Packing: How do you trust God?

“Don’t take along gold, silver or copper for your money-belt. Don’t take a traveling bag for the road, or an extra shirt, sandals, or walking stick, for the worker is worthy of his food.” Matthew 10:9-10

When preparing for a trip it seems like we have so much we take with us. We have to make sure we have enough clothes, shoes, more clothes for activities and well shoes for that too. We have to make sure we have some way to communicate and pass the time in the lull, not to mention enough money to get what we need and a few things we want.

But, what else do we take with us? Expectations, worries and concerns. There are so many stories in the bible about trips and journeys and most of us will not take a trip as big or impressive as half of those in the bible. What did most people in the bible take with them? Most of these people took the clothes on their backs and very little else.

We can start by looking all the way back to Exodus, yeah they took all their belongings because they were moving to a new place not knowing where they were going, but they didn’t take with them enough food for the journey. Quite frankly, they had no clue how much food they would need to take. What did God do for them? He rained food for them to feed them.

Now one thing that has held constant is that most of us still take worry and concern with us. Even as we step out and knowing that we are traveling to do something that God wishes us to do, there is still concern.  We trust God, but still our flesh keeps us from trusting completely. What then? Why do we all fall so short from what God wishes for us?

Most of these trips, especially the spiritual ones, are made to help us draw closer to God. We are told not to worry so many times in the bible, but we are never told not to question. In fact we are told to question everything to test it to see if it is Godly or if it is something to cast aside. 

With Spiritual journeys we typically carry with us a lot more than physical journeys. We carry not only worry, but doubt and then there is the luggage from our past. We carry with us every time we have fallen, every time we have struggled to stand. Is this a bad thing? It depends on your perspective. If you focus on it as a doubt and a list of all the times you have failed or you have been failed, then it’s a bad things. If you carry it with you as a reminder of how many times you have fallen on your face and eventually gotten back on your feet, or how many times God has been there, then that is a positive reassurance for you.

There is a lot that goes on in every day life that packs on a lot of negative energy, emotion and habit. So to combat all of this what do we do? How do we prepare for the world and what it has for us? Well if we look at the lessons that we are given from God’s word, then we have what we need. We have instructions. When you rise, put God in your heart with a prayer.

Start the day with a conversation with God to prepare you for the day. Second spend a few minutes while you are getting some coffee in your system to read a few passages from the bible, even if it is one or two chapters. While you are on your commute, talk with God about whatever is on your heart. These are all things that you can do.

Just like exercise for the body daily is great for keeping your body in shape. Do a few bible curls to strengthen the soul. A few mind games or puzzles for the mind. That is one thing from eastern philosophy that is spot on, true strength lies with not only the body, but the mind and soul as well. The mind and body must expand to the spirit or soul or it is not complete.

We humans are three parts of one whole, and from that an extension of the one true God. We are body, mind and soul. Father, Son and the Holy Spirit; three parts of the same whole. So strengthen that which is your weakest you cannot focus on the weakest part, but the other two will help you strengthen the weakest part. A knee is not just two bones meeting; there is muscle and ligament with that muscle. If you have a weak ligament you have to work on the muscle to help it out.  

So when we are gathering together things for a journey, you have the physical needs as well as the mental and spiritual ones. Careful how you pack your bags though, if you pack in too much you leave no room for the chance encounters that can be life changing, and no room for new things to be added to your life.

God uses all journeys in a multitude of ways. It is only after we have gone through them do we come close to getting what God intended for us. Sometimes it is many years down the road before we have developed the wisdom to understand what we have gone through and why. So I leave you with a question to answer for yourself.

What have you gone through in your life that you still cannot understand why you did it or had to go through it? Pray and open your mind to see if there was a lesson that you learned through it. Was there a higher purpose for it?

“A wise man can learn more from a foolish question than a fool can learn from a wise answer.” Bruce Lee

A Question of Human nature

I have always thought much about people and why they do what they do. It was always hard for me to imagine how for so long that pain and suffering has existed. Receiving the question of why do people write viruses over and over, for me there is many answers, but it comes down to one. The answer is, because they can.

It is the same answer for many things. Why do people hurt one another? Why do people steal, when they do not need it? Why must the strong always oppress the weak? Why must there always be a struggle? Humans are greedy people. We want what we do not have, and, by nature, are not happy with what they have.

