I am NOT cut out for this!

I love people! They amuse me. They intrigue me. The are all all together alike and at the same time all together different. God loves people more than I do. He made each of them differently. Abraham Lincoln is quoted as saying this: “God must love the common man, he made so many of them.”

Someone else said, "You are unique... just like everyone else!" 

The Psalmist said this in Psalm 139:13-14. 

 For you (LORD) created my inmost being;

    you knit me together in my mother's womb.

  I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;

    your works are wonderful,

    I know that full well.

Just because the Bible says this does not mean that I (or you... or we) feel this way. When was the last time that you looked in the mirror and said, "Yay God!?" No, most of us are more likely to see what we do not like about ourselves. It goes beyond physical appearances. (If you don't yet "get this," one day you will.)

So, I and millions or billions of others bemoan the reality of who we are. I want to be great at everything but there are some things that I really stink at. God made me like that. I can do some things quite easily while other things... I just don't get. I want to say, "I'm just not cut out for this!"

I am right. I am not meant to be everything to everyone. I am not a Renaissance man. I am designed to do what I have been made to do.To sit back and dream of what I would love to be but can't, only strangles my mission in being all that God has made me to be.

All alone, I am like a solitary puzzle piece. There is no story, no greater purpose and no apparent significance. That is why I need other people; Those strange, not like me or anyone else types.  

We are a piece of the puzzle. Yes, you may not be cut out for "this" BUT you are cut out for something. Find out what it is and then connect with the rest of the pieces. Enjoy it and you might find yourself agreeing with the psalmist and saying, "I am fearfully and wonderfully made!" 

What Will Heaven Be Like?

Questions are not uncommon when our two nephews come for a visit. Now seven, they have been asking us "stumpers" for years.

I remember a friend who was telling me that he thought that he had a good grasp on the concept of the Trinity. "Then," he said, "My five year old began to ask me questions." If you want the depth of your knowledge to be tested, try to answer the questions of a small and curious child.


Fortunately, Nadine and I have been able to slip by some of Sam and Elijah's inquiries by simply saying, "That's a good question for your dad." It turns out that the same thing is going on in Weston's Mills where their dad sometimes says, "That's a good question for Aunt Nadine or Uncle Bryan." Ultimately we are all better for the questions.


Something we all have probably wondered and still don't know is this, "What will heaven be like?" It is an impossible thing to fully understand or explain.


Paul put it like this in the letter we know of as 2 Corinthians.
I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago—whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do not know, God knows—such a man was caught up to the third heaven. And I know how such a man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, God knows— was caught up into Paradise and heard inexpressible words, which a man is not permitted to speak. 2 COR 12:2-4


So, until we get there, we just won't really know... not fully. Our hopes and general ideas about heaven are but whispers of the splendor of what awaits us on the other side.

Recently as I have been searching for a set of lost keys (anyone seen a Ford fob with a remote starter attached?), I have found comfort in the fact that in heaven, no one will ever lose their keys! In fact, we won't even need anything locked or secured. 


That alone is cause for pause. 

I Blog! I Blog Now!!

So here I am... Blogging. The title of my first blog brings to mind a scene in the film, "What About Bob." You may recall the scene where Bob is strapped to the mast of a sailboat calling out,  "Isn't this a breakthrough, that I'm a sailor? I sail? I sail now?" 


I don't know if this is a breakthrough but here I go. This came about by suggestion of my son Aaron. Thanks Aaron.


I am a member of many things: a family, a country, a workforce, a group of friends and a church. But the first and most significant thing about me is that I have been made a son of God through Jesus my Savior. I am a part of God's family now. 


I am a work in process and that is what this blog is about: God changing my life and the lives of others. It is about the ordinary encountering the extraordinary. 

My hope is that we will all find some encouragement as we strap ourselves to God's mast and see where He will take us... despite our doubts, fears and inhibitions.