Carrots Eggs & Coffee

A carrot, an egg, and a cup of coffee...You will never look at a cup of coffee the same way again.
A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up She was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose.
Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and placed each on a high fire. Soon the pots came to boil. In the first she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs, and in the last she placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil; without saying a word.
In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl.
Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl. Turning to her daughter, she asked, "Tell me what you see."
"Carrots, eggs, and coffee," she replied.
Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noted that they were soft. The mother then asked the daughter to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard-boiled egg.
Finally, the mother asked the daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled, as she tasted its rich aroma the daughter then asked, "What does it mean, mother?"
Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity: boiling water. Each reacted differently. The carrot went in strong, hard, and unrelenting. However, after being subjected to the boiling water, it softened and became weak. The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after sitting through the boiling water, its insides became hardened. The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water, they had changed the water.
"Which are you?" she asked her daughter. "When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?
Think of this: Which am I? Am I the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity do I wilt and become soft and lose my strength?
Am I the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the heat? Did I have a fluid spirit, but after a death, a breakup, a financial hardship or some other trial, have I become hardened and stiff? Does my shell look the same, but on the inside am I bitter and tough with a stiff spirit and hardened heart?
Or am I like the coffee bean? The bean actually changes the hot water, the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it releases the fragrance and flavor. If you are like the bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you. When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest, do you elevate yourself to another level? How do you handle adversity? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?
May you have enough happiness to make you sweet, enough trials to make you strong, enough sorrow to keep you human and enough hope to make you happy.

source unknown

The Top 10 Leadership Principles of Jesus

1. Leadership is servanthood

2. Let your purpose prioritise your life.

3. You must live the life before you can lead others.

4. Walk slowly through the crowd.

5. Replenish yourself.

6. Great leaders call for great commitment.

7. Show security and strength when handling tough times.

8. Lead on a higher level.

9. Choose your key people.

10. There is no success without a successor.

John Maxwell

Bible vs Mobile Phone

Ever wonder what would happen if we treated our Bible like we treat our cell phone?

What if we carried it around in our purses or pockets?

What if we flipped through it several times a day?

What if we turned back to go get it if we forgot it?

What if we used it to receive messages from the text?

What if we treated it like we couldn't live without it?

What if we gave it to Kids as gifts?

What if we used it when we traveled?

What if we used it in case of emergency?

This is something to make you go....hmm...where is my Bible?

Oh, and one more thing.

Unlike our cell phone, we don't have to worry about our Bible being disconnected because Jesus already paid the bill.

Makes you stop and think 'where are my priorities? And no dropped calls!

source unknown

If I Were Looking for God…

‘If I were looking for God, every event and every moment would sow, in my will, grains of God’s life, that would spring up one day in a tremendous harvest. For it is God’s love that warms me in the sun and God’s love that sends the cold rain. It is God’s love that feeds me in the bread I eat and God that feeds me also by hunger and fasting. It is the love of God that sends the winter days when I am cold and sick, and the hot summer when I labor and my clothes are full of sweat: but it is God who breathes on me with light winds off the river and in the breezes out of the wood.’
‘God’s love spreads the shade by the sycamore over my head and sends the water-boy along the edge of the wheat field with a bucket from the spring, while the laborers are resting and the mules stand under the tree. It is God’s love that speaks to me in the birds and streams but also behind the clamor of the city God speaks to me in God’s judgments, and all these things are seeds sent to me from God’s will. If they would take root in my liberty, and if God’s will would grow from my freedom, I would become the love that God is, and my harvest would be God’s glory and my own joy. And I would grow together with thousands and millions of other freedoms into the gold of one huge field praising God, loaded with increase, loaded with increase, loaded with corn.’

Thomas Merton

Scholar Warns That Faith and Truth Belong Together

Vishal Mangalwadi, a Christian scholar from India, shared the following story after visiting America:In November, 2011, I visited two classes at a Christian university in North America. I asked both: "How many of you would still believe Christianity if you found out tomorrow that Christianity was not true. That is: God never became a man; Jesus did not die for our sin; or, that he did not rise from the dead?"
Twelve hands went up in [the class of about 25 students]. These sincere and devout students had grown up in Christian homes, gone to church all their lives, and studied in Christian schools. Some had been in that Christian university for three years! They respected their elders who taught them that Christianity was all about faith with little concern for truth.
Christianity lost America because 20th-century evangelicalism branded itself as the party of faith. Secularism (science, university, media) became the party of truth. This is one reason why 70 percent of Christian youth give up meaningful involvement with the church when they grow up…. Secularism acquired the "truth" brand by default because evangelicalism began defining the Church's mission as [just] cultivating faith, not [also] promoting knowledge of truth.

