Monday's cartoon

I wonder why I never learned this in Sunday School?

End of the year regrets...

I was thinking this morning about how quickly this year has gone. In less than a month most of us will be making the traditional "New Year's resolutions." Even the most jaded of us will turn over a new leaf and promise to do better this year...even though we all know we won't keep these resolutions for more than a few weeks.

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Let's start a new tradition. It will be much easier to do and much more fun. No guilt involved, really, because there's nothing we can do now to fix what we have already done. Let's start something new called "END OF THE YEAR REGRETS." I think this could really catch on. It will start this way, "In this last year I wish I would have....." Here's where we can be really honest and probably do more good for ourselves looking back with regret than looking ahead with intent.

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Let me get this started with my own short list to begin. I invite you to contribute your own list as well.

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In this last year I wish I would have....

....prayed more

....taken more walks with no destination in mind

....slowed down and enjoyed the day

....slept in once in a while

....read more books

....been a better planner

....lost weight....I think I will always be working on this one

....written more personal notes to people I care about

....spent more time with the grandkids

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Ok, there's a start with a very quick list from me. As I think about this for my life I realize this might actually do me more good than making promises I won't keep in the new year ahead.....maybe this might actually work....

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Faith and compromise

As I read Daniel 3 this morning I came to one of the classic stories of God's amazing deliverance of his people. It's a story that is taught in Sunday school because it clearly shows both God's great power to deliver and three men's trust in him whether he delivers them or not.

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As I think about Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego it strikes me that what we don't see in their lives are the little decisions that led to this big one. None of us are strong enough for this kind of test if we haven't already battled and won a dozen smaller challenges to our faith. For these three men this was a life and death test of their faith and it was a test I'm sure they had prepared for by many smaller tests over time. If they had compromised their faith for the easy way in the past they would have done so when faced with the furnace of fire, but what we see are three men resolute and willing to die rather than compromise. What we see is the final exam. What we don't see are the hundred small tests they had already taken to prepare for this day.

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It's those small, seemingly insignificant tests of faith that prepare us for the bigger ones ahead. If we are willing to compromise now in the small things we won't be ready to stand if the test demanded a life or death decision. Faith is built one test at a time and so is compromise. This story of these men and their bold test of faith has lived on for more than 2,600 years because of their trust in God and his amazing deliverance. What you don't read about are the many other Jews in Babylon at this same time who had already bowed their knee to the king's demands. They have disappeared with the millions forgotten who stood for nothing and so were remembered for nothing.

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Our tests will probably not be this severe. I doubt any of us will face the furnace for our faith, but we might. What you need to know about this story is what you can't read in the text...a big "risk it all" faith is built on a hundred little decisions of faith over compromise. At the time these small decisions might seem uneventful choices, but they are choices that build our faith or weaken it. Trust God in the little things and you'll be ready for the big things. When you have seen God faithful with the small things your testimony and faith will stand when the fiery furnace is warmed for your welcome. Faith is built when no one is watching and revealed when everyone will see it.

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I look forward to asking these men about their experience and the fear they must have felt as they chose to obey God rather than man. Their faith, built over many small choices, prepared them to handle the test that might cost them their lives. Their example has given us a wonderful story of faith and trust to guide us when our faith is tested.

Saturday's cartoon

Yes, it's a silly cartoon, but it's about coffee so I had to post it. Although it makes me wonder...will there be coffee in heaven? Will we have some of the blessings and treats we enjoy here or will heaven be so beyond our thoughts and expectations that none of this will matter?

What am I thinking? Of course there will be coffee there...

Divine detours

"The best things that have happened to me in life were those things that I didn't plan" -Hank Cooper, a PhD and the "Starwars Defense Initiative" architect in the Reagan Administration.

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"In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps." Proverbs 16:9

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I'm reading through the book of Acts right now and traveling with Paul as he evangelizes the Roman world. This morning I'm reading chapter 17. It's interesting to see how flexible Paul is as his plans are directed by God. If he is run out of one city then off to the next. If one town welcomes him then he stays for a while. It's not a life that a person who must be in control would enjoy because it's clear that Paul's journeys and life were completely in the hands of God. In a moment of time he may be redirected to a different destination than he had planned and Paul had to make the course corrections. It's as if we have a divine GPS always on and working in our lives. We might have our route planned, but then we hear his voice, "turn left NOW." and our course is changed. It's a scary journey at times, not knowing where I'm going or when, but it's a restful one at the same time knowing who is directing the path. Because I really believe God is directing my life and my route I can sit back and enjoy the ride. What will be the next great adventure? Only God knows and won't it be fun to find out what it is?

