Where do you stare in the midst of a storm?

In Matthew chapter 14:22-33 Matthew recalls the events that told about the storm that the went through.  In this particular event Peter comes out of the boat and walks towards Jesus but as he walks he takes his eyes off Jesus and begins to sink in the midst of the storm.  Peter called out to Jesus to save him and the Bible says that Jesus immediately stretched out His hand and caught Peter. 

This event made me think where do I have my eyes during  storms in my life.  Do I have them on Jesus or do I have them on the storm and become afraid of what is happening around me.  A lot of times we take our eyes off Jesus and immediately we begin to sink and forget that Jesus is right there to take care of what we are going through.  But we shouldn’t be afraid because Jesus is right there to immediately catch us and take care of what we need. That’s not to say we will get the answer we want but it does say that he will be right there to catch us should we become afraid and need Jesus’ help. So I ask you where do you have your eyes during a storm in your life, are they on Jesus or are you sinking in the storm afraid of what is happening around you.

6 Ways Jesus Found Rest

Today in church our Pastor Jim Brown ( Pastor of Delmar Christian Center)gave us 6 ways that Jesus found rest and I thought they were so good I should just share them.   I know that in this busy time of my life that it is hard for me to find rest and these 6 items made a lot of sense to me.

1. He prayed and trusted God is Father for everything.

2. He did whatever He could each day and did not fret over tomorrow.

3. He focused His energy on relationships not things.

4. He looked each day for what he might give not what He got.

5. He valued spiritual reality far above the thngs of this world.

6. He sought to forgive, to love, to be patient and to heal.

I think that if we all focused on how Jesus obtained rest our souls would be more at peace and just think of all the things that we would accomplish for God’s kingdom.  All these things seem like a lot of work but I know that in order to bring my soul to rest it will be worth it.

Rick and Bubba’s Guide to the Almost Nearly Perfect Marriage by: Rick Burgess and Bill “Bubba” Bussey

I just finished reading the book and found it to be a very enjoyable book to read.  In the book Rick and Bubba talk about many topics but a couple of them that stood out to me.  The first one is His money Her money.  This chapter talked about how the money should be both of theirs and paying the bills should be a team effort not divided into his or her money.  The second point that they make in the book that stood out to me was that marriage is what you make of it.  You can make your spouse feel any way you want them to feel.  It’s the power of the tongue and what you are speaking into the marriage that can make or break our marriages.

The short chapters helped me to stay focused on what I was reading.  Using humor also helped keep my attention on the chapters and I especially liked the top 10 lists that they put throughout the book.  It was a very funny book that also brought a good message of how you can keep your marriage alive and full-filling.   This book was definitely worth the read and will challenge you to look at your marriage in a totally different way, I know it did for me.

Bringing me back to earth

There’s nothing like realizing that you have thought more of yourself than you really are.  Tonight I sat down to make a dessert for a picnic tomorrow and all I could think was how good I would look when people saw this wonderful dish I could make.  Well the dessert didn’t look as beautiful as I wanted it to look and I was reminded by the Lord that I was wanting all the glory for that dessert instead of how much it would bless people.  So I had to ask my self why did I really want to make this dessert; was it to bless the people at the picnic or was it to make myself look good. And I had to answer it was to make myself look good.  It is just like God to use a dessert to  bring me back down to earth and realize what I do things for.

Generosity

On Sunday I heard a local pastor preach about generosity. This got me thinking about in my life how much I had actually been generous to people around me. He talked about how Rebekkah had given water to the servant and then to the servants camels and I had to wonder how many times had I gone out of my way to be generous to another person. How many times have I not listened to God’s voice to give out of His love and His generosity. So I ask you how generous have you been? What have you done for God lately? I know I haven’t done very much and that I have to change.

New Grandson

On July 13, 2009 our daughter gave birth to our first grandchild a little boy. We are very proud grandparents. A lot of joy to be had in our house now.

Perspective

I just finished ready the book “The Noticer” by Andy Andrews.  It was a great book.  It talked about perspective and how you look at life.  So I began to wonder how is it that I was looking at my life.  Was I looking at it through God’s eyes or was I looking at it through my one sided eyes.  I think about all the things that I have been through in the past few years and I had to think what perspective had I been looking through.  I have to say that the perspective I had looking at was not through the eyes that God has for me and His perspective but my perspective that wasn’t a very good one.  A character in the book says “All a person needs is a little perspective.”  I think this is so true.  If we just take a little perspective we can see ourselves just as God sees us. So I ask you, Do you have a little perspective?