Vishal Mangalwadi, "Why Christianity Lost America?" Vishal Mangalwadi's Blog (12-10-11)

Random Thought

The happiest of people don't necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the most of everything that comes along their way. The brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past; you can't go forward in life until you let go of your past failures and heartaches.

Beginning and End

When you were born, you were crying and everyone around you was smiling.
Live your life so at the end, you're the one who is smiling and everyone around you is crying.

The Rogue Warrior's Leadership Code

* I will test my theories on myself first. I will be my own guinea pig.
* I will be totally committed to what I believe, and I will risk all I have for these beliefs.
* I will back my subordinates all the way when they take reasonable risks to help me achieve my goals.
* I will not punish my people for making mistakes. I'll only punish them for not learning from their mistakes.
* I will not be afraid to take action, because I know that almost any action is better than inaction. And I know that sometimes not acting is the boldest action of all.
* I will always make it crystal clear where I stand and what I believe.
* I will always be easy to find: I will be at the centre of the battle.

source unknown

Stillness

Silence your body to listen to words.
Silence your tongue to listen to thoughts.
Silence your thoughts to listen to your heart beating.
Silence your heart to listen to your spirit.
Silence your spirit to listen to His Spirit.

- Mama Maggie Gobran

N. T. Wright on Our Culture's Longing for God's Presence

There is all the difference in the world between waking up in a single bed and waking up in a double bed with nobody on the other side. Many in our Western culture may be atheists or agnostics, but they still find themselves wondering why the other side of the bed still feels warm, and the sheets a little rumpled. And I think this is true in ways that were not the case even ten, let alone thirty years ago.

Geoffrey Stevenson, editor, The Future of Preaching (SCM Press, 2010), p. 138

Two Philosophers Admit That They Did Not Want to Believe

In his article titled "Unreasonable Doubt," Jim Spiegel quotes two contemporary philosophers who have resisted belief in God for personal and not just intellectual reasons. Thomas Nagel, an atheist who authored a popular introduction to philosophy titled What Does It All Mean? wrote: "I want atheism to be true … It isn't just that I don't believe in God, and, naturally, hope that I'm right about my belief. It's that I hope there is no God! I don't want there to be a God; I don't want the universe to be like that."
The 20th-century ethics philosopher Mortimer Adler (who was baptized quietly at age 81) confessed to rejecting religious commitment for most of his life because it "would require a radical change in my way of life, a basic alteration in the direction of my day-to-day choices as well as in the ultimate objectives to be sought or hoped for …. The simple truth of the matter is that I did not wish to live up to being a genuinely religious person."

Jim Spiegel, "Unreasonable Doubt," Christianity Today (2-10-11)

Customizing the Bible Like the Pandora Radio Program

One of the marvels of the Internet age is a thing called Pandora radio. When you listen to a radio station on terrestrial or satellite radio, you have to listen to every song played. You can change the channel, but you can't change the song. You're stuck with whatever you're given. But that's not so on Pandora. On Pandora, you put in different singers, bands, or songs that you like; and they use an algorithm to parse the music that you list. The algorithm asks, is this rock, or is it soft rock, or is it hard rock? Is it antiphonal? Does it have guitar leads? Does it have a front man? It analyzes what you like, and then it can incorporate other similar songs and artists into the mix. And by each song that's played Pandora puts a little thumbs-up sign and a little thumbs-down sign. When you click the thumbs-up sign, the algorithm is strengthened even more to your tastes, and it will play more music like that. If you click the thumbs-down sign, Pandora will just skip that particular song and bring up a different one for you to judge.
In an age where customization of lifestyle and belief has become the norm, this is often the way we approach the Bible. I like 1 Corinthians 13 about love; I don't like 1 Corinthians 11 about women. I like the Book of Joshua about God bringing the Israelites into the Promised Land; I don't like the parts of Joshua about killing people. I like Jesus, the baby in the manger; I don't like Jesus who calls a woman a dog. I like Jesus in the beatitudes; I don't like him when he talks about plucking out your eye and cutting off your hand. We tailor and customize our view of Scripture and, ultimately, our view of God. It's like we have our own internal algorithm all the time, sorting through and processing the biblical data to say, "Oh, I accept this part, I'll preach this part, this part is useful to modern society; but this other part I'm embarrassed—even ashamed—of."

