Feeling worthless lately? Like you’re living under a cloud of futility or failure? Chances are, it’s because you’re being lied to, and you’re choosing to believe the lie. Below are ten hidden rules – ten lies – that, when we take them to heart, leave us knee-deep in a life of shame (and shame-based behavior). They are beliefs, using lies, leading to shame, hopelessness, ineffectiveness, and turmoil.
See how many have seeped into your belief system:
1. If I do it, I must do it reasonably well.
It doesn’t have to be perfect. But it certainly should be awesome.
2. If I do it reasonably well today, I must do it even better tomorrow.
Growth and improvement lead to better performance, which ultimately leads to perfection. [click to continue…]
It’s a universal problem, I suppose. In more than 30 years of church work, one of the most common refrains I have heard (and generated, I’m sure) is, “I don’t like my pastor.”
I’ve heard it from every conceivable angle. Staff members who feel like they’re working for an isolated jerk. Church members who miss – or are tired of – the old guy. People who can’t stand the new guy. Heck, I’ve even met pastors who didn’t like themselves.
Little did I know there is a counseling hotline available for people to call for advice or to vent their frustrations. It’s called, appropriately enough, the “I Don’t Like My Pastor Hotline” – or “Idle Miff” for short.
Idle Miff is run by a guy named Big Al, who will only give his first name. His only other known credential: he was once a pastor himself. Rumor has it that Big Al has a gift for cutting to the issue… and cutting to the quick if he has to.
And for the first time ever, Big Al has agreed to an exclusive interview. Be amazed, friends.
Be amazed, too, that Big Al probably weighs about 130 pounds dripping wet.
It’s a busy day at Idle Miff, and Big Al, as always, is working the phones alone. Mondays are always his busiest day, he says, “for obvious reasons.” So we’ll just have to be OK to catch him between hotline calls.
Not a problem, says I. It’ll be fun to see him in operation. [click to continue…]
How’s this for a welcome to a pastor’s study?
NOTICE
The Pastor of Calvary Church Receives Sinners and Eats With Them.
Any Questions?
Now there’s a guy who’s either long on courage or short on brains! But he knows his New Testament. And if he does it in the right spirit, he also understands something about the searching heart of God.
In answer to the question hanging on the pastor’s door, Jesus once told a story. [click to continue…]
(Here’s a parable that didn’t quite make it to the Bible. It’s a follow-up to the story of the Prodigal Son. In case you missed that first episode, you can find it by clicking here.)
When last we heard from the Prodigal Son, his loving father, and his older brother, Dad was appealing to the older sibling to come join the party.
“All that I have is yours,” he was saying – which was technically true, since the younger brat had wasted all of his part of the inheritance.
By and by, life settled down. The older brother continued to do well, and was admired by all for his performance. The younger son got with the program – for the most part. Occasionally his friends and family could see some of those old streaks of self-will-run-riot in him. But for the most part, he lived in great gratitude for his father’s forgiveness and restoration. [click to continue…]
An old fable passed down for generations (and doctored a little bit)…
An elderly man was traveling with a boy and a donkey. As they walked through a village, the man was leading the donkey and the boy was walking behind. The young people there said the old man was a fool for not riding, so to please them he climbed on the animal’s back.
When they came to the next village, the moms in the crowd said the old man was cruel to let the child walk while he enjoyed the ride. To please them, he got off and set the boy on the donkey’s back and continued on his way.
In the third village, senior adults accused the child of being lazy for making the old man walk. The suggestion was made that they both ride. So the man climbed on and they set off again.
In the fourth village, the animal rights activists were indignant at the cruelty to the donkey because he was made to carry two people.
The frustrated man was last seen carrying the donkey down the road. [click to continue…]
“I feel like a man with three dollars in my pocket. Maybe a quart in my tank. And what astounds me is how quickly I think about spending what little I have. I get a little bit back in my soul and I start thinking about advancing the Kingdom. People that need my help. I get a little bit of God back in my tank and I start thinking about who I need to pray for. Lord have mercy” (John Eldridge)
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Hi, I’m Andy, and I’m a fumaholic.
(All: “Hi Andy!”)
I’m really glad to be here tonight to share my experience, strength and hope with you. The First Step says that “we admitted we were powerless over our fumaholism, and that our lives had become unmanageable.” So tonight I thought I would share how my life got to that place.
I’d like to start with a couple of confessions… that is okay in a place like this, isn’t it?
(Room erupts with raucous laughter) [click to continue…]
Imagine for a minute that you’re five years old. You have taken your crayons and, on your own initiative, made a card for your grandparents. No special occasion… just an “I love you” message of your own design.
Hopefully you are motivated by a simple desire to express love to your grandparents. At the same time, even at age five, you probably also assume that your parents, teacher(s) or somebody will also be proud of you.
Praise you.
Approve of you.
The big word for that: validated. And it feels good.
But what if you got something else in return? [click to continue…]
There’s a reason you wouldn’t name your precious baby boy “Herod.” He made Judas look like a choirboy, and Peter look like, uh, the Pope.
Herod Antipas was the kind of guy who would torture your cat for no apparent reason. A thug and a bully, Herod was a manipulator and would betray his own family if it meant getting more power. The only thing sacred to this man was whatever he wanted in the moment.
Herod’s first wife was an Arabian princess. No joke. Can you imagine a more romantic idea for a lifetime companion in the Middle East? Apparently Herod could. [click to continue…]
Think fast. Salvation aside, if you were to lose everything you own – visible and invisible – what would be the most costly to replace? Your house? Your land? Your health? Your friendships? Your family? Your valuable antiques?
Tough question, isn’t it? But it’s an important one. After all, we spend a great deal of time and money protecting ourselves against possible losses. That’s what the insurance industry is all about. And just as insurance underwriters have a system for determining “replacement value,” we also need a clear sense of what is most valuable. The Bible gives us some direction for that in Proverbs 22:1:
“A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches,
Loving favor rather than silver and gold.”
Your most irreplaceable possession cannot be bought or sold. It isn’t a commodity – like family or health – that can be earned or borrowed. Your most precious possession is your integrity. Your good name!
I can hear some of your brains now. “Oh, THAT! Yeah, I guess so.”
But think about it. [click to continue…]
In the course of this short year so far, I have been reminded suddenly, and sometimes rudely, how short life can be, and how there are no guarantees of the things or people we tend to take for granted in this world.
I have also been reminded that life is filled with the potential to make mistakes. Sometimes those mistakes arise out of misguided values. Sometimes out of boneheaded stubbornness. Sometimes mistakes arise out of good things taken too far in self-serving directions. Often those mistakes come when we lose our sense of balance.
I’ve thought a lot lately about how short life is, and frankly, sometimes how much shorter that I wish it could be. Hillsong United’s “Soon” sure sounds appealing: [click to continue…]
Feeling worthless lately? Like you’re living under a cloud of futility or failure? Chances are, it’s because you’re being lied to, and you’re choosing to believe the lie. Below are ten hidden rules – ten lies – that, when we take them to heart, leave us knee-deep in a life of shame (and shame-based behavior). They are beliefs, using lies, leading to shame, hopelessness, ineffectiveness, and turmoil.
