Excellent thought

This is from www.TheHappyGuy.com. I get his email every day with an inspiration quote or a nice little insight. Today's was especially great.

FUTURE

"What is the value of the future to our well-being?

The future is the repository of everything we do. All our good acts. All our bad acts. All our mistakes. All our triumphs.

In the near future, we and those we are close to will reap the rewards of whatever seeds we sow today. Those "rewards" might include heavy fines or even jail. They might include windfalls of money or lasting friendships. They might include awards or shelter in a storm or a safe haven from a war.

In the farther future, the children of our children and of those we love will benefit from a hospitable climate or suffer from an inhospitable climate. From a world without war or a world without peace. From a world of technological wonder or a world of social decay.

What we do today -- the big things, the little things, the things we think don't matter -- is vital to the future. In fact, the future is God's way of saying that what you do matters."


Our actions have a ripple effect through time in the lives of the people close to us. They will be either ripples of love or ripples of despair.

In the words of the Knight in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: Choose wisely.

Dale

Resilience

This was a talk McManus gave about building resilience in context of the parable of the prodigal son. Really good stuff here.

(Conversational English, so not grammatically correct.)

“There’s something really sick inside of us -- that the more we have the less we seem to be able to enjoy it. The more we have the less grateful we are. Now here we have a child of privilege, of entitlement, and he couldn’t see what a good life he had. So he walks away from his father and steals, essentially, everything that would have been his in the most beautiful of ways. I think we’re like that with God. I think a lot of times, we don’t really want a relationship with God, we just want whatever stuff might be available from Him to us. I mean, how else can you explain so much of our ‘religious’ conversation? Our prayers are all about what God needs to do for us, and if He doesn’t do it, we become embittered against God. And yet so little of our energy is spent on trying to know God for who He is. And, ironically, if God isn’t just some kind of cosmic energy, but He really is a God who can be described as ‘Father’, as Someone who cares about us and longs for a relationship with us, then maybe there’s more to who God is than simply what He can do for us. And a part of developing resilience is being able to see beauty even in the ugliest moments of life. And a part of spiritual health and vitality is to be able to live life where you see things that bring awe and wonder and astonishment and pleasure and enjoyment.”


McManus has a great way of unwrapping the Word with quirky and amazing points of view. Digging me some God through Erwin!

Dale

What is your gift to the world?

Listening to more McManus podcasts and ran across this gem ..

2 Corinthians 9:6-11

Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. Each man should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work. As it is written:
"He has scattered abroad his gifts to the poor; his righteousness endures forever." Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God.

(Again, conversational English, so not grammatically correct.)

“What Paul is telling us is that we are to be conduits of God’s generous spirit and this goes so FAR BEYOND our material possessions – there is stuff inside of you that if you don’t nurture and take stewardship of and unleash -- there are things in this world that will never get done because they were YOURS TO DO.

Years ago, when my son Aaron was maybe 10 or 12 or so, I had a conversation with him, I said, “I need some counsel”. Ever since Aaron could talk, I brought him into my counseling situations and always asked him for advice. You know parents give so much advice but take so little, so I wanted my kids to feel like it was a flow of communication and insights and input. So he was used to giving me counsel all the time. (Now they give it to me unsolicited, but ..)

I said, ‘Buddy, I have this situation. There’s this family; they have several kids, they are very poor, they are very hungry and the children are starving and their home is cold and they have no heat. And they have a relative who is extremely affluent, has millions of dollars, but he won’t bother to go to the bank and make a withdrawal and help them. What should I do?’

I mean, he was incensed. He said, ‘Dad, that person is wicked!’ I love that 10 year old righteous indignation! ‘That person is wicked! You need to go and rebuke them!’

I said, ‘Buddy, you are that man.’

It got very quiet. I borrowed the teaching technique from the prophet who talked to David.

‘What do you mean?’

‘You are that man. You have all those resources left untouched.’

See, I had a dilemma. I had a kid who was testing at the age of 10 at the college level in everything and I couldn’t get him to perform academically in school. And I realized that he had a treasure inside of him placed by God that only he had the lock and key – only he had the capacity to reach inside of himself and pull that out.

And, by the way, that’s you. And me. Because all of us are created in the image and likeness of God. There is talent and gifting and intelligence and passion and creativity inside of you, and it’s not there just for you to have a toy box to play with. It is the resource of God to all humanity, and when you begin to live at your optimal level – when you allow God through His presence in your life to unleash your creative spirit, you become a gift to the world.”

What gift will the world receive from God through you?

Great insight from my boy Erwin ..

Dale

Been listening to the Mosaic poscast

I have about 14 months worth of Mosaic podcasts that I've downloaded but never listened to. Busy with work, phone calls -- life. I recently started listening to them, and haven't stopped for about three days. Every free minute I listen. GREAT messages. I'd forgotten how much I love McManus, and, in a way, how much I love Jesus.

Here's a great quote, and the reason I've posted this message (the context is Jonah & apathy -- remember this is a podcast and spoken, so this is conversational English and not grammatically correct):

I wonder how many of us are living in the belly of a whale. We are just letting life happen to us because we've given up on MAKING life happen. We are just letting the future come at us because we've given up on creating the future. See, you were designed by God to lean to into the future -- to BECOME -- to be an agent of CREATING the future. But when you give up on the future, you give up on life -- you just move into apathy and you lose your passion.

See, sometimes a part of the painful process is that we discover that the things we are passionate about we're not talented for. You ever had that discovery? I know we're not supposed to say that -- whatever you are passionate about you're supposed to be able to have the talent to do -- but that's just not true. See there are some things that you will be passionate about -- that you'll just love, just wish you could do -- but you were just not given the talent to do it -- just like me.

You know what that passion is supposed to do? It's not supposed to misdirect us on a false destiny, it's supposed to give us an appreciation for the gifting and talents of others. So you just say, "Wow, I could never do that!" And you're supposed to CELEBRATE that someone else is uniquely gifted and created to be able to do that -- that's how we can learn to enjoy each other! See, not everything you are passionate about you're going to be talented for, and so sometimes you're supposed to say, "I'm passionate, and that means I'm supposed to appreciate and enjoy it."

And then there are other things you are actually talented for but not passionate about. And some of you are trapped in that life. You were in 2nd grade and you were great at math. And so your Mom and Dad said, "You're going to be an engineer." You thought an engineer was the guy who drove a train! So you said, "Toot! Yeah! I'd love that!" You didn't know it meant you were going to be an "engineer".

And now you are one. And you are miserable. I talk to people all the time, successful people -- engineers, architects, lawyers, doctors, business people who hate their life and they are GREAT at it!

Not great at hating it. Ahh, actually they're pretty good at that too.

I wonder if you are here, and you are living the composite of all your parents and all your peers and all the people who spoke into your life what they saw for you and you were talented at it so your talents affirmed THEIR decision for your life, but you're passions have never affirmed it.

And so you are working in an office, and you're looking at a computer and you are great at your job, but you just wish you could teach 8 year old third graders and watch their lives develop and their minds unlock. "But, well, that's just not practical."

Or maybe you just moved into a 'slush fund' job -- "I really didn't know what to do, so I decided to do this." And so you go become a teacher, because "they need them." You have no interest or passion investing in people's lives.

And your students? They'll never appreciate geography again because of your contribution to their life.

But, you know, it's a job. It's a job, right?

And, maybe you need to look at your life and wonder and examine if you've moved to the Dark Side of Destiny where you've moved into Apathy and you've accepted your life because you haven't taken charge of it in that sense.


Good stuff! McManus rocks.

Dale