I'm Glad You Said That: The importance of the rightly spoken word.

Remember trying to solve a mystery or a riddle?  We look around desperately for a clue.  Some hint that will help things become clear. You shake the wrapped present, listening to get an idea of what’s inside. Someone whispers a clue and the light dawns and we’re grateful. We’re glad for what they said.

You were faced with a problem and then someone said something that unlocked your mind to see a way forward.  We say with profound gratitude, “I’m so glad you said that.”

Or we see a lingering injustice, a situation that’s out of kilter and finally someone stands up and says something so that correction can happen.  We say “I’m so glad you said that.”

We’re unaware that our headlight is out or that our inspection sticker has expired or that our tire is low on air and someone says something and problems are prevented and we say, “I’m so glad you said that.”

Proverbs 25:11-12 expresses the feeling of joy and appreciation of hearing the helpful hint, the valuable clue, the appropriate warning.
:11 Like apples of gold in settings of silver is a word spoken in right circumstances.
:12 Like an earring of gold and an ornament of fine gold is a wise reprover to a listening ear.  

We often need someone to say something helpful. Life can be a mysterious riddle, we need all the clues and hints we can find.

For centuries, Jesus followers have found valuable clues and hints in the Scriptures. The Word opens the door of our understanding to the grace of God, the value of love, the evil of my sin, and so much more.

Read the Word. Listen to it taught. Go on a Sunday to a place where it is the center of attention. Position yourself to receive beautiful, helpful, true words.

You'll find hints and clues to help you think better and understand more deeply.

You’ll find yourself thinking, “I’m so glad someone said that.”

Simple Thoughts On Prayer - Part 1

There are those who believe in God but are unsure about how what to say in prayer.  These few thoughts in this blog and the next are for you. This is simply a description of how I pray in the hope that sharing my practice will help you get started.

These are things I ask for every day, knowing I need God’s help with them every day.

I am sharply aware of my limitations, imperfections, and inadequacies so there is a sense of urgency to all of them.

You’ll see that in much of this I’m doing the alliteration thing. I didn’t set out to do that it.  It just developed that way.  I like it because it helps me remember what I need/want to ask for.

First - God, I’m Yours.

It seems right to start the day with a prayer affirming my complete availability and submission to God as well as asking for His power for kindness, love, and strength for service. It helps me be in the right place as I recognize the rightful place of God.  If you want an "e" to keep the theme going, you might declare that you want to "Empty" yourself of you.

Second - Engineer The Day. 

I ask God to engineer my day. He is the Master Designer of all things  I trust He knows what is ahead. I trust He is wiser than me on the use of each minute. I trust that He can arrange the events, provide the guidance, and steer me through each task. As a teenager, I encountered Proverbs 3:5-6, this prayer for God to divinely engineer my day comes from these words, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your path straight.”

Third - Empower Me

 I pray daily for God to empower me. The New Testament (John 15:5, Galatians 5:22) makes it clear that for there to be any of the character of Jesus in me, it will require a work of God’s Spirit. And, it’s not automatic. So I ask, “Holy Spirit empower me,” acknowledging what I know to be true, that there’s nothing in me that can produce the fruit of virtues such as love, kindness, and so on. My worldview starts with a belief that there is a God, who really does interact with people, and who can supernaturally work in them.

I would caution you against thinking that asking for God-empowered character eliminates the need to make efforts in that direction. That would be, in my view, unbiblical. I ask for a kind heart AND I strive to be kind. God works in me AND I engage in every effort in the same direction.

(To Be Continued.)

I'm Certainly Not Taking The Blame!

I blame Christmas. Or maybe it was the candy makers who shall remain unnamed. They made the sweet, chocolatey delights. They put the peanut clusters right there! Right in front of me where I had to walk by them.  And those things with the peanut butter in the middle and the chocolate on the outside. WHAT WAS I SUPPOSED TO DO?? They basically forced me to consume them. And then what happened? I saw a number on the scale that I didn't like. It's their fault. No question. Wait....maybe the scale's broken? I hadn't thought of that.   

One thing's for certain:  I'm not taking the blame. The number I saw and what I may or not see in the reflection (I admit nothing) is their fault.  

Them. They. Him. Her. Isn't that how it goes? It's always someone else's fault. 

This is what we do, isn't it? We look for someone to blame.

