I have a friend who lives by a three-word philosophy: Seize the moment.

Just possibly she may be the wisest woman on this planet.

Too many people put off something that brings them joy just because they haven’t thought about it, don’t have it on their schedule, didn’t know it was coming, or are too rigid to depart from their routine.

I got to thinking one day about all those women on the Titanic who passed up dessert at dinner that fateful night in an effort to cut back.

From then on, I’ve tried to be a little more flexible.

How many women out there will eat at home because their husband didn’t suggest going out to dinner until after something had been thawed?

Does the word “refrigeration” mean nothing to you?

How often have your kids dropped in to talk and sat in silence while you watched “Jeopardy!” on television?

I cannot count the times I called my sister and said, “How about going to lunch in a half hour?”

She would gasp and stammer, “I can’t.”
The reason? Check one:

I have clothes on the line.
My hair is dirty.
I wish I had known yesterday.
I had a late breakfast.
It looks like rain.

And my personal favorite: It’s Monday.

She died a few years ago. We never did have lunch together.

Because we cram so much into their lives, we tend to schedule our headaches. We live on a sparse diet of promises we make to ourselves when all the conditions are perfect:

We’ll go back and visit the grandparents when we get Stevie toilet-trained.
We’ll entertain when we replace the living room carpet.
We’ll go on a second honeymoon when we get two more kids out of college.

Life has a way of accelerating as we get older. The days get shorter, and the list of promises to ourselves gets longer.

One morning, we awaken, and all we have to show for our lives is a litany of “I’m going to,” “I plan on,” and “Someday, when things are settled down a bit.”

When anyone calls my “seize the moment” friend, she is open to adventure and available for trips. She keeps an open mind on new ideas. Her enthusiasm for life is contagious. You talk with her for five minutes, and you’re ready to trade your bad feet for a pair of rollerblades and skip an elevator for a bungee cord.

My lips have not touched ice cream in 10 years.

I love ice cream. It’s just that I might as well apply it directly to my hips with a spatula and eliminate the digestive process.

The other day, I stopped the car and bought a triple-decker. If my car had hit an iceberg on the way home, I would have died happy.

Now…go on and have a nice day.

Do something you WANT to…not something on your SHOULD DO list.

Hear the music before the song is over.

The problem of despair is not one you can neatly solve then file away. It roars to life every time someone in your family hears the ugly diagnosis of cancer, every time we feel rejected by a friend, every time we face a situation we know will expose our inability to act in such a way as to receive the approval we crave from those around us. You would think that “spiritual people” would levitate above and live beyond the cold-grip of despair. But the Bible gives us no such hope. MP3 download.

Q1 (1:14). What is the role of psychology in the church today?

Q2 (6:47). What is the “third heaven” mentioned in 2 Cor. 12:2. I have a friend who is a Mormon and he said that this is the highest point in heaven and hopes to one day attain to it. I never heard this before so I wanted to find a good way to engage in my response.

Q3 (18:39). The other day my 3 1/2 year old daughter asked me if demons could hurt her. Being completely unprepared for the question, I responded “Well, if you’re best friends with Jesus (something we’ve talked about many times), although the demons will try and scare you, they can never harm you.” I just wondered if I was anywhere close to being accurate.

Q4 (also 18:39). What is the role of demons and Satan today? I would like to know more in regard to questions like: Can a demon possess a Christian? What is the criterion for Satan to possess a person? In other words, is there something a person does to open the door to the Enemy? Can Satan read my mind? Doesn’t Satan know he is defeated and, if so, why doesn’t he give up? Is it possible for a demon or Satan to repent and turn again to serving God? Sorry for so many questions, I have wondered about these for some time and I am glad for this format in which I can get answers. I hope it helps with these kinds of questions too.

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Until we are content with being one of the million nameless, faceless church members and not the next globe-trotting rock star, we aren’t ready to be a part of the church. In the grand scheme of things, most of us are going to be more of an Ampliatus (Rom. 16:8) or Phlegon (v. 14) than an apostle Paul. And maybe that’s why so many Christians are getting tired of the church. We haven’t learned how to be part of the crowd. We haven’t learned to be ordinary. Our jobs are often mundane. Our devotional times often seem like a waste. Church services are often forgettable. That’s life. We drive to the same places, go through the same routines with the kids, buy the same groceries at the store, and share a bed with the same person every night. Church is often the same too — same doctrines, same basic order of worship, same preacher, same people. But in all the smallness and sameness, God works — like the smallest seed in the garden growing to unbelievable heights, like beloved Tychicus, that faithful minister, delivering the mail and apostolic greetings (Eph. 6:21). Life is usually pretty ordinary, just like following Jesus most days. Daily discipleship is not a new revolution each morning or an agent of global transformation every evening; it’s a long obedience in the same direction.

Psychology has no ability or inclination to deal with the spiritual motivations of the heart. Even many contemporary Christian psychology models (hence the use of the phrase: “Counseling that is Christian”), do not address the root issue that all humanity faces – we are sinners. The heart’s problem is not that it is a leaky love tank longing to be filled. The Bible depicts the heart as the problem. Our motivations are polluted and need to be cleaned up. According to Scripture, the heart is fixated on expressing sin, a willful disobedience to what God demands. It is an idol-making factory making false gods out of people’s approval and ultimately putting ourselves on the throne.

