Find your own Calcutta.

This true story that Tony Campolo tells is too good not to share…

A woman who had been deserted by her husband visited a pastor friend of mine one day.  Her husband had run off with a younger woman, leaving her bereft, troubled, and broken.

My friend suggested that she put some time in missionary work, thinking that doing something for others might help her forget herself for alittle while and alleviate her pain.

Taking his advice, the dejected wife wrote to Mother Teresa in Calcutta, India. 

Hungry people are everywhere.

Hungry people are everywhere.

One morning, years ago, I was running tight to leave for work.  I was standing at the kitchen counter drinking my morning protein shake and my five year-old son Elijah walked in from just waking up.

“Dad, I want some breakfast.”

Renee was still asleep from working late the night before and I said, “I’m sorry, son.  I can’t get you anything right now.  Mom will be up soon and she’ll take care of you.”

He paused thoughtfully while I finished my shake and then said, “Dad, if you saw a hungry man, would you give him something to eat?”

Now how do you answer that?

Painting God’s portrait well

As followers of Jesus, we are called to reflect God with our lives, describe God with our words, to point others to Him.

Is the description, the image of God others are getting from us compelling enough to draw them to Him?

As true today as it was nearly 50 years ago, I love what J.B. Phillips wrote in Your God Is Too Small:

The trouble with many people today is that they have not found a God big enough for modern needs.  While their experience of life has grown in a score of directions, and their mental horizons have been expanded to the point of bewilderment…their ideas of God have remained largely static.

The appreciating factor of youth

Today our son Elijah turns 15. Is that even possible?

It seems it was just not at all that long ago I was sliding through icy intersections getting Renee to the hospital so we could meet little Elijah Moses.  How quickly the years have gone.

I suppose a father is allowed to wax a bit nostalgic (and maybe even proud) as he considers his son getting closer and closer to adulthood.

Elijah is intelligent, great with little kids, ministry-minded, and has an entertaining sense of humor.  I just like being around him.  And he still tells us that he loves us a few times a day.

I’m happy to be his dad.

As I reflect on this, I simply want to encourage you in this post to appreciate a young person in your life.

What makes you weep or pound the table?

According to Bobb Biehl in his book, Masterplanning, if you want to idenitfy what your core drivers are and what needs God has purposed you to meet, ask yourself this question:

“What makes me weep or pound the table?”

The answers to this question say a lot about how God wired you, which says a lot about His purposes for you.