Dear friends, for the past 35 years I have been a paid mentor. It has been said that once you have 10,000 hours of doing something, you have achieved a certain level of competency. Made popular by Gladwell's book, Outliers: The Story of Success, the principle states...
Friends, you are not your story. Wherever you have been, whatever you have gone through, and whenever you look back on what your life was before this moment in time, is the past. You are not your story. Christ Jesus has written a better story for you and me. He has a...
The greatest gift mankind has ever received is Jesus Christ. The second, the one he brought for us: Grace. Glorious, grace is an unearned and undeserved favor from God. It is a profound, and central to our understanding of being a Christ-follower. It is essential to...
Lord, good morning. Thank you for being here. Dear child, I am always here. What is on your mind today? Father God, I just want to confirm my decision to fully enter semi-retirement, which I call “Portfolio Life.” Dear child, I have already given my blessing for this,...
Have you ever been told to “go with the flow?” I have, and it is usually when I am not doing that. Or how about “Go along to get along.” For my Spanish-speaking blog readers, I have no idea how these English phrases translate into your romantic language. I imagine...
Lord Jesus, sometimes, I just don’t know how to pray. This scripture comes to mind: 26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. 27 And he who...
This is the word that describes how I feel when I read the news. I can’t imagine what God feels as he watches how we humans treat each other. People, in general, left up to their own devices, treat each other poorly at times. We are capable of great goodness, and...
Friends, what happens when you find you can only spend 15 minutes with God in the morning? What do you do? How do you think Christ would answer that question? For me, it is Bible Roulette. I am going to randomly open my Bible to some place, and start reading. Example:...
In case you missed the last two day’s of posts, here is a summary: Post 1: Habitual Decision Making; we need to get out of the habit of making decisions and let God make the decisions for us; our job is to “discern” His decisions. Try this. It is a lot harder than it...
DECISION MAKING – PART 2 OF 3 In case you missed yesterday’s post, here is the summary, followed by Part 2 of this 3-part blog series: SUMMARY FROM PART ONE Here is the final paragraph from yesterday’s post: In our decision-making, it is imperative to remember...
DECISION MAKING - PART 1 OF 3 I just found myself about to make another big decision, without consulting Christ. This is a really bad habit that I have. We could also call it a character defect. I am accustomed to running my own life, and not living in full surrender...
HONORING OTHERS ABOVE OURSELVES Friends, I write on subjects that God gives me during my quiet times with him. I bring topics before him, and I try to listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit. Today, was an especially deep, intimate time with Christ where I had an...
LOVE LIKE THERE IS NO TOMORROW What if today were your last day on earth? What if it was your last week or month? We never know when our time on earth is up. It is the height of arrogance and pride for me to say: “I guarantee you that I will ...”. I can not guarantee...
FULLY FOLLOWING CHRIST Friends, for years I got this wrong. I was really following myself, but giving the appearance of following Christ. And it resulted in failure after failure, in the deepest possible ways. For example, my marriage was a failure. On the outside, it...
MARRIAGE REQUIRES BROKENNESS Dear Lord, thank you for breaking me. Thank you for giving me a woman that can see through to my inner soul and know when I’m broken and when I’m not. All: Patty is free to say anything to me at any time, and she does. She points out the...
MINDFUL LOVE Friends, there is a lot of talk about mindfulness these days, and it often misses the point. What Christ wants is for us to get out of our selves, and love others. So, this “me, me, me, ... it’s all about me” journey that the world teaches is flat out a...
WHAT GOD WANTS With what shall I come before the Lord and bow down before the exalted God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousand rivers of olive oil? Shall I offer my...
NO TOPIC NEEDED Good morning Lord. What topic should I write about today? Dear child, how about “No Topic.” There does not always have to be a “topic” for our conversations. Can you just come and sit with me? Yes, Lord. My heavenly Father. Our should I write to Jesus...
ONE DAY AT A TIME Friends, March 4, 1996 is my sobriety date. On that day, I heard “One Day at a Time” for the first time, and it helped me through some very difficult times over the past 27 years of my recovery journey. Yesterday was one of those days. It was very...
JUDGEMENT IS MINE Lord, you say judgement is yours, and yours alone. Why is that, and how can we avoid judging each other? Especially Christians. We seem so judgmental. We judge each others faith, maturity, “fruit”, denominations, and more. How can we sit in judgement...
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