thoughts

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The Perfect Match Is A Myth

I think it’s a myth that two people can be a perfect match. I don’t think two people can ever be perfect together. 

Do you remember the old fairy tale of Goldilocks and the three bears? In that story, Goldilocks stumbled into the bears’ house and tested out several things in the house: three bowls of porridge, three chairs and three beds. 

Each time she discovered that the little bowl, chair and bed was “just right”. 

This story is so far from reality, no wonder it’s a fairy tale! … Forget the three talking bears, and the fact that they lived in a house, made and ate porridge, sat in chairs and slept in beds. That wasn’t the wild fantasy. 

The real fantasy was that some of that stuff was “just right” to Goldilocks! 

That doesn’t happen in real life. There is never a perfect fit. 

We can get close, but it will never be perfect. 

I’ve been married for 33 years now and you would think that my wife and I would become more and more of a perfect match over the years. 

Not so. 

Recently there have been two glaring examples how we are not a perfect fit. 

The first example is with clothing. You would think that by now if Lily asked me to comment on her outfit that I would be able to tell her what I thought and it would help.

It doesn’t. 

I don’t know how to comment on her outfits. If I say it looks really nice, I may have said it too quickly or without looking at her long enough to make an informed decision. Maybe my facial expression wasn’t quite congruent with the comment I was making. 

At any rate, whatever I say it is not “just right”. 

There is no perfect fit here. 

And then yesterday, Lily and I were walking across a parking lot to enter a store and she exclaimed, “I can never figure out how we can walk together.” 

She was walking fast and trying to adjust to my slower pace. Sometimes, however, she has a hard time keeping up with me. 

Lily just wants us to be able to walk together at the same pace, but it’s never “just right”.

I’m not trying to move out of step with her; my stride just changes with where I’m walking to, and the purpose of our walk.

For instance, yesterday we were walking into a store. I can’t tell you how unexcited I was about doing that. Thinking about shopping makes me tired, so I’m not walking too fast into that. 

On the other hand, earlier in the day we were going for a walk in a park and Lily was having a hard time keeping up.  

For the record, at the time, I didn’t know she was working hard to keep up with me.

In that instance I was looking forward to getting out of the heat, so my mind was set on getting through it with few delays.

You see, we are not a “perfect” fit. It’s never “just right”. … but we’re really good together!

Here’s the thing: When you are evaluating your church, or your small group, or maybe the ministry you serve in, don’t evaluate it for a perfect fit. It’ll never be “just right”. Don’t wait for God to make it perfect or bring something perfect along. Trust Him to make you good together. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: With whom have you found you are good together? Leave your comments below.

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There Is More Than One Kind Of Listening

The other day I needed to listen very carefully … not that we shouldn’t always be listening, but sometimes it’s more crucial than at other times.

There are times when you don’t have to listen that attentively – like when you are doing something, working on something and you also have the TV or radio on in the background. 

You don’t really need to listen carefully to what your ears are drinking in. You are focussed on another project.

There are times when you should be listening but you choose not to – like occasionally when my wife, Lily, asks me to do something or tells me something so I can do it right. 

I have to admit that there are occasions – and I won’t tell you how many – that I have chosen not to fully listen to what she is saying.  

… I’ll be questioned on this later, by the way.

For instance, when she asks me to swing by the grocery store on my way home and pick up a few items, I don’t always pay attention to the details of what those items are. I don’t hear the size or the brand or the colour; I’ve stopped listening. I’m busy planning my route or another task I’ll do on the way.

The thing is I always have an out in those situations: I can call her when I get to the store. I can look at two kinds of yogurt and text her a picture of them to make sure I get the right one. 

I don’t feel I need to listen to her entire description before I’m in the store. … It’s a time when listening isn’t crucial. 

But there are times when you really need to listen. 

The other day I was flying my drone. It was a cloudy day at dusk – not the best conditions for visibility. I had taken the drone up to about 90 metres high and over 100 meters away. 

