Editor: Richard (Dick) Innes
Published by: ACTS International
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Vol. 9 – No. 3107 August 04, 2007
Thought for the week: "A good character is the best tombstone. Those who loved you and were helped by you will remember you when forget-me-nots have withered. Carve your name on hearts, not on marble." – Charles Spurgeon
"A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have." – Gerald Rudolph Ford
"The person who upsets you the most is your best teacher, because they bring you face to face with who you are." – Lynn Andrews
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men." – Martin Luther King Jr.
"Character, in the long-run, is the decisive factor in the life of an individual and of nations alike." – Theodore Roosevelt
"The problems of the world cannot possibly be solved by skeptics or cynics whose horizons are limited by obvious realities. We need men and women who can dream of things that never were." – John F. Kennedy
"It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently." – Warren Buffett
"The highest reward for a man's toil is not what he gets for it but what he becomes by it." – John Ruskin
It was October and the Indians on a remote reservation asked their new
Chief if the coming winter was going to be cold or mild? Since he was a Chief in a modern society, he had never been taught the old secrets. When he looked at the sky he couldn't tell what the winter was going to be like.
Nevertheless, to be on the safe side, he told his tribe that the winter was indeed going to be cold and that the members of the village should collect firewood to be prepared. But being a practical leader, after several days he got an idea. He went to a phone booth, called the National Weather Service and asked, "Is the coming winter going to be cold?"
"It looks like this winter is going to be quite cold," the meteorologist at the weather service responded.
So the Chief went back to his people and told them to collect even more firewood in order to be prepared.
A week later he called the National Weather Service again. "Does it still look like it is going to be a very cold winter?" "Yes," the man at National Weather Service again replied, "it's going to be a very cold winter." The Chief again went back to his people and ordered them to collect every scrap of firewood they could find.
Two weeks later the Chief called the National Weather Service again. "Are you absolutely sure that the winter is going to be very cold?"
"Absolutely," the man replied. "It's looking more and more like it is going to be one of the coldest winters ever."
"How can you be so sure?" the Chief asked.
The weatherman replied, "The Indians are collecting firewood like crazy."
It may be off the official list of planets in our solar system, but "plutoed" has been named the 2006 Word of the Year by the American Dialect Society, according to a Jan. 7 Associated Press story.
According to the AP story: "To 'pluto' is 'to demote or devalue someone or something,' much like what happened to the former planet last year when the General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union decided Pluto didn't meet its definition of a planet."
"Plutoed" won in a runoff against "climate canary," defined as "an organism or species whose poor health or declining numbers hint at a larger environmental catastrophe on the horizon."
Other words considered include "murse" (man's purse) and "flog" (a fake blog that promotes products).
Ravi Zacharias writes, "You may recall the chess victory of the computer 'Deep Blue' over the world champion Gary Kasparov, which caused many to compare the similarities of machines and humans. Yale professor David Gelertner disagrees. He writes:
'The idea that Deep Blue has a mind is absurd. How can an object that wants nothing, fears nothing, enjoys nothing, needs nothing, and cares about nothing have a mind? It can win at chess, but not because it wants to. It isn't happy when it wins or sad when it loses. What are its [post]-match plans if it beats Kasparov? Is it hoping to take Deep Pink out for a night on the town?'"1
1. David Gelertner, "How Hard Is Chess?" Time Magazine, May 19, 1997. Cited on "A Slice of Infinity" by Ravi Zacharias. www.rzim.org/slice/slice.php
A person's basic needs are for food, clothing, and shelter. And, with a roof that doesn't leak and cupboards filled, why worry? Worry depletes our energy and ability to think clearly; and is the root of many ills of society today.