Black Friday

(click on cartoon to enlarge)

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If you were like millions of other people the promise of a bargain drew you to the malls today. I know, we drove by several malls and most of you were there! I'm so glad my sweet wife hates the shopping madness as much as I do. For those who joined the maddening crowd I hope you survived and found that bargain. And, so with Thanksgiving behind us and black Friday nearly over, let me say, "Welcome to the holiday season!"

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope you have a wonderful day with family and friends.

Thankful, day 7

Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.

1 Chronicles 16:34 (NIV)

.At the very core of this thanksgiving holiday is this simple truth- God is good. It's one of the most important things anyone can learn about the God of the bible...he's good. What does that mean for us? It means that his very nature, his very goodness influences everything he does, every word he says, every decision he makes. And here's the thing that's hard for some to understand- he's ALWAYS been good. It isn't just a New Testament goodness. God has been consistently good throughout eternity. Here's how James describes it:

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James 1:16-18 Don't be deceived, my dear brothers. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.

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The thing that has clouded our vision of him is sin itself. Not his sin, but ours! The very problems of our world, of our life, are our own making. But in the middle of all the evil we see there is a wonderful creator who is good and does good in our lives. It's his goodness the led a group of pilgrims to start this holiday so they could intentionally say "thank you" to a good God.

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So, as you enjoy your thanksgiving meal take a moment and lift this simple praise to God,

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"Thank you, Lord, I am so blessed and grateful that you are a good God. Because of your love and goodness I am blessed."

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Eyes on eternity

Frankly, we all need glasses. Most of the people I know are badly near-sighted. Our vision is only able to focus on "here" and "now". Our decisions and desires are all based on this life....taking care of retirement, saving for "the future" and making decisions to "make me happy." Our vision is on an amazingly small part of eternity we call "my life." Everything we do, every decision we make and even how we spend our time is based on our near-sighted focus on "my life" and "now."

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In the grand scheme of things, to be honest, "your life" is not even an event on the timeline of eternity. But, because our vision is so limited, we only see "now" and fail to focus on some amazing things that are important to our lives. Here's a short list of the important things that are blurry to our vision as a near-sighted race:

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1. God. Our vision of him is blurry because we rarely squint our eyes to try to focus on him. It's hard for us to get this most amazing God in focus and so for most of us our vision is quite blurry about who he is, what he's like, what he thinks about me. Not having God clearly in focus will make it hard for me to focus on everything else beyond my near-sighted world. It will make it hard for me to see my life and my situations clearly as well because if I can't get God in focus then I won't be able to see clearly what he's doing in my life.

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2. Eternity. One of the things we have trouble with is eternity. It's just so....eternal! Forever and ever and, well, you know where I'm going with that. Imagine we roll out a piece of paper that would go from coast to coast, 3,000 miles long in all, and we use this chart to try to get a glimpse of eternity. Let's begin in California to mark our chart in 1 inch increments. Here's our legend- 1 inch=1,000 years. Basically each inch will break down to 10 lifetimes. Your whole lifespan would be one of the 1/16 inch marks on the chart. Each mile would basically cover a million years. Here's how amazing this is....if we start at the water's edge in California and walk 30 feet we have covered the entire 6,000 years of recorded history that we see in the bible. 30 feet, did you get that? Now, as we move across the country, a million years per mile, we cover a period of 3,000,000,000 in our imagined timeline. Only 30 feet of it was man's recorded history, and only 1/16th of an inch was your life. Here is the amazing thing- That whole timeline we drew as we crossed the country is only a small dot on the timeline of eternity. It's amazing how big this is. I think that's why it's so blurry to our vision. We simply can't imagine it.

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3. Here's the part of this that must come into focus for us- what we do with Christ in this life will determine our eternal destiny. We have this "1/16th of an inch" of life to make decisions about him and those decisions will determine our eternity ahead. The very reason Jesus became a man was to provide a solution for our eternal problem. He said, "God loves you so much that he sent me to die for your sins. If you will believe in me I will give you eternal life." The implication is clear- if you don't beleive in him (trust him for salvation) then you have what every man has apart from faith in Christ- eternal death. It is the most important thing we could possibly do with our lives, the most important decision we will ever make and yet our focus is on "now" and "happiness" and "my needs." Sadly, the enemy of our souls has done an amazing work to keep our vision on the NOW to the eternal loss of many.

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I know, in my own life, I live most of my days with the distant horizon out of focus, but I'm praying for a vision for eternity, eyes that look into the days ahead and make decisions today because they will affect me for billions of years to come. I so wish we had our eyes clearly focused on eternity. I'm praying for eyes to see, so that I can make decisions for eternity and not just for today. I'm praying the same thing for you as you read my thoughts. Eternity awaits, your decisions today are important.....

