Symptoms are misleading, when will you find the root cause?
The title of this post says it all…”symptoms are misleading…” Just like an iceberg, symptoms are what can be seen, but the root cause is still below the surface. Before I gave my life over to Christ and became His child, I thought I was a Christian and was going to heaven when I died. I truly believed I was His child and that all my poor decisions and negative reactions in life were just symptoms of what life threw at me daily. Just because the symptoms were negative reactions and poor decisions, that did not mean I was not his child, right? Wrong. For me the symptoms that I diagnosed as “what life threw at me” were really a missing relationship with our Heavenly Father.
Taking the Next Hill
I don’t know about you, but I am the type of person who needs a challenge or a hill to climb to get motivated. I have found this to be true in both my professional and personal life and now I find it true in my spiritual life. In my professional life I love coming into a challenging situation with the odds stacked against me. Many times in these situations whatever task is at hand is not the popular choice with the masses. So, I typically find myself swimming against the current of the mainstream. These types of situations usually require confronting the current culture or environment that is already embedded in a work situation. To me, I see this as a hill; it motivates me, keeps me engaged and challenges me to work hard, set goals and see the changes that take place slowly over time. I have experienced this several times in my career and it is not a quick fix. It takes both time and I remaining constantly engaged to see it through. Staying constantly engaged is the key to success in this situation. With my personality and the need to “take” the hill it is not difficult to stay engaged.
Kennedy Racing Team, AWANA Grand Prix (Pinewood Derby)
March 9th was the Annual AWANA Grand Prix (Pinewood Derby Race). This is the first year my kids have participated in one of these races. I did them a few years back when I was involved with AWANA’s as a leader.
Look at these beauties, they look shinier than a Corvette on a dealer’s showroom floor. Click on any of the pictures for a larger view, check out the LivingVision logo like the one on my site. Free advertising.
Okay, enough about how good the cars look. Three cars race down the track at one time per heat. There were over 100 cars entered in 4 categories.
1. Puggles/Cubbies
2. Sparks
3. TNT – (older kids)
4. Adults Read more
Caught in the Middle
As a Christian do you ever feel like you are caught in the middle? Let me explain what I mean. In your mind you want to live that passionate Christian life that God calls us to have, yet you’re still hanging on to some control that you just won’t or do not know how to let go of. Maybe there is something in your life, an action or habit, that you are holding on to where God is saying…just turn it loose, give it over to me. I often find myself in this type of situation where one side of my brain wants to jump in with both feet, and the other side is saying no, no, no. I often go in spurts, where I have several “on fire” days for God only to be followed by an equal or larger amount of days with not wanting to or even spending much time with Him. When I was not a Christ follower, I was not in the middle; all of my days had nothing to do with God. Soon after I became a Christ follower, the weeks following were filled with being close to God, I wanted everything I did to be about God. Too often, after those initial weeks after accepting Christ, I have and many others have experienced an emotional let down. That is what I call “caught in the middle”. You are somewhere between what you used to be and what you want to be. Casting Crowns has a song called “Somewhere in the Middle”. I have attached the words to this song at the very bottom of this posting for your review. This song provoked me to write this blog and to look deeper at myself and why I do this “on/off” thing with God. Read more
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