Bible

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How’s Your Fish Bowl?


Children love fairs and carnivals.  The atmosphere is ecstatic.  It draws their attention and draws them in like flies.  The game area was always an area to be avoided with my mom, she viewed them as scams, hard to win.  I always wanted to play.  So when my daughter at age five wanted to toss the coin and win the little goldfish I let her play.  A few coins later she had her goldfish.   We set it up in her bedroom on the dresser.  I cautioned her to be careful and not knock it over.  She was so proud of her fish.  She finally calmed down and I turned off the light for the night.

I always awoke way before everyone and  peaked in early to check on my daughter.  There on the dresser sat the bowl and the goldfish was belly up and floating.  Arrghh, now I had to deal with a dead fish?  What would I tell her?  I hurriedly dressed and ran down to the 24 hour WalMart, bought a fish and returned fast enough to replace before she awoke.  “Whew, escaped that one I thought”, patting myself on the back.   Off to school she went.  That night we went through the same bedtime routine and finally she told the fish goodnight and we settled in for the night.  Next morning, as usual I stuck my head in and THERE WAS THE GOLDFISH, BELLY UP AND FLOATING.  “Oh, no, really?”  Once again, being the coward I was then, I hurriedly rush to WalMart and returned with yet another goldfish.  Whew.  Got by again.  This was crazy.  The fish was okay all day.  Looked like things were going to be okay.  Off to bed.  mac28_deadgoldfish01_wideEarly the next morning I hear this loud cry, “MY GOLDFISH!”.  I jumped out of bed, dazed that someone awoke before me.  Running across the hall into her room there stood my daughter in front of the bowl, staring at the goldfish belly up and floating.  I hugged my little girl and tried to comfort her.  What I had dreaded I finally had to face.  After all the shielding I had tried, I still had to face the inevitable. I tried to explain how everything dies.  But, for a small child death is always hard to understand.  With tears streaming down her face she looked up to me with the saddest confused eyes and said, “mommy I don’t understand why he had to die.  I loved him so much.  Every night I took him out and told him so as I petted him.”

We laugh about it now.  But, isn’t that the way we all are?  We put our life in a glass bowl and we love it with tender loving care.  We want it all perfect and comfortable. We pet it and even sometimes smother it … causing what we love the most to die.  There are those around us that will even try to fix all our problems like I tried with my daughter.

Life has ups and downs; life has good times and bad times.  God wants to teach us and sometimes He does in the good times and other times in the bad.  Everything is a lesson that will make us more like Him. When you become a Christian you change.

2 Corinthians 5:1(NLT) “17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!”

To change you have to learn about Him.  You have to go through things in life to grow physically and you must go through things to change spiritually.  Do not avoid these times, do not try to pad and protect yourself from the lessons.  Do not whine and ask “why?” Instead, ask Him “why am I here in this place Lord? What do you want me to learn?”

Psalm 25:4-5(HCSB) “4 Make Your ways known to me, Lord; teach me Your paths.5 Guide me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation;I wait for You all day long.”

Psalm 86:11(ESV) “11 Teach me Your way, O Lord,that I may walk in Your truth;unite my heart to fear Your name.”

Proverbs 3:5-6(NASB)“5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. 6 In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.”

Instead of avoiding look to Him and say, “here am I Lord, teach me.”

Renee’ Green Copyright 2013

RBGreenDesigns.com 2020

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At whom are you pointing your finger?


Everyday you read it, see it or hear it … someone pointing the finger at the ‘other guy’.  So and so did it, it’s someone elses fault.  The old saying is, when you point the finger there are three others pointing back at you.  no-finger-pointingEveryone is to blame, and no one is to blame.  No one wants to take credit for the bad, no one wants to be at fault.  We are a NO FAULT generation.

Christians are no better, they love to point fingers.  “No wonder what they are going through, did you know that …?”  and so the gossip goes.  Gossiping, that’s another blog.  Pointing the finger, you cannot go to church or be in a gathering of Christians without hearing people pointing the finger.