I usually go back and forth between looking at my control screen to see what the drone is viewing and watching it in the air. But with those conditions, when I took my eye off my drone to look down at what it was recording and then back again, I lost sight of it. 

I’ve lost a drone before, (read about that here) so I got this sick feeling in my gut when I didn’t know where it was. 

I immediately stopped it going forward, and looked at my screen to make sure the drone was pointed back in my direction. Then I started to bring the drone back. 

But I still couldn’t see it. At 90 meters high on a dull, dark, cloudy day, it was just a speck in the sky. 

What I had to do was listen very carefully for the sound of the drone’s whirling propellers. 

When I could hear that sound, I knew the drone was close. I scanned the sky where the sound was coming from and there it was – a little black X against a dark grey sky. It was directly over my head. 

Here’s the thing: If you want to hear from God, if you want to know what He wants you to do, you have to listen for Him very carefully – not listening like you’re picking up a few groceries, but listening like the survival of your drone is on the line … or like your life depends on it. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What do you long for God to speak to you about? Leave your comments below.

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I Just Couldn’t Find it

This article was originally posted in 2012. 

Have you ever looked for something that you were certain of its location, but still couldn’t find it?  Don’t those times drive you insane?  

I find myself living out the definition of insanity, “doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result.”  We probably all do that at times.

You either dig around in a drawer or a room, searching the same spots over and over,  hoping to find what you are looking for.  

You start talking to yourself, your blood pressure rises, you get angry with yourself, and then at the thing you’re looking for, until you don’t even want it anymore.  In fact, you hate it now, but you just HAVE to find it!

We’ve all been there; it’s not a pretty sight.  Your family starts out sympathetic, even helpful, but as you start to get frustrated, they start to vacate the area.  

As you start to sound like Gollum (from the Lord of the Rings), your family members look for things to do, errands to run, other places to be.

The other day, while preparing my sermon, I had three illustrations I wanted to use: one was a personal story, and the two others came from books.  I could remember some of the details for one of the illustrations, and even remember the book I had read it in.  

I had seen the title of the book the day before on one of my shelves, so I went directly there.  With the book in hand, I sat down at my desk and started looking for the story.

I looked at the beginning of each chapter because often times they started with a story.  That didn’t help.  I looked at the chapter titles to see if any of them would ring a bell.  

I was sure the story was in this book, but I wasn’t having any luck finding it. 

I was getting a little frustrated and I lost my confidence that I was even searching the correct book.  I got another book out by the same author and started looking through it, even though I didn’t think it was in there.  

Then I turned to the internet.  I googled the gist of the story with the author’s name.  I had to change my search three times before I got some results that seemed promising.  I looked at several hits but none of them were helpful.  

Then I discovered a document someone posted referencing the story.  Finally some hope.

The bad news was the document didn’t have the story details.  The good news was it confirmed that the story was, in fact, in the original book I had been looking in.  So I set to work to find the story.  I started at the back of the book this time.  I looked on pretty well every page for mention of it.  I finally found it . . . in the INTRODUCTION! 

Here’s the thing:  Sometimes I get all caught up in what I’m doing.  I know what to do, and it’s usually something small, within my power.  What I don’t do is ask God for help right away.  I fuss and stew instead of turning to the One who can guide me right to what I need.  Don’t wait until you’ve exhausted every avenue before you seek God, turn to him first. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question:  What have you learned from frustrating times like I described?  Leave your comment below.

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Three Things In Two Hours

You have two hours and three things you want to get done … how do you decide which things you are going to do?

That was my dilemma the other day. 

I was at our cottage and planned to pack up after lunch to drive home. But there were three things I wanted to do before lunch and I only had a couple of hours: I wanted to go for a 30-minute bike ride, write a blog post and fix the leaky taps in the bathtub. 

I really wanted to do all three. In the back of my mind I thought I could only do one, but I rejected that thought, focussing on what I could do first. 

