heyday, 80 percent of U.S. households collected some kind of stamp.
My sister and I grew up licking green stamps and pasting them in books. When the A&P bag began filling up with completed books, we started getting excited. We’d peer at the two pages of toys in the S&H catalogue, surrounded by page after page of sheets, clocks, toasters, and other boring things. (Truth be told, you could get virtually anything with stamps; a school in Erie, Pennsylvania, exchanged 5.4 million stamps for two gorillas for the local zoo.)
Anyway, when we had collected enough to make the trade, we’d go off to the Redemption Center. Technically, we’d already “bought” the stuff. We were presenting evidence of our purchase (the stamps) in order to redeem – to buy back – our merchandise.
This is not about Green Stamps, but about redeeming. About buying back something that already belongs to you – namely your opportunities and your time. [click to continue…]
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It was a typical piece of junk mail – the next great offer, the last of the big bargains, real savings on my long distance, or something like that. Just before it sailed off into File-13 history, something at the bottom of the page caught my eye. It said: “Four things that you can never get back… the spoken word… your past life… wasted time… and neglected opportunity.”
Never has something so close to oblivion been so profound. So much of our lives are like the ebb and flow of the tides. So much comes and goes, only to come back again. But there are those other parts of our lives that are like a shooting star – they don’t come back. Other things may come that look similar, but that’s only a matter of appearance. Fact is, there are four things you can never get back. [click to continue…]
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Here’s a little exercise we actually take worship service time to practice occasionally. Follow the instructions carefully (yes, I mean I want you to actually do this):
“No.”
Repeat this exercise regularly, just for practice, and as needed in live game situations.
Not, “No because…”
Not, “Maybe later…”
Not, “Let me pray about it…”
Certainly not, “See if you can find somebody else, and if you can’t, I’ll see what I can do.”
Learning to graciously, kindly refuse is one of eight steps to building or rebuilding margin in your life. Margin has to do with creating gaps – cushions of time, money, energy, or spiritual strength that act as living shock absorbers for those who have them.
Imagine how it could revolutionize your attitude, relationships, productivity, and health if the next time somebody says, “Got a minute?” you actually do! [click to continue…]
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