Recently someone a few towns over won $600 million in the lottery.  I heard so many comments from Christians.  “Better not have been a Christian, unless they found it in the parking lot!” Amazing what people single out.  So many play the $.44 cent lottery (cost of stamp to mail in an entry to win millions in a contest).  Others ‘gamble’ on the stock market.  Gambling’s a sin, right?  Depend on how much you spend?  What about that $1.29 candy bar at the check out? Gluttony’s a sin right?  Depends on if you’re overweight?  That soft drink? That movie? What about that latte?  We just LOVE to point our fingers at everyone elses lifestyle.

Matthew 7:5 (NASB) “You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”

One woman looks at another shaking her head and leans to her neighbor, “how does she allow herself to get so overweight?”  The guy leans in to comment to his co-worker, “I heard he has something on the boss and that’s why he got the promotion.”  The little boy nudges the girl beside him, “her mom bought that award for her.”  (Where do you think the kids learn it from?)

The root of much finger pointing is jealousy.  Watch your thoughts today, you might accidentally speak out loud.  Now back up and read the preceding verses to Matthew 7:5:

Matthew 7:1-4 (NASB) “1Do not judge so that you will not be judged. 2 For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. 3 Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ and behold, the log is in your own eye?”

The only judgement comes from God’s word.  Let Him be the judge.

lPOINT TO THE SCRIPTURES! r

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“Who’s On First?”


Ahh, baseball’s end of season.  Millions are watching to see who will win the World Series.   Who will win, who will lose?  

Some of you are way too young to remember the old comedy routine of Abbott and Costello’s “Who’s On First?” ???????????????

It’s a classic bit of confusion not unlike real life when we get our “game of life” out-of-order.  Life is a game with rules and regulations.  Our problem is in not “reading the Rule book”.  We want to run “home”,  or maybe to “2nd” or “3rd” skipping “1st”.  You cannot score a run to “Home” without running the bases and you have to start with “1st” base.

In our game of life we tend to run after foul or fly balls; chasing around the infield or outfield and totally disregard “1st” base.

Today you may face some curve balls, knuckle balls or spit balls.  You’re going to swing and try to connect.   Don’t look at the pitcher, the catcher … run around the infield or chase out into the outfield   LOOK to “First Base” and start running.  First base is your Lord and Savior.  Without First Base there is no game.  There is no beginning, and no end.  There is no success, no win.

If your life is confusion and mayhem, if you’re playing the game with out the “Rule Book”, His word, then you are going to lose.  You are going to be lost, miserable and empty.  Get into the Word, check your Guide, and head towards First Base.

Psalm 119:105 NASB  “Your word is a lamp to my feet And a light to my path.”

James 1:5 HCSB “Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives to all generously and without criticizing, and it will be given to him.”

RBGreenDesigns.com 2019 (reposted from blog dated 5/31/2013)

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“Pick-a-little, Talk-a-little”


Remember in the musical Music Man pickalittlewhen all the older women start chattering like a passel of hens?  They were bent on telling the Music Man about the librarian.  There was probably a little truth in what they said, but mostly it was their jealousies and need for gossip that spewed from their mouth.  We laugh when we watch the scene.

Working in a retail environment since the introduction of cell phones, gossip has gone global.  No longer just in the neighborhood (or church foyer), gossips have worldwide reach through cell phones, Facebook, Twitter and more.  Careless chatter gone out worldwide never to be retrieved.  I have blogged before about careless tongues (O Be Careful Little Mouth What You Say.) Words hurt, they scar and sometimes those scars ruin lives.  It does not matter if you are talking behind someone’s back or to their face, words once out are never taken back.  Like the toothpaste squeezed out, you cannot make it go back in the tube.

