Editor: Richard (Dick) Innes
Published by: ACTS International
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Vol. 12 – No. 1510 April 10, 2010
Thought for the week: "If we ever forget that we're one nation under GOD, then we will be a nation gone under." – Ronald Reagan
"I have never met anyone who was happy and satisfied with their life, who sold out their core beliefs and values in order to gain fame or fortune." – Ray Lammie in Thought for Today.
"The purpose of life is to have a life purpose." – Unknown
"Think it more satisfactory to live richly than die rich." – Sir Thomas Browne
"Never mistake knowledge for wisdom. One helps you make a living, the other helps you make a life." – Sandra Carey
"Feedback is the breakfast of champions." – Rick Tate
"When written in Chinese, the word 'crisis' is composed of two characters—one represents danger and the other represents opportunity." – John F. Kennedy
"Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place" (Psalm 51:6).
In 1996, Kenneth Lay made a comment in a book entitled, Business as Mission. "In my own case, I grew up the son of a Baptist minister. From this background, I was fully exposed to not only legal behavior, but moral and ethical behavior, and what that means from the standpoint of leading organizations and people. I was, and am, a strong believer that one of the most satisfying things in life is to create a highly moral and ethical environment in which every individual is allowed and encouraged to realize their God-given potential. There are few things more satisfying than to see individuals reach levels of performance that they would have thought was virtually impossible for themselves."
Something went very wrong from the time Kenneth Lay wrote those words and the time he was convicted June 6, 2006. Strangely, Lay never went to prison because he died suddenly of a heart attack a few months after being convicted. No one is immune from starting life well and ending it badly. Kenneth Lay was the chairman and CEO of Enron.
Source: Os Hillman. Cited on
Faith Thought of the Day by Ray Lammie
Sometimes symptoms of a stroke are difficult to identify. Unfortunately, the lack of awareness spells disaster. The stroke victim may suffer severe brain damage when people nearby fail to recognize the symptoms of a stroke. Now doctors say a bystander can recognize a stroke by asking three simple questions:
S Ask the individual to SMILE. T Ask the person to TALK to SPEAK A SIMPLE SENTENCE
coherently, i.e. "It is sunny out today." R Ask him or her to RAISE BOTH ARMS.
Another sign of a stroke is this: Ask the person to "stick" out their tongue. If the tongue is "crooked," if it goes to one side or the other, that is also an indication of a stroke. If he or she has trouble with ANY ONE of these tasks, call 911 immediately and describe the symptoms to the dispatcher.
One man challenged another to an all-day wood chopping contest.
The challenger worked very hard, stopping only for a brief lunch break. The other man had a leisurely lunch and took several breaks during the day. At the end of the day, the challenger was surprised and annoyed to find that the other fellow had chopped substantially more wood than he had.
"I don't get it," he said. "Every time I checked, you were taking a rest, yet you chopped more wood than I did."
"But you didn't notice," said the winning woodsman, "that I was sharpening my ax when I sat down to rest."
Ask young people why they get high on drugs or alcohol or seek sex without intimacy or commitment and they're likely to tell you it's fun and they just want to be happy.
It's tempting to envy the life of fun-loving "party animals," "playboys," and "good-time girls" until one thinks about how they feel about themselves and their lives when they're alone without the hyped-up stimulation they seem to thrive on.
It doesn't take a psychologist to realize that if happiness is the destination, these folks are on the wrong road. The problem is, the intense sensation of fun or feelings of pleasure experienced by a substance-induced buzz or an exciting sexual encounter are quickly replaced with a consuming sense of emptiness that drives a need to start all over to fill the vessel again.
Each time drinkers, drug users, or sex addicts discover that getting what they wanted isn't making them happy, they fall into the despondency conveyed in the famous Peggy Lee song: "Is That All There Is?"
People who make pleasure-seeking the focus of their lives are like drug addicts who need continually stronger and more dangerous doses to get high.
Happiness is different than fun and pleasure. It's a less intense, but more durable, feeling of well-being. It's not a continuous state. A good life is usually seasoned with moments of joy and despair, play and work, success and failure. Happiness is a kind of emotional resting place of quiet satisfaction with one's life.
The art of living a happy life is not having more of what you want but getting better at enjoying what you have.
This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.
"There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not: The way of an eagle in the air; the way of a serpent upon a rock; the way of a ship in the midst of the sea; and the way of a man with a maid."1
"It's not my problem. It's my wife/husband who needs help!"
How many times have you heard this defensive type of statement? Having worked in the area of divorce recovery for the past decade or more, I have heard it repeatedly. One person recently said to me, "How do I make my husband understand that he is the one who needs help. He needs to know that he is wrong so he can get counseling."
"And why did you marry this person? What attracted you to him/her in the first place?" I ask. Rarely do I get an honest answer.
This is not true in all cultures but, at least where we make our own choice about whom we marry, there are always underlying reasons why we are attracted and drawn to a particular person of the opposite sex.
At least one single man I know was facing reality when he said that he could walk into a room full of women and would automatically be attracted to the sickest (emotionally sickest) woman in the room! He knew it was because of his own emotional sickness. There's hope for this man.
No matter what your wife/husband has done, the reality is you can't change them. If you try to, it just makes them angry or angrier. As I've said many times, the only one we can ever change is our self, and as we change, those around us are almost forced to change in one way or another. However, this is not always for the best because some people don't want us to change and get angry when we do. Change upsets the games they are playing!
I'm not saying that we should put up with someone else's abusive behavior. Not at all. But we need to remember that we are the only person we can ever change. And while we pray for the other person, we need to first ask God to change us—and to confront us with the truth about ourselves so we can see any character flaws we have that we need to work on and resolve.
And we can always ask God to help us to be as Jesus to our husband/wife so that they, seeing Jesus in us, will want him for themselves. That may be the only hope for encouraging others to change.
Suggested prayer: "Dear God, help me to quit playing the blame-game and always accept responsibility for whatever I am contributing in any conflicting situation in which I find myself. Help me to keep on changing and growing to become the person you want me to be. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus' name, amen."
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