A Little Understanding . . . Please

Jude 1:10 “But these people attack with insults, anything they do not understand; and those things that they know by instinct are the very things that destroy them.”

Our society today is making a habit of verbally attacking people who do not conform to the “norm”. Looking back fifty years or so, it seems like our world was more compassion and innocence back then. Trust me, that’s what age does to our memory.

We only seem to recall the good times of our younger years. But last week I was reminded of the dark times of my youth back in the ‘50’s. In our town we had no special education programs in public schools. So the special students had to ride the same bus, sit in the same cafeteria, and sit in the back of the same class as everyone else. We never talked to them because we thought they were “dumb”. They made us feel uncomfortable.

Therefore, we made fun of them and pushed them around. In short, we did not treat them like the other students. In reality, we were self-righteous and just did not try to understand them or their needs. Then in college, I took a Developmental Psychology class which required two months of lab work in the Greenville Tennessee Mental Hospital. It was there that I discovered how I was guilty of not understanding special people and condemning the individual because of my desire not to understand. Several young patients were severely deformed or had serious mental deficiencies because their mother or father had been an excessive user of lead filled moonshine or had been users of recreational drugs. Others were just the way God created them. All of them were special people who had the same basic needs that I had.

They wanted to love and to be loved.   I then understood, and asked the Lord to forgive me for insulting others and being a real “jerk”. As we look back on our past, do we find false thoughts, beliefs, or prejudices that do not fit into the teachings of Scripture?

Can we be honest with ourselves and stop the chain of misunderstanding that may have passed from generation to generation or from childhood to now? It might help us all to be more humble, to get on our knees, and ask the Lord for the compassion and wisdom to love people right where they are.

And pray for understanding to love them the way the Lord loves them, and us.

Unconditionally.

A Simple Prayer

Did you ever wake up way too early with things running through your mind?  Then you can not get back to sleep?  Well this is a normal occurrence for me. 

Everything from what I have to do today, to what's on TV, to keep the dogs quiet so Lynnette can sleep, to replaying a dream that I had to see if it made any sense, and the list goes on and on.  Well, it's Sunday at 4:30 a.m. and here I am composing my thoughts. 

But this morning I awoke thinking about a family that was hurt deeply by others and how they are searching for a hug and acceptance.  My mind races in that I can not be around to give them the hugs, so I go to praying for them to find the people they need who will uplift them and give them love and acceptance.

I simply pray for them and ask the Lord to lead them to people who will love them unconditionally. No need for a long drawn out dissertation of prayer but just petition the Lord for his favor in their lives.  Period.

Is there someone out there where the Lord has placed them on your heart?  It is not by accident that they have now come to you mind so just say a simple prayer and watch the Lord work.  You will be enriched beyond your wildest imagination of what the Lord does today.  So get going on your simple prayer.

Declaring Your Independence

None of us can imagine what it fells like to not be free.  As we celebrate a day of rejoicing in our freedom, many of us are bound by struggles that keep us from really understanding the refreshing breath of REAL freedom.

We may be bound by drug, alcohol, relationship, job, or no job, and kids, as the list keeps us emotionally and spiritually from really being FREE.   I looked up what the word FREE means:  "Receiving or enjoying something of value that does not require any monetary outlay of funds or obligation on the part of the receiver"

Well, I guess if you drill down to bottom of this many of us are really not free in this country of freedom.  So often we encounter "strings attached" to a gift or relationship with many people. 

Yet when I stop and look at my relationship with the Creator of the Universe, I see someone who just wants to be close to you and give you permanent freedom.  If you are really free from what the world offers then you celebrate that freedom and want to stay that way.  In our daily relationship with the Lord it is in our freedom that we find compassion, love, and admiration in every aspect of life.

Maybe you should really learn to declare your Independence from the struggles of life.  You can learn a lot more in a free (yes "free") day of activities on the 3rd - celebrating the 4th - at 5:00 p.m.  www.faithpromise.org

I would love for you to declare your independence from the struggles daily life has for you and enjoy what freedom really feels like in your life.