Working in retail you hear so much (you wish you did not have to hear) of people’s private lives as they wander around chatting on their phones.  Conversations best kept private are spilled out over aisles.  It seems people think they are in their own private phone booth and because no one is on the aisle with them, then no one can hear them.  And of course their are those that think they have to shout their words across the phone for it to get to the other end of the line.  People just like to talk.  In specific they like to PICK-A-LITTLE, it makes them feel better about themselves to tear others down.  Once started their TALK-A-LITTLE becomes talk-a-lot.  The art of silence has gone.  It is no wonder people do not “hear” what is being said any more.  Their ears are in overload and you have to get their attention.  Recently a father let a loud whistle in the store to get his kids to come.  He looked at my stunned face as if to say “what?”.  His kids don’t listen to their names or him talking, so he’s resorted to whistling for them like a dog.  (Shaking my head).

Wouldn’t it be better to really PICK LITTLE to say, and TALK LITTLE, so that when you did speak others would want to hear what you say? Wouldn’t there be less hurt and less anger if people slowed down and chose their words carefully?   Hmmm, that sounds like a verse from the Bible.

James 1:19 ESV  “Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger;”

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The Pain’s The Thang


My mother would always steer clear of people who gave “organ recitals” as she called them.  They were “downers”, depressing people. Your mistake would be to ask, “how are you”?  They never got better, something was always wrong, yet they were at the mall, in church, at the school function.  They sounded as though they were dying yet they looked and acted fine.  Some people never get enough attention.lookatme

Makes you want to give them their own t-shirt, “here’s your sign”!

Many of us have our issues, our daily battles.  I have to say my chronic condition is a struggle.  Mom and dad raised us that if you were this side of the grass to get on with your life and bear up under what ever it is you’re going through.  Physically it is hard I know, trust me.  (I will not give you an “organ recital” now, so don’t worry :-D).  Unless you had a fever or couldn’t keep your food down, you went to school and later on work.  My father had a great work ethic.  He went back to work a month after he had his right lung removed and worked for many more years.  It is a mind-set, mind over matter… you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.

Work ethic, seems to be a vanishing concept.  People would rather complain about what needs to be done, how hard it is to do it or even about the paper cut that is going to keep them from doing the job.  “It’s too heavy, I don’t do ladders, my foot hurts, my back hurts ….”.  Down deep I think it simply they need someone to look at them and give them attention.  There is a legitimate time of sickness or injury, but using it for attention or to make your life easier just makes you an HYPOCHONDRIAC!

 

Sadly, many people carry this mentality into their spiritual life as well.  I call them “Spiritual Hypochondriacs”.  hypo It is no secret that in the Christian life we have ups and downs, mountains and valleys.  Some people hit the valley once and get stuck.  They clamp down on the experience and never get better.  They remember when things were better, when God blessed them and everything was smooth.  Every time you meet them they have the same prayer request.  Let me insert here I am not talking about a long time illness, financial situation, loss loved one, etc.  I am talking personal growth.  Many times we do go through an extended time in the valley because we do not grow in the Lord, we do not learn what He brought us there to learn.  Our daily life is about growing more in the Lord.  If we get stuck in the valley, we are not feeding our spiritual life.  We are not reading His word, praying for others, talking with Him daily.  We need to fellowship with other Christians who help pull us along and we in turn pull them along when the road is hard.  If we are not doing His work, helping others then we “are all about me”.  It’s the spiritual version of “look at me”.   These kind of people become cancers and spread through a body of believers, making them all “doubting Thomas’s; woe is us Christians”.  Nothing the devil likes better than to get Christians in to spiritual hypochondria.

Got pain?  Don’t make it the thang.  Take a time of rest if you need it, let it heal or get better, but do not wallow in your illness.  Doctors say that positive attitudes and can do spirit helps people heal faster than many medicines.  For Christians, that same attitude applies.  Sometimes the valley is long, it is a drudgery of day-to-day, never-ending it would seem.  But, the Scriptures tell us,

James 1:2-4(HCSB)“2 Consider it a great joy, my brothers, whenever you experience various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. 4 But endurance must do its complete work, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.”

Some coach has taken credit for the “No Pain, No Gain” concept.  But it came from the Bible.  Let people hear of your journey, counting it all joy with expectation of what the Lord is going to accomplish in your journey.

Don’t make the PAIN the THANG!

smile-through-the-pain