Though I would only ride my bike for about 30 minutes, getting ready, cooling down afterwards and taking a shower would bump that activity up to an hour minimum. 

Writing a blog post might take 40 minutes minimum, but it could take up to an hour. Since I hadn’t thought of a subject to write about, it was likely going to take an hour. 

Then there were the leaky taps. 

This was a late entry onto my list. The taps had been dripping for a while, but for some reason it seemed like they were dripping a little more now.

I knew this project could spill over any time limit I put on it. 

What would you do?

In the back of my mind, I still (being delusional) hoped I could get all these things done by noon. 

While I was staring at my blank tablet screen, I thought, “Why waste time sitting here trying to think of something to write about?” So I got up and looked at the taps … I thought a bike ride and shower should be last on the list. 

You can probably figure out how those two hours were spent. 

When was the last time you attempted a home repair that fit into a nice, neat little time frame? When have you tried to fix a plumbing problem where everything went smoothly, without a hitch? 

I went to the hardware store to just replace the valves for the hot and cold water taps. But they don’t make a standard tap valve. There were many styles and it looked like they were out of some. The one the hardware employee and I settled on didn’t look like an exact match but I took a chance. 

When I got back to the cottage, I quickly discovered it was not the right one. So back I went to the hardware store for trip two. 

In the end, I decided to just change the washers … which would have been quick and easy except that the screws were stuck. 

I had to soak the taps in CLR to get the calcium off them. 

Guess what I did while I waited for the CLR to do its work? I ate lunch.

I blew right through my two hour window, and didn’t even get the taps fixed. … I didn’t even get one thing done in my time frame – brutal!

On a side note, after lunch when I swapped out the washers, the taps stopped leaking.

Here’s the thing: With all the things we want to do and could do, some things will get crowded out. We just won’t have time for them all. How often are we guilty of not having time for God, simply because of our wants and priorities? Put God in the first spot every day. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: Lately, how have you crowded God out of your day? Leave your comments below.

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We Celebrated Yet Again

The other night my wife, Lily, and I celebrated our wedding anniversary – our 33rd.

It’s pretty normal to mark special occasions with a celebration of some kind. Some celebrations include many people, some just a special place. 

Lil and I have celebrated in different ways over the years. There were some that are more memorable than others. 

There was the time on our tenth anniversary that we stayed a night in the Fantasyland Hotel at West Edmonton Mall. We had a choice between choosing the Trucker Room, where the bed was actually in the back of a pickup truck, or the Polynesian Room with a canopy bed, a large fountain jacuzzi tub, and greenery that gave the feeling of being in a garden. 

Lil picked the Polynesian Room over the Trucker Room which was okay because I wasn’t really drawn to sleeping in the back of a pickup truck anyway. 

Many of our anniversary celebrations have involved just the two of us going out for a nice dinner to a unique or special restaurant. 

But there have been times when the celebration got bigger and extended – like for our 25th anniversary. That was kind of a whole year celebration. 

We started out at the beginning of the year going a cruise with our children, marking likely our last family vacation. Then a few months later, we spent 14 days on a tour of Israel. We finished off our “year of jubilee” with purchasing a park model trailer at our vacation spot at Sauble Beach. 

It was an expensive anniversary celebration, but one year we won’t forget. 

Celebrations are necessary; they highlight something that is special. They cause us to reminisce about the past and recall the good things, accomplishments, and milestones of life. 

They cause us to remember why the thing we are celebrating matters. 

We celebrate birthdays, achievements, goals, successes, victories, and even sometimes we celebrate for the sake of celebration. 

The thing about celebrations is that they pertain only to those on the inside of the celebration. 

The other night Lily and I had dinner at a restaurant on the St. Lawrence River, overlooking the water from a screened in porch. As the sun went down and the moon came up, the light glimmered across the water. The boats below us gently rocked back and forth tied to their docks. 