Looking for someone to blame is a bad, unproductive, no-good  habit of the mind. And it's all too common.  

Two things about this blaming business:

First, it guarantees we won't fix the real problem. We won't look for how we contributed to the outcome. We won't evaluate our role, and we'll never see where we can make some changes.

Second, it often pushes someone away and raises the tension in the room.  Telling someone “it’s all your fault” only puts them on the defensive or triggers their sense of shame. No one wants or needs that. Here's what never happens:  You blame someone for what happened and have them respond with a genuine "Thanks for pointing that out. I take full responsibility, and I'm better for knowing that I did it." 

There is a thinking shift needed. Break the habit of instantly looking for someone to blame. Recognize the truth: When things go a bit sideways, we all contributed. Be honest about your part of making the mess.  Sharing your contribution first, will help get a conversation off to a good start. Then you can attack the problem, not the other person/people involved.  

Remember the words of I John 1:8 - "If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us." You build credibility when, with authenticity, you own your part of the problem. The path to progress always passes through honesty with your self about what really happened.

I need to wrap this up now. There's still Christmas candy in the kitchen that someone has to tend to.  

The wound of rejection or the gift of acceptance?

Rejection hurts.  We’ve all had a taste of it.  Or more.   Maybe from the group that didn’t want you or the parent that left you or the spouse that walked away.  Rejection wounds us and leaves us shaky and fragile and scared.

The New Testament tells us stories of rejected people who were shockingly accepted and intentionally loved by Jesus.  Read about a tax collector/thief/traitor in Luke 19.  See the story about a woman from a minority with a questionable past in John 4.  Or the story of the woman caught in adultery John 8.  In each case, Jesus did the unusual.  He pushed past the surface barriers to connect and offer kindness and hope.

You have a choice today.   You can wound others deeply by ignoring, avoiding, criticizing, rejecting.  Or you can offer the gift of making someone feel accepted and seen and cared for. 

“But, but, but....if you knew them you’d know they are bad people who do bad things.”  Possibly true.  However, there’s a difference between condoning or endorsing behavior and accepting/loving people.  Re-read the stories.  Jesus never once endorsed misbehavior.  In fact, part of his gift to them was to point them in better directions. 

“But, but, but....I’m not Jesus.”   True.  But then there’s this: “But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did”   I John 2:5-6

So look past the differences and the issues today and find someone to move toward in love and acceptance.

The Ten Minutes That Matter

You have a public life. It’s the part everybody sees. There aren’t many who don’t give at least some thought to how they appear to others. That’s why my most frequent fashion question is, “Does this look ok?” I’m not even sure what “ok” is all the time but a certain part of me fears not getting there. It’s not just clothing, it’s the impression you make: calm, cool, and sophisticated, that’s the ticket. Or competent. Or deep. Or spiritually strong. Sometimes you want people to think you care. Sometimes you want them to think you just don’t care because you are that confident and together. But whatever the goal, we can all give a lot of time and attention to carefully crafting an image.

Many have a professional life. That’s where you perform for a paycheck. You tell someone, “I’ll get the job done.” Every day you go out there and put your effort, skill, and energy toward fulfilling a promise and getting a reward in return.

You have a personal life. You interact with family and friends. You have conversations and go to Dairy Queen and take walks together.

And, we all have a private life. Our private life is hidden from everybody else.  But here’s the thing, who you really are is determined by what you do in your private life. It’s alone, in a private place that you think through your values and decide what matters. It’s in the private moments that you connect with God, confess, repent, surrender, and settle the matter of who’s in charge in your life that day. You don’t build your character while you’re in public, at work, or with your family. If it’s going to happen, it happens when you are there in your private world, through feeding on the Word and the wisdom of others.

Everything about your public, professional, and personal life depends on what happens in the hidden, secret, solitary minutes of the day. The strength of a building doesn’t depend on the flooring or the paint or the pictures on the wall. What matters are the solid timbers and steel beams and the foundation that are hidden from sight.

So, are you giving time and attention to your private life?  Maybe tomorrow take ten minutes to set some priorities, remind yourself of the kind of person you want to be, read some Scripture, and tell God you need Him. All of that will show up in the rest of your day in a very good way.

Do Something Good Today

I love this description of Jesus from the book of Acts in the New Testament:

Acts 10:38 how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.

