When it is all said and done!

I just walked back in the door from a funeral for Rev. Carlton Carruth. He lived a legendary life and left a great legacy. He ran the race well and finished strong. As I listen to my Dad give the eulogy it made me think that we are all writing our eulogy right now by the way we live our life. The choices we make the things we do all determine the legacy we leave.

 I hope when my life is done it can be said “He made it hard to stand in comfortable places and he stood with us in difficult places.” At least that is what I would want said today, tomorrow I will probably want something else.  What do you want said about you when it is all said and done? Are you living it out now?

Your Best

A while back a bunch of us worked on an old house in down town Brunswick to restore it so we could use it as our offices. A lot of different people did a lot of different things to make the project work. My main two jobs were to work with Jeffrey hanging some sheetrock and with David laying the Hardi-board. To be the amateurs that we obviously were I thought we did a pretty good job. I mean sure there were some fairly significant gaps in the sheet rock and the holes for the boxes might have been a bit large, but nothing a little mud and tape couldn’t fix. All in all it was “a okay”! 

I had never even heard of hardi-board, but basically it is like sheets of cement that you attach to the floor so Wesley can come back later and lay tile over it. David and I were to cover the floor with the hardiboard and we did a descent job if I may say so my self. I mean technically there may have been some spots that the stuff didn’t fit just perfectly, but I mean it is all going to be covered up by the tile anyway, so what does it matter if there is a gap here and there.

Good is the enemy of great

Okay prevents OutstandingAlright is not excellent

2^nd best keeps more people from God’s best than worst ever dreamed of.

 

Settling – becoming satisfied with less than God has for you.

 God is constantly challenging me to strive for maximum impact, to not settle for good intentions or half hearted attempts. God wants and deserves our best…. because He gave us His best.

Thought for the day

“from my daily planner” 

“We did not change as we grew older, we just became more clearly ourselves.” Lynn Hall

 

That makes me think about Eph. 4:1, which says, “Live a life worthy of the calling you have received.” 

I hope we all can begin to get our mind around who we really are and then start living into that reality.

Defeating Discouragement!

 

I think the heart of discouragement lies in unmet expectations or perhaps more specifically in the belief or feeling that expectations cannot be reached. It is more than simply not having obtained the desired result. It spills over into a feeling that ever reaching the goal is hopeless. This defeated state robs you of energy and deprives you of drive.

It was several campouts with my brother ago when I first start my battle to defeat discouragement and it began with a simply question around the campfire. How do you define success?

The Chapel was just getting started and I had gone from running large ministries with large very talented staffs to running a ministry where the entire staff consisted of just me. Lets just say my days looked a lot different and what I was able to accomplish over the course of a day was significantly different. I discovered that I had to redefine how I defined success. Previously, my subconscious measure of success was productivity or said another way results. Well, now a highly productive day might consist of carrying a letter through all the steps necessary to put it in the mail. I worked hard and I worked smart and I worked long, but the productivity – the results – were far less than I was accustomed and thus my subconscious expectations were unmet = discouragement.

Ministry is a difficult vocation to measure. Changing lives is our bottom line, but those results are ultimately out of our control. God changes lives despite our efforts not because of them. Yet we are called to be a part of the process.

To keep from belaboring the point, here is where I landed. My current definition of success is did I do what God said to do today?  I have found that to look at the outcome, the outward results either leads to pride or discouragement. I think what God really cares about is that I do what He says. If I simply share what he shows me my message will be successful.

 Discouragement derives from unmet expectations. Make sure your not operating from unrealistic expectations. Let God help you redefine what success looks like in your life and you will be amazed at how much better your life will become.