Hershael York, sermon "Judgment at Ai"

Words I Live By

The gems of spiritual wisdom that have enriched my life
This is my 43rd year of journaling. In those journals I have a record of almost every day: what happened, what I learned, where I blew it, how God has poured one undeserved blessing after another into my life. In the course of journal-writing, I have accumulated thousands of quotes and insights from other writers and thinkers. When they have moved my heart, I have written them down. Often I skim the pages of my journals and retrieve the thoughts that once brought me inspiration or rebuke. To borrow the words of the cereal commercial, I have "tasted them again for the first time."
Here are a few of those, in no particular order. These statements have helped realign my soul.
* The prayer that John Stott has used to begin many of his mornings:
"Good morning, heavenly Father; good morning Lord Jesus; good morning Holy Spirit. Heavenly Father, I worship you as the creator and sustainer of the universe. Lord Jesus, I worship you, Savior and Lord of the world. Holy Spirit, I worship you, sanctifier of the people of God. Glory to the Father, and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit. Heavenly Father, I pray that I may live this day in your presence and please you more and more. Lord Jesus, I pray that this day I may take up my cross and follow you. Holy Spirit, I pray that this day you will fill me with yourself and cause your fruit to ripen in my life: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Holy, blessed, and glorious Trinity, three persons in one God, have mercy upon me. Amen."
* Philo of Alexandria (first century, A.D.): "The grateful soul of a wise man is the true altar of God."
* Reinhold Niebuhr: "Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore, we must be saved by hope …. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore, we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it from our standpoint. Therefore, we must be saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness."
* Sir William Ousler: "The practice of medicine is an art, not a trade; a calling, not a business; a calling in which your heart will be exercised equally with your head. Often the best part of your work will have nothing to do with potions and powders, but with the exercise of an influence of the strong upon the weak, of the righteous upon the wicked, of the wise upon the foolish. To you, as the trusted family counselor, the father will come with his anxieties, the mother with her hidden grief, the daughter with her trials, and the son with his follies. Fully one-third of the work you do will be entered in other books than yours."
* John Wesley: "Though I am always in a haste, I am never in a hurry, because I never undertake more work than I can go through with perfect calmness of spirit."
* An unknown worshipper in a Welsh church back in 1859: "[The pastor, having read some Scripture, made a few passing remarks thereon, (and) an influence was felt by all present, which we had never experienced in the like manner before. There was a beauty, a loveliness about the Holy Word which we had never hitherto perceived. New light seemed to be thrown upon it. It electrified us, and caused us to weep for joy. The feeling became general. All present were under its influence. The hardest hearts were forced to succumb … and then we sang, aye, sang with the spirit, and repeated the hymn again and again—we could not leave off. Every heart seemed inspired to continue, and the last two lines were sung for full a quarter of an hour." (Note to myself: talk about repeating the ends of songs!)
* Jim Collins: "Every institution, no matter how great, is vulnerable to decline. Anyone can fall, and most eventually do. But decline, it turns out, is largely self-inflicted, and the path to recovery lies largely within our own hands. We are not imprisoned by our circumstances, our history, or even our staggering defeats along the way. As long as we never get entirely knocked out of the game, hope always remains. The mighty can fall, but they can often rise again.
* Jospeh Millner of Hull, 1789: It is an affecting consideration to reflect what a number of clergymen there are whose lives demonstrate them to be totally void of any religious sensibility whatever, with whom "to pray and to sermonize" is the same thing as to till the ground or to navigate the seas, a mere secular trade, and unconnected with any concern for their own salvation or that of the flocks committed to their charge.
* Henri Nouwen: "How much longer will I live? …. Only one thing seems clear to me. Every day should be well-lived. What a simple truth! Still, it is worthy my attention. Did I offer peace today? Did I bring a smile to someone's face? Did I say words of healing? Did I let go of my anger and resentment? Did I forgive? Did I love? These are the real questions. I must trust that the little bit of love that I sow now will be many fruits, here in this world and the life to come."
* Augustine: Our whole business in this life is to restore to health the eyes of the heart, whereby God may be seen.
* Epictetus the Pagan: "What else can I, a lame old man, do but sing hymns to God? If, indeed, I were a nightingale, I would be singing as a nightingale; if a swan, as a swan. But, as it is, I am a rational being, therefore I must be singing hymns of praise to God. This is my task; I do it, and will not desert this post, as long as it may be given me to fill it; and I exhort you to join with me in this same song. (Discourses 1.16,21)
Bottom line observations about these quotes:
* Over time few things of consequence change.
* Spiritual living is hard (but satisfying) work.
* Not every good insight comes from a Bible-believing, born again, Christian.
* I have so much to learn.
© 2010 Gordon MacDonald

Truth Professed, or Believed?

