First Things Weekend

This weekend was full of FIRST things!

My FIRST time to attend a Pearl football game cheering for the Pearl Pirates...



Moved my FIRST baby sister into college...

(She's the one on the right with the long hair.)

The FIRST time to not have my grandmother here to wish her happy birthday on August 20th...

(She would have been 69)

and...

My FIRST time to buy Cheerios! I stumbled upon a new favorite - Banana Nut Cheerios.

(I'm not usually a fan of Cheerios in any form, but these are great!)

First things can be fun, scary, sad, or just weird. But that's the way of first things. You take them as they come, and make the best of them!

Encouragement

Have you ever encountered harsh opposition at a time in your life that you were passionately following God and being obedient to His commands? It's sometimes enough to stop you dead in your tracks and that's exactly satan's intent. I want to provide you some encouragement straight from Scripture today. These new testament writers new this feeling all too well, and this is what they had to say about it. I hope it encourages you to keep pursuing righteousness no matter what people say about you.

So how am I to respond? I've decided that I really don't care about their motives, whether mixed, bad, or indifferent. Every time one of them opens his mouth, Christ is proclaimed, so I just cheer them on! And I'm going to keep that celebration going because I know how it's going to turn out. Through your faithful prayers and the generous response of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, everything he wants to do in and through me will be done. I can hardly wait to continue on my course. I don't expect to be embarrassed in the least. On the contrary, everything happening to me in this jail only serves to make Christ more accurately known, regardless of whether I live or die. They didn't shut me up; they gave me a pulpit! Alive, I'm Christ's messenger; dead, I'm his bounty. Life versus even more life! I can't lose. Philippians 1:21 MSG

If with heart and soul you're doing good, do you think you can be stopped? Even if you suffer for it, you're still better off. Don't give the opposition a second thought. Through thick and thin, keep your hearts at attention, in adoration before Christ, your Master. Be ready to speak up and tell anyone who asks why you're living the way you are, and always with the utmost courtesy. Keep a clear conscience before God so that when people throw mud at you, none of it will stick. They'll end up realizing that they're the ones who need a bath. It's better to suffer for doing good, if that's what God wants, than to be punished for doing bad. That's what Christ did definitively: suffered because of others' sins, the Righteous One for the unrighteous ones. He went through it all—was put to death and then made alive—to bring us to God. 1 Peter 3:13-18 MSG

On the iPod

If you're looking for some new music then you should check this out on iTunes. I can't seem to turn it off.

And this one's not new, but it's so good! I'm going back and forth between the songs on these albums constantly!

Enjoy!

From Contentious to Contentment - Step 2

A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones. Proverbs 14:30

Blinkers. No, not the mechanism in my car used when changing lanes or making a turn that makes my car sound like the wooden percussion instruments children beat with a stick to make music. I'm talking about the kind used on horses to limit their range of sight. Blinkers, also known as winkers or blinders, are pieces of horse tack that prevent the horse from seeing to the rear or to the side of them. Many racehorse trainers believe that these keep the horse focused on what's in front of them, encouraging them to pay attention to the race, rather than distractions, such as crowds. They are even used on driving horses to keep them from being distracted or spooked on crowded streets.

Step 2 - Stop looking around at what others have-look instead at how God has uniquely created & blessed you!

What I would give for a pair of blinkers for my own eyes most days! I'm a racehorse in a race, yet I start out of the gate most days without my blinkers on. I eventually lose focus of the race as my eyes look beside me at the other horses in the race. Next, my eyes drift up toward the crowd. The only things I notice are those more talented than me, more important than me, and the ones God seems to be blessing more than me! These distractions only lead to one thing...discontentment. Before I know it, I no longer like anything about being a racehorse and running a race is the last thing I want to do! These feelings stop me in my tracks and I sit down in the middle of the racetrack complaining to anyone who will listen (including God!) about how much better everyone has it than me. It leaves me miserable.

But on those days when I remember to put my blinkers on my eyes, I start out of the gate confident in the race I'm running and sure there's a prize to be won at the finish line. I'm focused on the goal. I'm excited about how my unique training has equipped me to succeed. I know there are other horses running beside me, but because I can't see them, their footsteps only encourage me to run faster. I know there is a crowd watching, but their collective cheers make me feel like they are all cheering for me. After all, the only thing I can see is the race I'm running. I'm focused on the finish line and I know I can reach it. It feels so good, so right.

It's amazing how true and practical the words from Proverbs are. When you have peace you have life. When you are envious, it brings destruction. When you find yourself constantly looking at everyone around you, you're going to always find someone taller, shorter, skinner, fatter, more wealthy, more intelligent, etc. So get out your blinkers and let's get focused.