Greed is the root of so much that is wrong with our lives and our world. The world is a big place, but each day we try to make it a little smaller. Someone once said, in response to the question of why World Domination will never occur. The answer was, “The world is too big, and the people are too different for any one group or ideal to dominate it all.”

Many have also said you cannot change the world, but you can change yourself and help change the things you touch. Now from this point your mind could be going in many different directions, but primarily along two different paths, negative and positive. So is the reason the world becoming smaller is so someone can control it? Or as we touch so much more and so many more people, can we not more effectively change more that we touch?

But what does this have to do with viruses? How to viruses spread? Everyone knows how a cold spreads, through contact. Viruses the same way. Ideas are humanities greatest virus. They spread as one to the other. If an idea takes hold, a notion, it can spread like wildfire. We see this every day in every facet of our lives. The idea that certain clothes look cool to the idea that this diet will work for you, to the idea that this person or that person knows what they are talking about.

These ideas build our society, and society, a lot of times, define our world. We are in an information age, so now more than ever is the concept true that Ideas are some of the most powerful and dangerous things out there. We have seen this in popular culture going back for some time. Inception was not the first, and neither was the Matrix. George Orwell's 1984 showed us an idea of control.

We flash back quite a way to the ideas that changed the world. From, “Fire good!” to Jesus might know what he's talking about to, E=MC2 is a good recipe for a weapon, to if we hook computers together they are much more powerful, to hey what if I could take my phone with me. Ideas change and shape our world and our lives.

Hey if a man letting himself get struck by lightning can change the world... why can't you? I mean really think about it, Ben Franklin, indisputably one of the most revolutionary men in history really shone with the great idea of being able to harness electricity, but what did he do. “Hey guys watch this! I'm gonna tie a key to this kite to prove that electricity is real.” I mean seriously, how could ANYONE think that was a GOOD idea?

If ideas such as leaving fruit juice out too long will and drinking it will get you drunk can be accepted not only as good ideas, but major industries. Why could more fruitful ones take hold? Well they can, but the trick in this age is getting people to take on ideas that they will not make a profit and will not get them more attention. How many of you, honestly, would not jump on board with an idea that would without a doubt make you a millionaire in a year with no consequences?

How about this one, taking on the belief of an idea that would get you labeled crazy if it promised you eternal life? I bet you would for sure if you didn't get this eternal life after you died. Death is scary for most of us. Here is the problem, we want to see that there is proof of this good idea before we will take it on ourselves.

This is understandable, it is a rare kind of person that wishes to be the first to do something that could be labeled as a bad idea, but man we all want to be the first to do something that is considered a good idea. All reward with No risk. Sorry life is not so easy. Yes you can live life in such a fashion, always taking the safe road and sticking with the status quo. The Status Quo does not equal change however. If you want to change things, you really have to be willing to take that step out there and be the first.

If you want to change yourself however, this is even more difficult. You have to be willing to change how YOU do things, and do things that are against the routines that you have developed. Anyone that has been addicted to anything will tell you how hard that can be. Our bodies are influenced by our environment. Part of our environment is our history. We learn how humans have existed for as long as we have been, and we accept that is the way of things. So what if you want to believe something that is contrary to what you were taught to believe? That's hard.

Pearl Bailey had a wonderful quote, “You cannot belong to anyone, until you belong to yourself.” Now for me, what this means is you have to know who you are and be yourself before you can truly know why you believe in what you believe in. You have to develop your own idea of how the world is, and how you are. You have to walk through these fires before your faith can truly belong to you and it's not just borrowed from someone else. Only then will your walk be true.

So moving to the heart of things. What do you want our world to be like? Loving, accepting, one without war and strife? You want a world without oppression? As Michael Jackson said, “You have to start with the man in the mirror.” World change begins with you. You want others to desire to be a Christian, give them reason to with your walk. “Faith without works is meaningless.” “May they know that you are my children because they see me in you.” If you really treated others with love and you loved them as you loved yourself... most of us wouldn't call anyone anything horrible. Now if you are like me and have a bad habit of talking to yourself... well I can be less than kind to myself, but hey I still love me every chance I get.

How about we start walking with the love of God instead of trying to do his job and walking with a yard stick to see how everyone else just doesn't measure up. May God be with you in your heart and your soul. And let's keep taking that red pill and see the world for what it is, so we can begin to make it the world that Jesus would love it to be. We have to be in this world, but not of it.