Psalm 37:4 Delight yourself in the Lord;
And He will give you the desires of your heart.
First thought - this one I have been thinking about for a while and for the life of me can't find the song that started this. If I do hear it soon, I will respond on the blog. Anyway, what I hear in the song is that we go through trials, tribulations and sorrow. God sees this sorrow and is happy we are crying. I may be simplifying this a bit, but really? God is happy we are going through these tough times? I know the Bible says there will be tough times, but I don't remember seeing a place where it says God will be happy when we are sad. I think about being a parent. When my child goes through a tough time, I am right there with her. I am not happy. What do you think??
Next thought - My next class has to do with Ministry Ethics and I just started the reading. Just based on the topic you know it is going to be interesting. Last night I was wondering how churches measure success, then I wondered how pastors measure success and then this morning I wondered how we as individual Christians measure success. Then, I was wondering if we should even look at measuring success. I am still transitioning out of my corporate world and we always had goals/measurements/updates etc... So I am wondering, do any of you measure success as a Christian in any of these ways? As a church or individual?
Oh and here is a website I was looking at as I wrestle with this idea: http://www.goodnewsdispatch.org/success.html
Cool thought - At basketball practice last week I was wearing this bracelet:
A few girls asked me what it stood for and they were excited to know I was a believer.
Last thought - since it is the New Year, does anyone make resolutions? Specifically I am wondering if anyone ever kept one or achieved one? I don't care about the subject. Just curious. I am working on making better choices this year with what I eat, how I spend my time, you get the picture.
Happy New Year everyone - blessings for 2013 and beyond :-)
You threw a lot of things at us in this blog.
ReplyDeleteMinistry ethics sounds like a topic/class I'd like to sit in on. I believe a lot of lay people could really benefit from it also. Probably the last time I'll ever be on a church council was just a few years ago. Big difference of opinion over our minister and and many council members on how she did things. What really bothered me the most in the struggles we went through was that very very few people looked at the mission of the church and what we were accomplishing in the God department. What all were looking at was the number of fannies in the pews and the declining revenues. I'll admit to the importance of being able to keep the church functioning however there was little to no focus on doing the job God called us to do. Instead it was the worry over finances, programs, the building itself, and who was mad at who rather than bringing souls to Christ.
I struggle with God being happy over our struggles. As parents we know how trials and tribulations make our kids stronger in the long run but we're concerned and wanting to be helpful while they are going through them. Isn't that more the nature of how God wants to be with us? I don't know. Interesting thing to ponder for a while.
I like the bracelet. Does the last "down" arrow signify when He's coming back? I don't think I've ever seen that one before.
Happy New Year to you too!