Balancing Life

Finding a balance is sometimes a bit of a challenge for me. Most people associate balance with work-life balance; the idea of balancing your personal life with your work life so as not to let your work life overtake your personal life. But there are other areas as well.

One of those other areas for me is the spiritual-non spiritual balance when it comes to blogging, facebooking and tweeting. We all know that all three areas are types of social media very prevalent today. As I read through other people's posts through the various methods I notice that they typically have a solid slant, one way or the other. You can pretty much tell who their audience is or who they are trying to reach out to.

For example, I follow a good number of pastors that I have never even met on Twitter. It is amazing to me how many times a day they can come up with something to say that is motivational or inspirational. They often provide links to their blogs where they provide great insights into a God-moment, lessons or thoughts. Their audience is clear. For some, the audience is Christian leaders. For others, the audience is a wide array of pastors. For a smaller group, their audience is their youth group.

The bottom line is that their audience is known and clear - at least in my mind as the reader. Do I feel like those posts aren't for me because I am not a leader, a pastor or a youth? No. Actually, I can usually get quite a bit out of just about any of their posts and I often feel like that nugget was meant just for me. Funny how that works.

So when I sit here and type away at my own blog or update my Twitter or Facebook account, it is interesting that I sometimes struggle to find the balance of who my audience is...who it is that I'm trying to reach out to. You might find it interesting that it is not a rare thing for me to write something out, delete it, reword it, type it out again, delete it and end up with the same thing I started with...or something completely different. Doing all of this out of an effort to not offend someone, not seem to "preachy", not go too far into Bible-thumphood...or on the other hand not be too secular, appear hypocritical, or worldly.

But what would happen if I lived my whole life like that? I'd be a mess! How do I know that? Because I've lived my life like that in the past; trying to figure out just the right thing to do or say for each person that I'm around. Thankfully I don't live in that hell any longer but live only to please One - the God who gave His Son to die on the cross for me, for my sins...and for you and yours.

So while I still catch myself stopping and second guessing what I'm writing, I'm thankful that I'm able to release the anxiety of walking the fine line between too much and not enough, in order to just be myself...the way that God intended it to be. My hope is that by doing so everyone will get something out of it...feel like there is that one piece that was meant just for them to read.

What about you? Where are you trying to find your balance? I encourage you to stay true to who you are, who God made you to be!

The New Year Challenge

The new year is just days away...

A fresh start...

A new perspective...

A new day...

What do you want to be different for you this year?

What are you resolving to do?

Where will your focus be?

What will you do with your passions?

Where will your purpose take you?

What adventure will you go on?

Would you consider giving your first 21 days of the new year (January 2 - 22) to God?

Join me and others as we embark on a 21 day "Daniel fast" where we will seek a more intimate relationship with Jesus while praying and fasting for individual needs / desires, all while exploring what our God-given purpose (chazown) is.

http://www.jentezenfranklin.org/fasting/index.php or

http://www.daniel-fast.com/

http://www.chazown.com/

If you would like to partner together to work through both, the Chazown experience and the Daniel Fast, let me know! We can motivate and encourage each other!

Think about it...why let it be "just another day"?

The Discipline of Servant Humility

In John 13:1 – 17 reads the story about Jesus, who knew that He was about to die – and incidentally, knew who was going to betray Him, washed His disciples feet. For most of us, having someone get down on their knees in front of us and washing our feet would be too much. We would be embarrassed, we probably wouldn’t want them to continue, we’d ask them to stop until it was obvious they were not going to. But can you imagine Jesus Himself, taking off His robe, wrapping a towel around His waist, and getting down on His knees in front of you, washing your feet and then drying them with the towel that is wrapped around Him? I’m pretty sure that would be one of the most humbling situations ever.

Now that you have thought about how you would feel, think about why you would feel that way. In verse 1 it says, “Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.” Wow. Loved them to the end. In other words, He just didn’t start out loving them and then took for granted that they would know He loved them…He didn’t “peter out” (pun intended) with showing His love in the middle of the relationship…He didn’t think so much of Himself (and how many of us would be thinking of others when we knew we were about to die) that He disregarded His love for them. No, Jesus loved His disciples to the end…and even in the midst of all that He had going on.

After washing their feet Jesus gets dressed and goes back to His place at the table and asks the disciples if they understand what He has just done for them. Jesus explains that by doing that He has “set an example that you should do as I have done for you.” So not only was Jesus loving them to the end, but He was setting an example for them to continue to immulate in their own lives with other people.

Don’t mistake this story as a feel good moment where you cheer for Jesus and go on with your life. No. This is, very clearly, a call to action. Each of us as disciples of Christ are called to serve others with the same humility and lasting fortitude as Jesus did. We are called to serve others, showing love even to the end. We are called to serve others despite what may be going on in our own lives…despite how busy we may have become (and I would argue that only we are to blame if we have allowed ourselves to get so busy that we never have time to serve others).

My devotional says it best: "His example from 2000 years ago is still the example for us to follow. In so doing, we continue to ask the question and seek the answer to the following: “Will the leader please stand up?” Not the person who holds the title or the position, but the role model. Not the highest paid person in the firm, but the risk taker. Not the person with the most perks, but the servant. Not the person who promotes himself, but the promoter of others. Not the administrator, but the initiator. Not the taker, but the giver. Not the talker, but the listener."

Make no mistake about it, we are as much of leaders as we allow ourselves to be. When you read “leaders” know that this is not a call to just the leaders around you, but it is a call to you and I as well. When you take Jesus’ example of serving others throughout His lifetime and you couple it with the Biblical call to live life together, we can easily see that this is for everyone, everwhere. It is obvious that we have some work to do…it is obvious that we are called to do more in the way of serving others. At least I know I am…are you? Think about it…

Lord, I am sorry that I have not always been the servant that you want me to be. I ask for your forgiveness as I have gone about my own life as if it is the only thing that matters. I want to be Your servant and follow in Your footsteps – be more like You. Help me to see clearly the opportunities to do that. Help me to get beyond myself and my own life and use me to speak into other people’s lives. You are the ultimate example of who I am supposed to become. Let it be so…