He went around doing good.

Is there better advice for how to live life? Here are a few thoughts on doing good.

1. Do something good today because that is what you were made for. The New Testament doesn't teach that you are by your good works but you were most definitely saved FOR good works. You don’t have the capacity to do every good thing...but you were made to do some good things. In the area of your strengths and gifts and capabilities, do some good things tomorrow.

2. Do something good today because you doing good will please your Father in heaven.  Jesus made it clear, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven." (Matthew 7:21) It's the "doing" that shows the reality of inner, genuine saving faith.

3. Do something good because the good things you do are the building blocks of a better world. It is true, we reap what we sow. Do good and good will come from it.

4. Do something good today and don’t let the devil keep you on the sidelines. Evil will whisper in your ear, "Who are you to try?  You're a nobody and your efforts will be wasted." Ignore that nonsense.

5. Do something good today and don’t listen to your excuses. “It’s not my job.”  “I”m too busy.”  “I’m too old.”  “I’m too young.”  “I don’t know how.” Ignore this nonsense too. Refuse to listen to your excuses.

6. Do something good today and don’t let past failures stop you. You may think the mistakes you’ve made in the past disqualify you from doing good today. If only people without past failures were eligible to do good then good things would never be done. Samson and Peter and Paul and many others...did their best work after they’d made serious mistakes.

7. Do something good today even if it seems like it's too small to matter.   Only God gets to decide what’s big and what’s little when it comes to doing good. I suspect the widow who did a small good thing in giving her mite to the Temple treasury is glad she didn’t think that act too small to count. I imagine that the boy with his lunch of fish and loaves is glad he was willing to do a small thing as well. You may have a sense of exactly what you could do and yet you hesitate because it seems so meaningless. Do the good things that are in your path regardless of how small they may seem.

8. Do something good even if it involves a task that seems too big for you.  If God puts the big job in your path, find the first small thing you can do towards tackling the big job and get after it. Every big job gets done because someone makes up their mind to start it.

9.  Do something good today because your family needs it. Family is responsibile to take care of family. Today there is some good thing that needs to be done for a family member. You can turn a few spare minutes into a chance to bless and help your spouse or a  child or a parent. You can warm their hearts and create the kind of family spirit that we all want in our homes. It may just be that someone else in the family is watching and the next generation may end up doing even more good things because of what they learned from you.

10. Do something good today for the glory of God and the love of others. Don’t get caught up in the need for applause or affirmation.

11. Do something good today because you need it. There is nothing that will bring you greater joy than doing good for others. The secret to self-esteem is to forget about yourself and do good for others. The more you focus on others doing good for you, the more miserable and unhappy you’ll be. You will never be more satisfied and fulfilled and happy in life then when you are doing good for others. Today, for your own sake, do something good and you just will find yourself at the end of the day, maybe a bit tired but able to look back with joy and gratitude on a day full of good things done.

Four Words. Four Prayers.

Listened to Annie Lamott (my new favorite) this morning.   (See her talk here.) .   She said there are only three prayers.  “Help.”   “Thanks.”   “Wow.”   There is some truth there.   I'll add one more.  "Sorry."

Help
I think we honor God when every day we ask Him for help with everything.   Our asking shows that we really believe He’s that powerful and that kind-hearted.  Our asking shows that we really understand how much we need help.  When we ask for help we exalt Him and we walk in an appropriate humility.

Here’s a great bit of instruction about asking for help all the time in everything from Paul’s letter to the Philippians:

  6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
                Philippians 4:6-7

Thanks
Everything is a gift.  Every new day.  Every bit of sleep.   Every old friend and every new friend.  Every good thing.  And even the tough things are a gift to help us trust and grow and change.

Wow
God does amazing things doesn’t He?    When we trust Him across the years He guides us to places we could have never gotten to on our own and looking back we say, “wow.”   When we let His Spirit and his Word shape us, we become better people than we would have ever become on our own and we say “wow.”  We look at the intricate complexity of this world and the more we see how remarkable it is, we can only say “wow.”

Sorry
Sometimes we will fail.   Everyone reading this has pride issues and selfishness issues.  At times, fear drives all of us to anger and worry and other bad places.   That’s when we can just say, “sorry.”   And we can know that I John 1:9 is true, “If we confess our sin, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”


Four words. Four prayers for all of us to pray.