Who are Your prayer Warriors?

Below is a note from my wonderful wife to the many people who were petitiioning the Lord for His blessing and Favor yesterday.  You have seen the power of prayer in sickness and other areas, but when you see the Lord working in business and daily life, you get excited to rely on Him more, tell others of the Lord being a daily part of your life, and sharing that God is showing His Favor EVERY day.   If I were doing things, "My Way" the results would not be the same.  So where are your prayer warriors? Are you being open with them so they know how to petition the Lord?  Transparency is the key.  Both with the Lord and others so the Lord can bless your life.

Friends and family,

Thanks SO MUCH for your prayers for Gary this afternoon.  In his words, the meeting with the Wal-Mart buyer went “interestingly well” and that the buyer was “very receptive”.  Here’s a brief summary of how the meeting went.  Each point below is a big “God-thing”:

• The buyer likes the product and even said that he has been looking for something like this and thinks that it would sell quite well when placed in the aisle with the storage tubs and totes.
• The buyer would like to place a good-sized quantity of product in 500 stores to start (this would be 500 of his stores which have the best sales of storage totes which our product is ideal for).
• If that “test” goes well he would like to place product in all stores by the end of the year (the after-Christmas emphasis on storage products).
  He agreed to the revised pricing that Gary presented.
• Interesting to note that this is the same buyer that just a couple of months ago totally blew Gary off.  I guess God was still in the process of pulling all the details and players together!

I won’t bore you with the details of everything that has to happen now in order for there to be an official and binding purchase order, but I will ask you to pray that everything falls into place both to secure the purchase order and for us to fill it.  We have good people working with us, but it’s quite a tap-dance putting all the pieces of this deal together.

Now for your prayer assignment for tomorrow (smile):  Gary is on his way to Little Rock as he has a meeting tomorrow morning (Thursday) with the CEO and others of Century Ladders.  They are interested in possibly distributing our Attic Trac product.  This will be an interesting meeting as they have pursued us since Gary first made contact with them.  Please pray that it becomes clear where God is leading and that His wisdom is clear in any deals or decisions to be made. 

Thanks again.  You guys are the best!
Lynnette

 

The Devil's Music

During my drive yesterday to Wal-Mart headquarters, I was radio channel surfing and came across a station called Grace Broadcasting.  The song playing was called, "The Dark Side of Grace".  It was about people who had yet to discover the grace of the Father in Heaven as they were living on the "Dark Side of Grace".  When the announcer came on he said that the station was a Country Christian station.

Most country songs over the years have been about drinking, cussing, sleeping with someone else's wife, and the list goes on.  My parents called this  this "The Devil's Music". 

I listened to every song until I was out of range and then thought about the music of my youth.   I grew up during the Beatles, acid rock, and heavy metal era of music.  Being in a band singing vocals made it hard to take when people called our music, "The Devil's Music". 

Then came Larry Norman, the father of Christian Rock music and gave us the introduction to our contemporary Christian music of today. Listen to a few of his songs and you will see how we have developed over the years to our contemporaneity Christian music of today.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWh8-FPelHU&feature=related

So hearing Christian Country music is taking some music that may be distasteful to some and making a praise to the Lord.   Never underestimate what can happen when someone says your music is "The Devil's Music" because it is just an opportunity to take the beat of the music and give praise to the Lord.

p.s. our band played ol' time rock and roll on Saturday and the entire band was in church on Sunday, singing the hymns but knowing there was a new music style coming.  Thanks Larry Norman!

Stop - Look - Listen

Matthew 6: 25-33   “Therefore, I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. . . Look at the birds of the air. . . See the lilies of the field. . .  Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own.”