A documentary I watched many times this last year is the story of Dick Proenekke who lived alone in Alaska for 30 years. His inspirational story, "Alone in the Wilderness," was broadcast on PBS in Seattle, and exemplified the type of energy that comes from hard work and vision. In 1968 at the age of 51, he moved to the Lake Clark region of Alaska and built a log cabin by himself. He said he wanted to find out if he could do things beyond his experience that he didn't know he could do. In the cold winters, he could walk for miles with snowshoes in minus 45-degree temperatures, and be comfortable if the wind didn't blow.
For Dick, this type of energy is attractive for it brings satisfaction such as when he finished his cabin and fireplace. Dick said that too many people work on parts of things, but doing a job to completion satisfies him. Too often in our work lives, people expect much of us, or we may expect too much of ourselves. That's when our energy level is depleted, satisfaction is elusive, and we suffer burnout.
I am reading the book of Philippians and found God's "Energy Factor." A sentence in the second chapter says that we should work out our salvation, and do it with reverence and without complaint. It seems that many people don't understand the balance between work in our own strength, and work in God's strength. I know one missionary who stayed on the foreign field too long because he thought the work couldn't go on with him. He soon found out that his efforts amounted to nothing. Then he and his wife took the necessary furlough to stop worrying and recover clear thinking and the desire to do what God wants them to do through them.
Times when we think we fail are really those times when God is shining at his best, for he works through us at our worse. In that regard, I am reminded of a verse in Hebrews 11, "out of weakness we are made strong." Also in the second chapter of Philippians, we're asked to do things without complaint, for when we do, our light shines brighter among those whose light flickers in darkness. God's Energy Factor is like the Sunday School song I used to sing, "This little light of mine, I'm going to let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.
When we hear this, someone is usually telling us to "get off my back" or "accept me as I am." Often it's a response to criticism. It could be about chronic lateness, thoughtlessness, broken promises, physical or verbal abuse, or infidelity. Whatever it is, we're asked to let it go.
In the end, this is a ploy to get us to lower our expectations based on the dubious idea that certain bad habits are an intrinsic part of character and therefore beyond our control. We're expected to believe it's foolish and futile to expect a person to change.
There are, of course, lots of things that are beyond our control: short stature, big bones, receding hairline. Fortunately, character is different. That's completely within our control. The poor and the rich, the slow and the smart, the plain and the pretty all have an equal opportunity to become people of character.
Sure, character can be influenced by heredity and environment, but it's determined by choice. No disposition, circumstance, or experience is so powerful that it forever fixes our character. Our character is never finished. It's constantly shaped and sculpted by the choices we make to nurture or ignore our more noble instincts and to surrender to or overcome negative impulses and corrupting temptations.
When it comes to what we demand of ourselves or of others, we should never lower our standards. Character is a function of choice. Weaknesses and bad habits are not excuses not to get better.
This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.
"Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters ... in singleness of your heart as unto Christ; Not with eye-service as men-pleasers; but as servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart."1
Craig Saunders wrote about an experience he witnessed when he attended a Special Olympics for the Handicapped where several people from his church were competing. He shared how in the 220 track race a very fast runner named Andrew was 50 yards ahead of the rest of the runners when he glanced back and saw his best friend fall. The crowd at the finishing post was yelling to Andrew, "Come on, come on, come on!"
But Andrew stopped, went back, took his friend's hand and lifted him to his feet and they ran together to finish the race.
The entire crowd stood to their feet and applauded. As Saunders said, "It was an amazing sight because that's what the Special Olympics are about. People don't consider being 'Number One.' The most important thing is that people finish the race."
Andrew won the Sportsman Award at those Special Olympics because he was more concerned about being "Number One" to his friend than being "Number One" to the crowd.
Suggested prayer: "Dear God, please grant that I will always want to please you and be there for my friends and not allow my life or lifestyle be that of wanting the adulation of the crowd. And please help me to finish the race that you have set before me. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus' name, amen."
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Books by Dick Innes, Editor of Weekend Encounter You Can't Fly With a Broken Wing How to Mend a Broken Heart I Hate Witnessing—A Handbook for Effective Christian
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