Thankful, day 6

Day 6 in my personal project of thanks. It's been interesting to me as I have thought about what I want to say. These exercises have actually built my faith as I've thought about what I'm thankful for. It's been a fun project.

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Today, I'm working on a theory. It's based on something I'm thankful for. Here's my theory- I believe that the ability to taste is proof that we are created by a loving God. Sounds strange, doesn't it? But bear with me for a moment. Evolution speaks to a gradual evolving of life to the point we are now. Each "evolutionary stage," whether by accident or need, moved creatures forward to what we are today (a very simplistic overview of evolution, I know.) The one thing that is completely unnecessary for us to exist and survive is taste. The ability to taste things is an extra, a blessing that has nothing to do with survival, but I am so glad we are able to taste...it makes food so much more enjoyable to eat. It turns eating for survival into eating for pleasure. Why do we have taste buds? Why are we able to taste flavors? Sweet and salty? Bitter or savory? All of this tasting thing is completely unnecessary to survival itself, but is a wonderful blessing to us. I believe the ability to taste is proof that we are created by a loving creator who not only wanted us to survive, but wanted us to enjoy it as well. So, today I'm thankful for taste. The ability to taste sweet and sour, bitter and salty, and a thousand other flavors that make the necessary job of eating such a treat. I'm thankful for taste and God' s great creative nature that would give us this amazing gift to enjoy and remind us of his love for us. AND, it will come in mighty handy on Thanksgiving day!

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"Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him." Psalm 34:8

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Still more to discover!

Here are just two of a number of new discoveries from the oceans. It always amazes me when I see how little we know about our own planet. Imagine how little we really know about space and creation itself. It makes the claims of many scientists sound much like a science fiction writer when they tell us how the universe came into being while at the same time they don't even know about all that lives on our own planet....seems a little arrogant to me. I would rather rest on God's claims of origins. His descriptions seem much more plausible, especially since he was the only one there to tell us how this amazing universe came into being.

A newfound deep-sea species of gelatinous dumbo (Grimpoteuthis sp.) flap a pair of large ear-like fins to swim (above)

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Larry Madin, Woods Hole

Oceanographic Institution

At 1.7 miles down (2,750 meters) in the

Northern Gulf of Mexico, scientists found this

transparent sea cucumber, Enypniastes (left)

Thankful, day 5

Today is day 5 in my week long project on being thankful. As I think about these ideas it becomes clear that a week might not be enough to do this theme justice. Giving thanks for a long list of things isn't the solution to this discussion either. To thank someone for a gift or for doing something for you is a simple expression of appreciation for a gift given. It might be a service, a gesture or an actual gift of some kind that generates a "Thank you!" from another person. God is so gracious to us that a daily diet of appreciation is probably the only way to correctly deal with this theme. God daily loads us with blessings we simply must say thank you for. He daily gives us all things to enjoy. He faithfully meets our needs, loves us, forgives us, gives us provisions we take for granted. All we have and all we are is because of the kind and gracious hand of God, so today may I invite you to begin the daily habit of thanking God for his work in your life and all that he provides? If you intentionally think about it all you might be surprised by how much we have to thank God for.

Thankful, day 4

This is day 4 in my week long project of thanksgiving. It's amazing how much I have to thank God for...food, provision, family, his love, direction, compassion, patience....I need that one a lot! But today I want to thank the Lord for forgiveness. I am constantly failing, sinning, saying the wrong thing, thinking the wrong thing, not forgiving others, mad about this, prideful about that, selfish, fearful, irritated at someone....well I could go on, but I think you understand. We NEED forgiveness. The load of sin and regret we carry would crush us if not for God's amazing forgiveness. In one amazing act of love on a cross more than 2,000 years ago God dealt with my sins once for all. That phrase...once for all....is a profound one to me. One sacrifice for all people, for all sins, for all time! It's scope and work is beyond my comprehension and I'm blessed daily that God has forgiven me. It's his mercy and grace that makes my relationship with him such a blessing. I never come to an angry God waiting to punish me, but I come to a loving Father who has already forgiven me. Today, especially today, and every day I'm most thankful for God's amazing forgiveness.

Saturday's cartoon

Thankful, day 3

Today is day 3 in my 7 days of thanks. Today I'm thankful for the body of Christ. It's amazing to watch our church family care for its members. A few weeks ago we told our church family that we were going to give gift baskets to those in our family in need during this Thanksgiving holiday, and the response to this need was amazing. Giving for others in need was twice what had been given last year, so this year we are able to really help many who are in the midst of difficult days. I'm so thankful for the church family I'm part of....it's great to see God at work among us.