The difference is seen in the way we live
Why are Christians so often so mean to each other?
I think it is because we do not care enough about truth.
I think its because we do not get clear about what we believe.
I think our thinking gets fuzzy, often enabled by the kind of subculture we have created, and fuzzy thinking goes largely unnoticed. I think we need some truth champions.
For instance, here's a clear statement from the Bible: "Love must be sincere." Or it could be translated, "Love must be without hypocrisy."
How serious do you think Paul was about that one? Think it's true? Must love be without hypocrisy?
Is your church a place where people love each other without hypocrisy? Is it even seriously attempted? Do you hold one another to it? If you work on staff at a church, do you spend as much time asking if you are loving without hypocrisy as you do planning services or evaluating programs?
Or here's another one: "Be devoted to one another in brotherly love."
Tertullian famously claimed that it was said of those inside the church by those outside: "'Look' they say, 'how they love one another' (for they hated one another), 'and see how they are ready to die for one another' (for they were readier to kill one another.)"
Think that is being said a lot by people who follow our intramural conversations these days?
I will tell you what bothers me.
It is clear that Jesus was very concerned about people obeying him. He said the difference between wisdom and folly was actually doing what he said versus not actually doing what he said.
He said that his followers were to make disciples, baptizing them, and then "teaching them to obey whatever I have commanded you," a phrase that Dallas Willard has called the Great Omission from the Great Commission.
But we seem to have found a way to appear to place Jesus at the center of our faith without actually struggling very much over whether we are really doing what he said to do.
Our problem is most of us don't know what we believe.
We may know what we profess. But knowing what we actually believe turns out to be a tricky business.
I believe in gravity. It is part of my mental furniture. Therefore I always act consistently with that belief. I don't have to psych myself up to believe in it. I don't get anxious if someone else disagrees with me about it. I know that reality will teach them about gravity without my getting mean-spirited about it.
Do I believe it is more blessed to give than to receive? The best way to tell is not to ask me—its to check with my bank.
What do I really believe about these statements:
•    Bless those that curse you
•    Love your enemies
•    Live in harmony with one another
•    Do not be proud
•    Do not be conceited
Do I really believe that these commands reflect God's expectation for my life?
I find a strange and humbling truth. I can talk about, or write about, or even simply begin to think about writing about someone with whom I disagree, and suddenly I begin to experience a sense of righteous indignation or superiority or judgmentalism.
I find it easy to dislike people; not just to be mad at them or frustrated over them but to have a contemptuous spirit of dismissal. I can want to hear or think bad things about them.
Jesus was not this way.
But I can harbor these thoughts and simultaneously count myself on Jesus' side. Anne LeMott wrote that you know you have remade God in your own image when He hates all the same people you do.
Love must be sincere.
When I was a boy, if there was a single connecting point that held the evangelical subculture together, it was a man named Billy Graham. So many relationships ran through him that if a discussion started to run off the tracks, he was able to pull together the primary voices of our little movement to return to civility. Kind of like my grandmother did for me and my cousins when we were boys, "Sit down at the table and say you're sorry and shake hands before you eat. You're family. You know better."
Our community is not webbed so thickly as it once was. There are more fiefdoms, and the fief-ers are not so connected.
It will help if we grow up.
It will help if we speak the truth in love.
We are good at professing our beliefs. It will help if we actually believe what Jesus said.
© 2011 by John Ortberg

Dietrich Bonhoeffer on the Ministry of Listening

Christians, especially ministers, so often think they must always contribute something when they are in the company of others, that this is the one service they have to render. They forget that listening can be a greater service than speaking.
Many people are looking for an ear that will listen. They do not find it among Christians, because these Christians are talking where they should be listening. But he who can no longer listen to his brother will soon be no longer listening to God either; he will be doing nothing but prattle in the presence of God too. This is the beginning of the death of the spiritual life, and in the end there is nothing left but spiritual chatter.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together (New York: Harper & Row, 1954), pages 97-8

Our Greatest Need

If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent us an educator;
If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist;
If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist;
If our greatest need had been pleasure, God would have sent us an entertainer;
But our greatest need was forgiveness, so God sent us a Saviour.

