Update

Update for Sunday, Oct. 11th, 2015

"If you feed them, they will come!"

A loud and boisterous "Thank You" for all who brought breakfast dishes last Sunday. Also, to all of you who help clean up after one of our "First Sunday" events, "Thank You". I know many of you look forward to every "First Sunday" and we are thankful for this opportunity. 

This Sunday's Lesson: God's Promise of a New Home

Scripture: Revelation: 21: 1-8

Mrs. Pat is on a trip so I will be teaching the next two weeks. I look forward to seeing you this week.

The following is from Dr. Kevin Elko. Dr. Elko is a Christian Sport Psychologist. He has worked with many teams on the professional and collegiate level. I subscribe (free) to his weekly Monday Morning Cup of Inspiration and it challenges me for the whole week. If you would like to subscribe, go to http://www.drelko.com/ and on the right side of website is the Newsletter and Monday Morning registration. 

The following came from his newsletter:

Heels Off!!!!

Dr. Kevin Elko

I believe everything teaches us, if we stop to reflect on what it could teach. September 11, 2001, taught me lessons I will carry the rest of my life.

I was called into New York City immediately after 9/11 to work with people who were impacted by the terrorists’ acts. Arriving there immediately after the planes hit, I saw people with casts on their legs because they were trampled in the street, I saw remains taken out of ground zero as firemen and their comrades stood at attention and saluted the fallen, and I saw the kindest, caring people you can imagine.

As a counselor, I was taught, when going into catastrophic situations, to protect myself, to interact, yes, but not to walk into something that is so emotionally charged that I could lose my balance. The fireman knocked me off balance, a staggering that woke my soul. Here were people who ran into the World Trade Center, giving up everything for people they didn’t even know.

To act is not a feeling but a choice

Christ was the one who taught us by his example—to feel and then act—when he fed 5,000 people that he didn’t know and healed the blind he had just met. My first lesson from 9/11 is to look, feel and then act – not to dismiss, saying, "That’s a shame," or even to urge someone else to do it. To act is not a feeling but a choice. Set out each day, looking for someone who needs something, feel compassion for that person, and then act. Don’t judge or say they should have done this or that they brought the situation on themselves (which obviously people did not cause 9/11), but rather act. Mercy always trumps judgment. Today, make a choice to intentionally love somebody. And if your heart is big enough, open it up and love everybody.

While at NYC, I met with a security guard describing the inside of one of the buildings immediately after a plane hit. He said he stood there screaming up the stairwell, "Take your heels off!" Then, he started to cry and said, "People died because I could not get them to take their heels off." Have you ever thought how much your behavior has an effect on others? This other lesson of 9/11 haunts me.

The metaphor of "take your heels off" has been powerful to me. To get anything in life, you have to take something off. Take off your pride if you want to grow and become a complete person. Take off your ego if you want a real relationship with God. Take off your need to be right if you really want peace in your life.

To find God, remove what isn’t God

We don’t need to find peace, joy or God; we have to remove what isn’t God and those things, and God and those things will find us. I have a good friend who says all the time, "I haven’t gotten much of anything by praying to God. But I lost my anger, the bitterness in my heart, my self-absorption about my life and my fear of death." Take your heels off; take off what limits you to become more.

The ultimate "take your heels off" is forgiveness. We cannot put peace and freedom on us until we forgive; it is a type of taking our heels off. Forgiveness is not a feeling, and for that reason, people can’t do it: they want to FEEL their way to forgiveness. But it’s a choice; you never feel like forgiving! The person who forgives is not the one who is wrong but rather is the one who is spiritually mature and makes the decision, not who captures a feeling.

At one of my presentations, a man said, "I haven’t spoken to my brother for seventeen years over my mother’s tombstone. Please excuse me; I am stepping out right now to call him. I don’t even remember the original argument, but I am asking him to please forgive me." The man did not have a feeling but was making a choice; to have a relationship with someone he loved he had to take the heel of pride off.

So now what? Once you realize the truth, what do you do with it? Your money is not your wealth, but your time is. Most people’s lives do not end too quickly, but they start too late. They walk around like they’re living a dress rehearsal. You should have a flashing sign in your brain: live because 9/11 is coming, and nobody escapes.

Coach Pagano of the NFL Indianapolis Colts became friends with a little girl with cancer while he was taking chemo. After he had finished, she sent him the following note, "Dreams are something your mind knows to be true and your soul wants to follow." The little girl’s mother delivered it to Chuck; three days later, the little girl died.

Live full so you can die empty

Right now there is something in you that your head wants to follow and your soul knows to be true, but you keep ignoring it; you keep living in quiet desperation. Yet you heard it inside of you too many times for it not to be the truth. You got caught up in full crisis living like the rest of us, but the real crisis is not here; when it comes, it will demand front center stage. Then, there will be no energy for this dream. Live full so you can die empty. Do it now with urgency because your personal 9/11 is coming with a bang.

Look, see, feel, act – that is what Christ taught us. Think that what you do impacts all. Curing oneself of the disease of "me" is a daily healing, because it never goes away. Get rid of what is not peace, joy and God, and all of these will find you.

In Asheville, North Carolina, in the middle of town stands a big wall with the words "Before I die, I will" written fifty times with a blank line after it. What is your blank? Before I die, I will find a cure for cancer. Before I die, I will help feed starving people. Before I die, I will write a book that will impact others. What would you write? Well, then, start writing. Whatever it is, do it now. Your 9/11 is coming.