          It was early morning as I walked into the meadow.  The sky was still a purple haze with the night sounds of crickets and pond frogs all around.  Walking along I thought,  “Finding just the right spot is always so difficult in the early morning.  Will I sit on an anthill?  There are snakes around the creek and everybody knows my philosophy on snakes: ‘The best snake is a dead snake.’  And those blasted mosquitoes!  I would have thought that they had had enough for the night and would be back in their nests.  Ah, here’s a nice spot to sit.”

          I continue on, “OK, Lord, I’m ready for You to pour Your spirit out on me.”  The sun is about to rise, which causes me to think.  “When I get to the office I need to rework my to do list, check for new orders, think about what I will eat for breakfast, and remember who I need to call this morning. Hmm, I wonder what time my favorite show is on tonight?  Did my wife get the flea medicine for the dogs?  How am I going to get that purchase order?  What has happened at the Tellico Plains events over the weekend?”  

And the list goes on.

          Well, by now the sun has risen and I realize that time is slipping by, so I take a moment and thank God for a beautiful sunrise, and then I’m off to the day’s activities.

          Has this ever happened to you?  You plan to get away just to spend some time with God.  You go outside, or to some remote location, just to listen to His voice, only to realize later that it did not happen as you planned.  

          That morning, I had gone out to get close to God, watch a wonderful sunrise, and just absorb His majesty.  Instead, I found that I had only prepared my agenda for the day, which, by the way, did not include the Lord.

          So, when I want to get close to God and listen to Him, I have to make a conscious effort to clear my mind of the distractions.  Here’s how I’ve learned to do it:

Stop – I slow down my mind from worry, anticipation, or coming events.   

Look – The world is such a beautiful creation.  I see the ants working so hard to carry food or the squirrels preparing a nest for their young and the winter weather.  Matthew 6: 25-34 takes on a much greater meaning after I have looked around at the activities of the birds, flowers, and animals.  But that only comes by looking and paying attention.

Listen – God does not always speak in a roar, even though we see His power in the storms and tornadoes.  His voice can be found in the whisper of the morning breeze, the gentle rain on maple leaves, or in the bird that calls out from the woodlands.

          The point is that my attitude in drawing closer to God is my responsibility.  He never hides Himself and can be found anytime and in any place.  The problem ends up being how can I make some quiet time to wash my mind of worry and trouble to just be WITH God.

          This week, make the effort to Stop, Look, and Listen for God.   

You may discover more of what he has in store for your life.

Being Fruitful

Matthew 9:36 -37  Seeing the people, Jesus felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. Then He said to His disciples, "The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.

Where is our compassion today? We have all become so hardened to life. The video/computer games being played on computers and televisions plus the “real time” views of war and murders are so realistic that the site of blood and death just seem to be fascinations of excitement for our own pleasure.

Our agenda is often clouded, not only by the lack of compassion for others but also for a goal that we have selfishly set for ourselves. As a young boy, I was taught that “Men don’t cry”. If you were punished by the “hand of authority” (spanking), you were given a short period of time to cry. Then the famous words, “Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about” would ring through the air.

Later in life, as hurts would come I learned to choke them inside and not shed a tear. As emotional pains developed, I became hardened to my own feelings. From 1974 to 1987, I never shed a tear for anything. It was just bottled up. JD Hughes, a Cincinnati radio DJ, became a friend of mine and assured me that Jesus had compassion for the hurting and that I needed to turn my life over to the one who had compassion for me.

For 17 years I had been in a position of Christian leadership, but had missed the passion of showing a real Jesus to others. With that conversation the flood gates of my heart opened wide, and thanks to this man, I refuse to ever close them again. It was then that I realized that real men do cry and are not afraid to show compassion for others. I learned that there is real freedom in just giving up our pent-up emotions. Later a pastor talked about “giving our lives away”. I had done that for years, but for all the wrong reasons. I worked hard to impress others with the talents the Lord had given. But I had held back.  In following new leadership at a new church, I have been inspired to share the love of the Father for everyone I meet as part of my Personal Growth Plan.

Now I realize that I was giving to others in order to get back something. The American Way, right? 