source unknown

Jesus the Teacher

He never taught in the classroom.
He had no tools to work with, no blackboards, maps or charts.
He used no subject outlines, kept no records, gave no grades,
And his only text was ancient and well-worn.
His students were the poor, the lame, the deaf, the blind, the outcast
And his method was the same with all who came to hear and learn
He opened eyes with faith
He opened his ears with simple truth
And opened hearts with love, a love born of forgiveness
A gentle man, a humble man,
He asked and won no honours,
No gold awards of tribute to his expertise or wisdom.
And yet this quiet teacher from the hills of Galilee has fed the needs
Fulfilled the hopes
And changed the lives of many millions
For what he taught, brought heaven to earth
And God’s heart to all people.

source unknown

Researchers Find That Gratitude Is Learned Slowly

Researchers have proven what most parents probably knew instinctively: gratitude doesn't come naturally. In her book entitled The Gift of Thanks, Margaret Visser cites a study which observed how parents teach their children to say "hi," "thanks," and good-bye." The children in the study spontaneously said "hi" 27 percent of the time, "good-bye" 25 percent of the time, and "thanks" 7 percent of the time. Parents had to prompt their children to say "hi" 28 percent of the time, "good-bye" 33 percent of the time, and "thanks" 51 percent of the time.
In conclusion, children had a much more difficult time learning to say "thanks." Most children have to learn to say "thank you" even before they know what it means. Visser states, "Eventually, when [children] have matured and been further educated, they will come to be able to feel the emotion that the words express. The words come first, the feelings later." Perhaps this applies to adults too!
Based on this research Visser concludes that learning to be thankful involves a steep learning curve. She writes, "In our culture thanksgiving is believed to be, for most children, the very last of basic social graces they acquire … .Children have to be 'brought up' to say they are grateful. The verb is passive: they are brought up, they do not bring themselves."
Visser also notes that, although we have to grow into the practice of thanksgiving, once we finally learn to be grateful, we seldom forget it: "Such phrases [like 'thank you'] become so ingrained in us that they last when almost everything else has been forgotten. In states of aphasia, or in people suffering from Alzheimer's disease, these little phrases often survive the shipwreck of other memories."

Margaret Visser, The Gift of Thanks (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009), pp. 8-15

Firefighters Are for Weak People

Recently a firefighter in our church was told by one of his colleagues that belief in Jesus was for weak people. I found that ironic coming from a firefighter.
I have a fire hydrant in the yard that runs along the side of our house. I have never looked at the fire hydrant and felt any shame. I drive by a firehouse every day, and I never think, If this community didn't have weak people, we would never need firehouses. And when I pay my property taxes every month - taxes that help finance fire departments - I never get angry at myself, thinking, If I could just handle fires on my own, I wouldn't have to write this cheque.
Imagine a person whose house is on fire. The fire is raging out of control, and soon a fire truck pulls up, sirens blaring. The person runs out of their house in a rage and says, "How dare you come to my house and think that I can't handle this fire myself! Firefighters are for weak people—not for me!" What would you think of someone like that? You would think they were insane.
We know that fire departments are for "weak" people because a power exists that we simply can't deal with on our own: fire. Actually, we admire firefighters because they are people who have committed themselves to take on the power of fire at personal expense.
Christians are weak in the same sense that a community is "weak" for having fire departments. They are people who acknowledge that a power exists that they can't confront and live - the holiness of God. This, however, is not cause for shame, because there was a man, Jesus, who dealt with that power at his own personal expense on a cross. When someone is rescued from the flames, they're not thinking about their weakness; they're overjoyed that someone would risk it all to save them.

Dave Dorr, Cincinnati, Ohio

The Spirit's Power

Jesus said to them. "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you." (Acts 1:8)
This past Sunday morning I arrived at church to get ready for worship only to find that the power was out as a result of a storm. The building was dark; the computer and projection screens were blank; the organ and microphones didn't make a sound. Early arrivers were standing outside wondering what to do? Fortunately within a few minutes the power was restored and we went on with worship as usual.
In our traditional service that morning we sang, "Only Thou art holy; there is none beside Thee, perfect in power, in love and purity." Then in our contemporary service we sang, "More love, more power, more of You in my life." Both had been planned ahead of time for their respective services.
It made me wonder what would happen if the power of the Holy Spirit were to be temporarily cut off from our lives, from our churches. Would we notice any difference? How much do we rely on the power of the Spirit to deal with our personal problems and worries? How much do we rely on the power of the Spirit to accomplish ministry in and through us? Or are we simply relying on our own strength and our own wisdom?
Today we celebrate Pentecost - the commemoration of the coming of the Holy Spirit upon Jesus' followers after His ascension. It is considered the "birthday" of the church. (Acts 2:1-11) Pentecost is a good time to wrestle with these questions.

- Rev. David T. Wilkinson