Month: September 2025

Mornings are important. They set the tone for your entire day. Don’t spend your mornings stressing out about all your tasks. Make it a point to spend a few moments giving thanks for all of your blessings. You should go into your day feeling as though you are ahead of the game. That you can handle whatever comes your way.

Give yourself something to look forward to. An activity you enjoy, or just the chance to be with someone you love. Be determined to be at peace. Be prepared to resist anger. Carry joy with you everywhere.

You just may find it is contagious. Instead of letting everything around you bring you down, be the one who brings everything around you up. It all starts with your mindset in the morning. You control it.

I was driving through town when I approached a red light. Several cars were ahead of me waiting for the light to change. I glanced to my right and saw a car attempting to come out of a business parking lot on to the street. I stopped short to allow the driver to come out in front of me. The driver pulled out without so much as acknowledging me.

I know we are supposed to be kind just for kindness sake, but I confess I was annoyed. How rude and ungrateful, I thought, to not even give me a wave, or some indication of gratitude. What good is a good deed if nobody knows you’ve done it?

Somebody does know. You did it for Him. I need to keep that in mind.

Fasting has become a trendy way to lose weight. I guess you could call it the ultimate diet. You just don’t eat. Folks like it because weight loss is quick and steep. It’s the closest thing to instant gratification that the dieting world can provide. I admire people who can do it effectively. Fasting is also commonly done for spiritual reasons. Sacrificing the joy of food to demonstrate one’s will to serve God’s purpose.

I’ve tried it, but I lack the willpower. When I’m fasting, I’m constantly thinking about food, and how hungry I am. When I come off the fast, I eat twice as much to compensate. Being hungry makes me grumpy. I think the term coined for it is “hangry”.

Another weight loss strategy is to actually eat more often. To consume a very small amount of food several times a day. Now there’s a plan I can get behind. Weight loss will be slower but steady. That’s okay. Patience is easier than sacrifice.

I sit down in front of my computer and fire it up. I need to find some important information from my bank account. As the machine boots up, the cover page of my desktop is jam packed with enticing headlines, all trying to lure me into clicking on what appear to be fascinating articles about the lives of movie stars, or a breaking news item about my football team, or a can’t-fail scheme to make a fortune, or an extreme political view.

Sometimes I can’t resist, even though I know most of it is just click bait. The stories seldom actually reveal anything substantive, or even true. Often, I get to reading some of these things, and then turn the computer off, completely forgetting my original purpose. I lack focus.

The quality of your life depends on your ability to identify the things that are truly important, the things that bring you real joy, and to focus on them. Don’t be distracted by splashy, superficial things that don’t matter. Don’t let your life become click bait.

About a year ago I was pressure washing my driveway when I felt the urge to sneeze. The sudden jerk of my body during the sneeze caused my arm to point inward, spraying the jetted water on my leg. The blast only hit me for less than a second, yet it still left a nasty gash in my leg. The power of water under high pressure is amazing.

The wound healed but morphed into an ugly scar about two inches long, just below my knee. It looked, I thought, like the kind of scar that would remain the rest of my life. Just great. Now every time I wear shorts I will have to explain to people the stupid way I got the blemish.

But somehow, oh so gradually, the mark shrunk smaller and smaller. I was noticing today, just over a year later, it is pretty much completely gone.

They say time heals all wounds. If you are troubled, stressed and worried about something in your life, maybe the answer is to just give it some time. The human body has an amazing ability to heal. Perhaps the mind and the soul can heal as well.

I found the most interesting statistic the other day. A Gallup poll was conducted internationally, asking people if they always find peace in their lives. The country with the highest percentage of people who feel at peace was Nicaragua, at 73 percent. Close behind were Uzbekistan (72%), El Salvador (71%), Panama (69%), and Honduras (67%).

These are some of the poorest countries on the globe in terms of money. Yet the great majority of their people are content with what they have, and apparently don’t stress about what they don’t have. By the way, the United States, which is one of the wealthiest nations in the world, had only 28 percent of respondents say they felt at peace.

They say money can’t buy happiness. Clearly, it can’t buy peace either.

On a recent Sunday morning I was asked to deliver the sermon at an area church. I worked hard to prepare the message and was convinced it was going to be great. But as I stood at the lectern, doing my best to speak with fervor and passion, I noticed a man sitting at the end of one of the pews was sound asleep.

I tried to ignore him, there were many attentive folks in attendance. But my eyes kept going back to him. I found myself over-emphasizing certain words and saying them loudly, in an attempt to wake him up. Didn’t work. He missed a good message. I don’t know if I delivered it well, but the message was good.

It gave me a new appreciation for preachers and sermons. I make it a point to pay more attention now. Wonder how much good stuff I’ve missed by allowing myself to daydream.

You need to rest. I know you are busy. I know you have places to go, people to see, things to do, but you need to rest. You need at least seven hours of sleep each night. If you don’t get that much overnight, then you need to find time for a nap during the day.

Cheating on sleep will catch up with you. Your immune system gets weaker. Your brain functions slow down. You will tend to eat more food, gain more weight, exercise less and lose muscle tone. A chronically tired body will eventually become diseased, and kill you.

If you are too busy to sleep, you are too busy. Do whatever you have to do to take a break from stress and worry, and take time to relax. Everything inside of you will say Thank-you.

The other day I was driving through town and, as I stopped at a red light, I heard a man shouting “Are you saved?” I looked to see a sixty or seventy-something man standing on the street corner, holding signs proclaiming Jesus as savior. He was parading up and down the sidewalk yelling praises at stopped cars.

I found myself with mixed emotions. Part of me felt I should be out there alongside of him. But another part of me wondered if such an undertaking really does any good. Is anybody really brought closer to Jesus? Or do people just laugh at his bold display?

Clearly, it doesn’t matter to him. He’s doing what he feels God is leading him to do. May it be so for all of us.

Most of us are afraid to die. We must be. Why else would we spend so much time going to doctors, having surgeries, and taking so many pills. We’re trying to live as long as we can, with the highest quality of life possible.

But, as they say, nobody gets out of here alive. Physical death is a certainty. It is inevitable. We try to avoid thinking about it. That may be why, when it becomes imminent, it frightens us so. If death is assured, it makes sense to prepare for it, not avoid thinking about it. The best way to do that is to secure your eternal future.

Jesus is your ultimate retirement plan.