It was special, but the people who were seated at tables around us had no idea we were celebrating anything. They weren’t party to our celebration. 

It was a private celebration in public.

A celebration can include many, but the many will only celebrate if they are connected in some way to the special occasion. Otherwise they are completely oblivious to it all. It makes no impression, no remembrance, no reminder. 

Only the celebrants experience the richness of the occasion. But for them, even when it is quiet, it’s a true celebration … Happy anniversary, Lil.

Here’s the thing: There will be a celebration when Christ returns. When Christ returns, this world will be made right. There will be peace; there will be joy; there will be a celebration. But that celebration, like any celebration, will be for those who are connected to Christ. It will be the greatest celebration this world has ever known, but it will be anything but a celebration for those who have no tie to Jesus. No one will want to miss being part of this celebration, so make sure you have a personal relationship with the One who is being celebrated. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What do you have to celebrate today? Leave your comments below.

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You May Not Be As Strange As I Think

 

The other day I came to realize I’m as strange as other people.

I think most of us think we are normal and everyone else is a little weird … or, at the very least, that other people have odd quirks about them that we don’t.

That’s not correct. I see now that we all have our little bits of oddness; we are all odd.

… Which reminds me of a club in my city – it’s called the Odd Fellows. Now there is a group that has embraced the fact that they are not like most people. They are okay with being strange, a little off-centre, even weird. And they have banded together to accept one another. 

I guess that’s what we should all do. 

I came to my realization of being odd during a conversation about the strange eating habits of other people. Granted it was almost dinner time, the BBQ smelt delicious and I was hungry. 

I mentioned that I knew a guy who didn’t like his food to touch and who ate his food one item at a time. 

My friend jumped in at that point and said, “What’s wrong with that? I don’t like my food to tough either and I always eat my food in an order.”

My first thought was, “Wow! There are two of them out there.” 

But that was really nothing compared to this guy I know. When he would eat pizza, he would separate all the parts. That’s right, the toppings (eg. pepperoni) would each go in separate piles, the cheese in another pile, leaving the crust bare. Then he would systematically eat each pile until that pizza all came back together in his belly. 

They say that when you eat, your food gets all mushed together, but when you eat like this guy I think your food actually reforms to its original prepared state!

That description even made my friend, who identified with this guy, exclaim, “Wow”, as in, “That guy really is weird.” 

But this is where it started getting spooky for me. I kept thinking and talking about how I eat some foods. 

For instance, when I have corn-on-the-cob with my meal, I always eat it first. Before I eat or taste anything else, I finish off my corn. But if the corn is already off the cob as kernels on my plate, then I eat them with everything else.

When I eat Chinese food, I always eat my egg roll first. I never leave it to the last, or eat part of it and save some for the middle of my meal. I down that thing first.

When I eat at Swiss Chalet, the first thing I do when I get my meal is butter that bun and eat it. I don’t touch the fries or the chicken until that bun hits the bottom of my stomach.

And It was right about then that I realized, “I’m as weird as the guy who eats pizza like it’s a  three course meal!” 

I don’t think I can handle the idea of me being weird so it must be that we are all a little odd … which actually makes us all the same.

Here’s the thing: We are all in need of the same saviour because, though our sins may be different, and some sin may SEEM worse than others, the fact is we are all the same in that we all sin. Never excuse your sin as being normal. We’re all in need of a Saviour – Jesus Christ – and His forgiveness.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What sin have you excused yourself of because you view it as normal? Leave your comments below.

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It Couldn’t Be Easier To Return

I’m always looking for an easy return.

I have a tape measure in our cottage that doesn’t return very easily. You have to tug hard to pull it out and then you have to push it back in. I want to throw it out and get a tape measure that will easily return after I extend it to measure something. 

So often we want an easy return. 

When you buy something that isn’t quite right, you want to be able to return it to the store for an exchange or refund … and you want that process to go smoothly.

It wasn’t always easy to return items. At one time, when you bought something, the store had no responsibility for it unless it was defective. Only then could you return it. 

