Home Archive by category "Life" (Page 29)

Category: Life

I am free.

I AM FREE I woke up in the middle of the night recently with these words forming in my mind. I have learned via the trials and tribulations of life that everything that ever worries me, concerns me, bothers me, irritates me, hurts me, saddens me, angers me, depresses me, or holds me back from victorious fellowship with Jesus have one little word in common: me. I heard Jesus whisper in my ear, yet again, “Let go of ‘me’ and you will be free.” The words below flowed in those early morning hours as my heart aches to be free of me. (click for full size) (This is now my daily prayer to keep me focused on Him, not me)

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A Baseball Writer With Heart

As I have bragged before (here, here and here or when he got me a Frank Thomas ball) my little brother is a beat reporter for MLB.com as the Blue Jays reporter. While I enjoy baseball, I’m nowhere near the avid fan my little brother is – which is why I marvel at his writing. As I blogged about once before, I am impressed at how his writing transcends mere baseball reporting. I’m not a Blue Jays fan (technically he isn’t either), but I follow his blog as I because I enjoy his writing and I don’t want to miss when one of these “beyond baseball” masterpieces comes through.Well, he did it again! He has written another “baseball article” that demonstrates that his ability to articulate LIFE and not just baseball, and is what makes him such a masterful sports writer. Before you read his article about how Blue Jays top prospect Travis Snider has dealt with several deaths recently, including his mother, it might interest you first to realize a few things not mentioned in the article about Jordan’s personal connection to this story. First of all,  Snider’s mom Jordan’s and my mother both have the same name, though…

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Making An Impact, or Not!

A Jelly Fish for God? Read on! Not too long ago, the most important thing to me was my personal contribution to the Kingdom of God. I’ve literally been “in ministry” since I was a young boy. To me, as the son of a preacher man and a mother who served in the local church with creativity and a keen sense of leadership – serving God was what it meant to be a Christian. By the time I was a teen-ager was I traveling to minister in churches besides my own and by my mid-twenties I’d been to over ten countries on mission trips ministering to children and equipping leaders. From the time I got up in the morning until I collapsed in bed at night, I lived to serve God. As I look back, I still am so thankful for all the amazing opportunities that God brought into my life, but I also feel the burden of stress and the deep exhaustion that was my daily experience. And the loneliness. I have learned the hard way that “Impact” is not the purpose of my faith. It is a result of following and serving God, but it is not why…

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Now THAT is a pile of snow!

I was up in Wisconsin on Saturday speaking at the INSIDE-OUT Elmbrook Children’s Ministry Conference, and could not believe what I saw when I arrived: (click any picture for a larger view) Yes, they had construction machinery moving the snow. MAN, was I jealous, that looked like so much fun! That is some serious snow removal! They take all the snow and put it in one corner next to a retention pond. By the end of the day, the pile was HUGE! I was told that their snow pile last into July! I just HAD to see the view from up there! It was a lot bigger than it looks in these pictures, and teens were snow boarding down the other side! Why did I climb the mountain of snow, with a cane and a sprained ankle? Because it was there!

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How Super is Winning the Super Bowl?

Reprinted from Bill Alison’s Amazing Time Management Secrets: It’s one thing to climb the ladder of success, but it’s quite another to climb the RIGHT ladder. Just how super is winning a Super Bowl? Consider these insights by guest blogger Josh Carter: From the outside looking in, Tom Brady appears to have the life everyone longs for, despite not winning Super Bowl XLII. But things are different on the inside. In a past interview with 60 Minutes Brady raised the question, “Why do I have three Super Bowl rings and still think there’s something greater out there for me? I mean, maybe a lot of people would say, ‘Hey man, this is what is.’ I reached my goal, my dream, my life. Me, I think, ‘God, it’s got to be more than this.’ I mean this isn’t, this can’t be what it’s all cracked up to be.” When pressed to answer his own question, Brady responded, “I wish I knew.” “My heart took delight in all my work, and this was the reward for all my labor. Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after…

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