I discovered that loving people just for the sake of compassion gives new life to serving the Lord. In the original Greek language of the New Testament, the word “harvest” is actually interpreted as “karpos “, which means “fruit”. When we give our lives away to the Lord’s service, we experience the “sweet fruit” of leading someone who may be hurting to the freedom that the Lord offers.

At times we may experience the “sour grapes” of someone in leadership hurting our feelings, but we must realize that a worship service is not about “Us”! It’s about taking the walls down and having compassion on others with the desire to see them get a relationship with the creator of the universe. Only when you have an attitude adjustment can you enjoy being fruitful and helping others who are lost or hurting.

Give your life away to the Lord’s service. There are limitless opportunities.

Look around!

Enjoy being fruitful!

God's Handwork This Week

Earlier this week I was at a restaurant with some friends for dinner.  Since I have a hard time hearing along with the crowd noise and being be a distance from others,  I was given me some insights that I would normally have missed.

Looking out the window to my right, I saw a spider dangling in mid-air and yet darting from side to side and from top to bottom.  Soon I became visually engaged in this frantic activity.  It was about an hour before dark and the spider was in non-stop motion.  So after a few more minutes of starring I got up close to the window and could see a magnificent web that was being spun.

It had eight perfect sides and was about two feet in diameter.  The spider had made the outer areas by going around and around the outside, still keeping the perfect octagon, while working it's way to the center.  Then the spider went from the center to the outside to lock the web together.  An aerospace engineer could not have done better.

Upon further examination each space between the strands was an accurate 1/2 inch apart.   Wow, how did a simple spider learn to make such a perfect trap for insects?

Later I stopped and thought how the Lord in His creation gave the insects and animals the tools for survival and yet the Lord's artistic finger also gave them a science and beauty that we take for granted as we knock down the sticky webs.

Think!  If the Lord has placed such value on something as small as a spider, then what has He placed in You?  You are His Masterpiece with so much more value yet all He wants is a relationship with you.  Something the spider can never know.

This weekend, look around for the little things where you can see God's handwork.    It could be a in little bug where there is a lesson for you to learn.

God's Standards

When I first became a student of the Old Testament, I read how God killed a man who touched the Ark of the Covenant as he tried to stop it from falling to the ground.  Imagine that, a man simply wanting to help out and what does God do but kill him.  Later I noticed that when the nation of Israel conquered some land, the Lord told them to kill every man, woman, child, and animal from the area.  Another time God killed everyone except Noah and his family in the great flood. And what about Sodom and Gomorrah, two cities that God leveled with fire from the heavens.

Wow, what a strict God!  Or so I thought, until a teacher at school had me look at God’s plan from a different perspective.  “You see” he said, “the plan for our salvation began in the Garden of Eden.  God loved us so much that all of history was a part of His plan for His people to attain forgiveness.” 

I questioned, “But, why did God have to kill all those people?  Didn’t He love them too?”

The wise professor responded, “Of course he loved them, but they chose to turn away from God, to serve Satan, and they suffered the consequences for their actions. Originally the plan for God’s people to deal with sin was through sacrifices and offerings of animals of pure bloodlines”  He explained further,  “Jesus was to be the ultimate sacrifice and therefore, had to be a descendant from the pure bloodline of Abraham to guarantee God’s promise.  God’s requirement for keeping the bloodline pure meant that the followers of Satan could not intermarry with God’s chosen people, Israel.”

It was then that I realized that God’s standard for life was based on His love for us.  Everything commanded by the Lord was to protect the promise of our salvation. 

In Zechariah, God tells us that His standard for life is that of love.  We should respect His power and realize that there are consequences to our actions. We must understand that it is not His anger with us that result in our consequences, but a reminder of His ultimate love.

While we are seeking a relationship with the Lord, we need to know that Jesus reflected His Father’s standards.  His law is love and His gospel is peace.

So, if it wasn’t for such a perfect plan that began in the Garden of Eden, we would all be in trouble today. 

That’s just another reason to praise God!