You are likely familiar with the nursery rhyme “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” Words may not break our bones, but if left to run wild in the wilderness of our imaginations words can in fact wound our souls so deeply, if not filtered through the Truth of the Gospel.
To lower the bar of expectation and hold someone to less of a standard feels to me as though I am distrusting, cynical, or even jaded. However, through our many disappointments, frustrations, and even heartbreaks my wife and I have coined a phrase: "let people be people."
The word retreat has a few applications. In war, to retreat is to pull back from a fight that is no longer serving the mission in order to live to fight another day. Sometimes we retreat into our homes to unplug and rest either alone or with our spouse. We may go on retreats with likeminded people for our work, marriage, or spiritual well being.
So, what is enough? How much money will make you happy? How much experience will leave you fulfilled? How much strength or intelligence will it take to keep you secure? When we are focused on these things the answer will always be more than I have right now.
The Pharisees were the most learned segment of the Jewish culture in Jesus’ day. They knew the Scriptures forward and backward; they knew the law, knew the prophesies and were living in anticipation of the coming of Messiah. And yet, when He arrived they missed Him. Why?
How often does it happen that when we find ourselves in a difficult situation we look for something or someone to blame? Sometimes bad things happen - sometimes through no fault of our own - and yet it lands squarely in our laps to deal with.
Christian Quips, in my estimation, are those sayings that have been coined to pacify our ache, explain away the unexplainable, and sometimes motivate or silence those to whom the phrase is directed.
Whether we realized it or not, a lot of our understanding of the character of God comes from our parents and likewise our children’s view of God comes from us.
We are emotional creatures, there’s no denying it and no need to apologize for it. Emotions are indicative of how we feel, happy, sad, overwhelmed, overjoyed, and so on. Emotions are not bad, they are simply part of being human.
It is so easy – a very human thing to do - to get just a degree or two out of phase when it comes to rules and begin to serve them. We are not meant to serve the rules, however, they are meant to serve us. Rules are there, not to be our focus, but to keep us focused.
