desktop

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Tempted With Files On My Desktop

The other day I wrote about cleaning up my computer desktop. Just a few days in, I’m already tempted to leave files on my home screen.

When I cleaned my desktop, it looked so good I just had to admire it for a while. I never wanted to leave another file on the screen again.

But a few days later, I find that my desktop is the natural, easiest place to put files.

For example, I had just downloaded a recording of my sermon from Sunday and it landed on my home screen. The recording needed editing before I could post it on the website. Naturally, I wanted it right in front of me to remind me I needed to do that.

Fortunately I had time right away, did my editing and then posted it to our site.

But then I had two files on my desktop – the unedited version and the one that was posted. I could have trashed the original download, but I thought I’d keep it just in case, while the edited version needed to be uploaded to an external hard drive for storing.

That involved another step which I wasn’t sure I wanted to do right then.

But as I looked at my clean screen, I didn’t want it to be blemished so I quickly put the file where it was to go and trashed the original.

My desktop was pristine again.

But for how long? How long will it be before I’m in a hurry or won’t know where to put a file or folder, defaulting to let it just sit on my desktop?

And when one things sits there, soon there will be more. The more there are, the harder it is to clear that screen.

It’s like the episode of the “I Love Lucy” show where Lucy was working on an assembly line in a chocolate factory. Her job was to move chocolates from a conveyor belt into boxes.

The machine started off slowly, but quickly sped up. The chocolates started coming too fast for Lucy. She was frantic and tried different tactics to keep up.

She first put her arm down on the conveyor belt to pile the chocolates up but that just made a mess. Then she started to dump them into her apron to clear the conveyor belt and catch up.  And then she started to eat the chocolates.

In the end, she was doing everything. She had chocolates backed up, her mouth was full of them, she had chocolate all over her face and her apron was overflowing.

What a mess!

It was an chaotic scene. … But that’s also how my desktop gets filled back up.

I love how it looks right now. But I just know the conveyor belt is going to speed up with all those files.

Here’s the thing: Sin works like that in our lives. When we sin once, it’s easy to confess it before God. But sometimes we sin and are not prepared to confess it, often because we are ashamed or still upset. So the sin remains. Then we sin in another area and let that go as well – more unconfessed sin. Pretty soon we are looking like a scene out of “I love Lucy” but with our sin instead of chocolate. Keep short accounts of your sins; deal with each one right away. Don’t let sin build up in your life and hinder your relationship with God.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What do you do to keep your desktop clear, or your soul right with God? Leave your comments below.

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I’m In Need Of A Desktop Cleaning

It’s my day off but I’m going to do a form of cleaning that I don’t really consider day off kind of work.

In the cartoon “Popeye”, when he would get to the end of his patience or the end of himself, Popeye would say “that’s all I can stands; I can’t stands no more”. Then he would eat a can of spinach.

You really should read that out loud with one eye shut, speak out of one side of your mouth and have a pipe stuck between your teeth.

Okay now that you’ve said it, that’s how I feel about my computer desktop. I’ve written about this before but it’s time again to address the mess that I have to stare at each and every day.

I have a few home screens that I switch between and, on two of them, I have family pictures. Those faces are skewed because of the number of files that are littering my home screen.

You would think that having those files right there to see would make it easy to find them, but it doesn’t work that way. When you have a screen that looks like mine, it takes longer that if they were filed in some kind of logical order.

Well today’s the day that I’m going to make my computer a little more functional again.

I’m not sure what got me to the point of not being able to “stands it” any longer, but it may have been a comment made by someone the other day.

I was showing a group of people a seminar video from my computer which was hooked up to a projector. For a brief time, the whole group could see what my computer screen looked like.

To make it worse, the projector showed my screen at a lower resolution so the aspect of my screen changed and all the files were condensed and jammed together.

One person said, “Your desktop is a mess.”

Now I didn’t want to call him “Captain Obvious”, but I’ve been living with this messy screen for about a year now.

I just have not wanted to tackle it. There was always something else to do.

I didn’t want to have to think up places for these files to go. It was easier to just leave them there and not deal with them.

Well, today I’m going to deal with it. I will probably trash some files, organize others into folders, and probably move some to a hard drive off my computer.

One of the reasons I’ve taken so long to do this is that I don’t have a space problem on my computer. I have tons of room on my hard drive.

If my HD was nearly full, I would have been forced to do something with these files by now. But there’s no necessity for that.

The only reason I am doing this at this time is that I’m feeling like Popeye the sailor man today – “I can’t stands it”.

Here’s the thing: How is your life right now? Is it a little cluttered with sin, some poor habits, maybe even an attachment to something that’s not healthy? Maybe it doesn’t seem that bad to you right now. But why wait till you “can’t stands it” any longer? It’s impeding your progress now. Don’t wait until you’re buried under it. Do some house (life) cleaning with God today. Confess those sins, turn from them, and ask God by the Holy Spirit to help you clean up your life.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What’s been cluttering your life these days? Leave your comments below.

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How To Clean Up A Messy Life

I’ve been noticing that things have been getting a little messy in my life. I haven’t been careful at keeping the little things tidy.

messy-desktop

What I’ve observed is, my night table is . . . well, you can’t see much of it because of all the little things that are covering it. You know, you empty your pockets at night, and where do you put all that stuff? Right! You put it on your night table.

Then there are things like cards. I recently had a birthday – what do you do with birthday cards after you’ve read them? … night table.

It seems that once you’ve let a few things stay on your night table, it’s free game for anything else that you or anyone else sees fit to place there.

I look at the mess on that night table and think I should do something about it, but I’m not sure where to put all those things. So they just stay there.

Then there is the desk top of my computer. It is littered with files and folders. They say that your computer doesn’t run as fast when the home screen is filled with the things you haven’t filed somewhere.

It usually starts with me thinking that I will soon need that file so I better keep it on the desktop for easy access. Since that’s convenient, it’s not long until I do that with another file. Soon I’m not taking the time to file anything; it’s easier to just leave it on the desktop.

It looks horrible. I’ve chosen a few pictures that I like to look at for my desktop, but now I can hardly see them for all the icons and file names that litter the screen.

This isn’t the first time this has happened to me. It happens regularly at work. Filing is an issue with me. I just don’t keep up with it and the result is that my desk at work gets some not-so-nice-looking piles of paper on it.

I find that I live this way for a while; it can even be a long while. But at some point – and I’ve reached that point right now – I need to do something about it. I need to do some cleaning up.

I started last night with my laptop. I trashed some files, filed others. I didn’t finish the job but I made great headway towards having a file-free screen.

My night table is next – the cards have to go, and all those other little things that should be put in their places … not just out of sight, but in the right spot.

Here’s the thing: One of the problems with clutter is that we don’t know where to put things. We don’t have a spot for them. Because of that, we tend to leave things lying around, hoping they will find a spot for themselves. But that never happens. Our life can also get messy with stuff we haven’t dealt with that’s just lying around – things like unforgiveness, jealousy, bitterness, lust, anger (this could be a long list). We don’t trip on those things every day, but they sure make our lives cluttered and difficult to relate to God, even find Him sometimes. Maybe it’s time to clean up the mess. Where should you put all that stuff? Take it to God, lay it all before Him and ask Him to deal with it. You’ll be amazed at how He can clean up your life!

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What part of your home or life gets the most messy? Leave your comment below.