Counseling that is Christian will help people see how to truth collides with the desires of our heart. Counseling that is Christian will show how to stop the leak that has been created and then fill the tank with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Psychology on the other hand can only speak to personal wounding that has either been thrust on the individual by another or resulting from some “dysfunction” that, with the right insight or drugs, can be resolved without God ever being brought onto the scene. I see in this one distinction as the Achilles-heal of the psychological model. Psychology can only deal with what is produced from the heart and not the heart itself.

The psychologist (non-Christian), deals with personal issues like a interior decorator working with a resident unable to clean up a home that is hopelessly cluttered with old furniture and garbage. Working with the resident the psychologist determines the right dimensions of the room, the value of the furniture and related memorabilia, then applies a color scheme that “works” with the newly-chosen contents of the room. When the job is done the room has been skillfully arranged and deemed livable again by the owner with the aid of the psychologist. Counseling that is Christian has a different goal altogether. This counselor works with the resident examining the clutter to see why it is there in the first place. Over the course of time, the counselor will guide the resident to identify items that should stay and things that need to be thrown-away based upon the desires of the true owner of the house, Jesus Christ.

Both examples feature people with issues that need to be dealt with. Both examples center on a counselor providing help in making the residence livable. However, only a counselor who is a Christian can and will evaluate a course of action in light of the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Psychology holds no such authority structure nor does it have binding truth-claims that must be brought to bear on the individual seeking help. At best psychology helps a person’s life be livable. Counseling that is Christian helps a person live life for the glorify God. This one distinction will lead the individual in need to live life to its fullest.

Multiple-Choice Question
This video teaches that:
A. All of us can change the world by tapping into the power that is within us.
B. Disbelief of the power you have inside you will hold you back from fulfilling your purpose.
C. Everything you need can be found inside of you and this is true for all living things in the world.

Answer given after video.

Answer: All of the above.

This is one slick ad and we must be prepared to help people process the truth-claims that this book will push on co-workers, friends, and family.

Question: How would you engage with someone who is contemplating or has bought-into this type of belief system?

While the ruling declared that the definition California has used since the beginning of statehood was unconstitutional, did it put a new definition in place? A definition is merely a description or limitation of what a marriage is. Is there any limitation, albeit a newly expanded?

Certainly, the judge’s ruling made definition of marriage a moving target, open to cultural redefinition according to evolving social norms. He struck down the definition in the law because we have new social sensitivities that dictate more inclusion. That means the definition of marriage changes as society changes. Even if we do have a new definition of marriage the very same judge could rule that definition unconstitutional in ten years if our social standards have changed.

In other words, marriage is anything we say it is. After all, who’s to say? Who’s to impose their limitations on anyone else who wants to claim a right to marriage? No one, that’s who. That’s the practical result of the ruling.

1. Will we have bodies in heaven?
2. Can we fall away once we are in heaven?
3. Will we have homes in heaven?

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Today we will consider some common questions that people have regarding heaven in an effort to distinguish tradition & truth. Today’s question are:

1. Will we have bodies in heaven?
2. What will I do in heaven?
3. Will I recognize people in heaven that I have known during my life on earth?

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“In whatever kind of a ‘race’ life may be, I have very abruptly become a finalist,” the ever-articulate Hitchens writes in the September issue of Vanity Fair. He concludes:

Against me is the blind, emotionless alien, cheered on by some who have long wished me ill. But on the side of my continued life is a group of brilliant and selfless physicians plus an astonishing number of prayer groups. On both of these I hope to write next time if—as my father invariably said—I am spared.

His essay is a mix of stoicism and dry British wit, but with an understated gravity that penetrates the gallows humor that marks his reflections. In truth, there is little said about facing death, but much about the “oncology bargain” that trades quality of life for quantity.

Let us pray that God is gracious and merciful to Mr. Hitchens.

Read the entire article from Christianity Today.

How might you answer these types of social issues in light of the command for the followers of God to “multiple and fill the earth.”

Jesus makes the powerful connection between how we view our future will mold the way we live here and now. What is it about the future that has the power to shape the way we live our lives? What is it that we will see in the future that will propel us to live distinct lives here and now?

Today we will continue the answer these questions in week two of the series: “Heaven, Tradition or Truth.” Together we will consider how our hope in the future will provide strength for us to stand strong in the moment. MP3 download.

Join me in asking God to develop other men like Warden Cain who see how the State needs what the Church offers so that the fame of God will spread.

LONDON — A huge ball of brightly burning gas drifting through a neighboring galaxy may be the heaviest star ever discovered — hundreds of times more massive than the sun, scientists said Wednesday after working out its weight for the first time.

Those behind the find say the star, called R136a1, may once have weighed as much as 320 solar masses. Astrophysicist Paul Crowther said the obese star — twice as heavy as any previously discovered — has already slimmed down considerably over its lifetime. In fact, it’s burning itself off with such intensity that it shines at nearly 10 million times the luminosity of the sun.

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Psalm 19:1

Read the whole story.

John makes a striking connection between how we view the future with how we seek purpose and purity in our lives here and now. My question for you to consider is why does John do this? Why make this connection? What is it that we will see in the future that will insulate us to live distinct lives here and now?

Today we will begin a 4 week teaching called: “Heaven, Tradition or Truth” in order to piece together how our hope in the future provides strength for us to stand strong in the moment. MP3 download.