If you bought something and the colour didn’t match, or it wasn’t the right thing after all, those were not grounds for returning it. You made the decision to purchase it, and it was yours – period. 

There were no easy returns. 

Something changed along the way, however, to the point that almost everything has become easily returnable. 

Recently I returned an item twice to a store before I got the right size. Both times it was an easy return – no questions asked. (Read about that here.)

There are some things that return so easily that you actually have to work hard to keep them from returning. 

I grew up playing with yo-yos. I still toss one from time to time. In fact, when I see one on a store shelf, I have a hard time resisting the temptation to pick it up and give it a toss.

When I see a child with a yo-yo, it’s all I can do to restrain myself from saying, “Here, give it to me and I’ll show you how it works.”

You see, the thing about yo-yos is that they are designed to return. But to be able to do tricks and to yo properly, you have to train it to sleep. 

Sleeping is basically delaying its return, making it spin out on the end of the string, so that you can perform some magical formations with that string. 

It takes training to learn how to do it. 

Nowadays you can buy a yo-yo that has a clutch built into it that will make it automatically sleep. But with a real yo-yo, if you place it in someone’s hand and they throw it down, it will automatically return. 

It’s just that easy. 

Here’s the thing: Do you realize how easy it is to return to God? I believe some of us think, or have trained ourselves to think, that it’s hard or difficult. The fact is that it’s easy to return to God; we’re designed for it. If you look at the Bible, the Old Testament is filled with page after page of examples where it was easy for people to return to God. He makes it easy. God is so patient and so eager that we return to Him, He sent His Son Jesus to make it easy for us. When you sin, don’t train yourself or fool yourself into thinking it’s too hard to return to Christ. It is easy – just humble yourself and return. He’s waiting. It really is just that easy.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: When have you found it difficult to return to God? Leave your comments below.

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Stress Can Be Good Or Bad

There is a certain amount of stress that’s good for you.

If we didn’t have any stress in our lives we probably wouldn’t get anything done. We would resort to saying, “Oh maybe I’ll do that tomorrow” … and tomorrow would never come.

If there was no stress, we would procrastinate … and some of us would procrastinate more.

Stress keeps us on our toes; it moves and motivates us, makes us feel responsible, and gets us to the deadline. 

These are all good things; we need a little stress in our lives. When stress builds up in us too much, however, it’s not good.

This last week I went golfing with my family. We hardly ever golf together because some of us hardly ever golf.

My son, Mike, and I golf the most, and Lily golfs with me when we’re on vacation. Karlie hasn’t golfed in two years.

Mike had a week of vacation and thought it would be nice to get a game in with the family. We looked at a couple of courses that would be within driving distance for all of us.

We ended up choosing a course that would be better suited for Mike and I and not Lily and Karlie. We got a really good deal on it so we booked it. 

Shortly after the arrangements had been made, Lily told me not to get all stressed, because that would impact the rest of the family. 

I have to tell you, I tried not to stress about it. I even prayed about it. 

Back when I was learning to golf, I felt pressure to keep up, to not hold up other golfers, whether I was golfing with them or they were in the group behind me. 

So knowing that this course was a little long for my wife and daughter, and knowing we were playing early in the morning, by the time I got to the course I was already tense.

I was definitely not relaxed. 

Even before we teed off, I was concerned about how quickly the next group would catch up to us and if we would be holding them up. … and I felt this even though there was no group behind us! 

All I can say is my game didn’t get off to a fantastic start … and it was all downhill from there. 

I could not get myself to relax and simply enjoy some time with my family. I was tense and hit more bad shots in that game than I’ve hit all season long so far. 

I kept looking back for the group behind us. I felt responsible to watch where everyone’s shot ended up. I constantly kept telling Lily and Karlie what they might be doing wrong when they hit bad shots. 

The crazy thing was they all got better as the round went on but I got worse. And that group behind us never did catch up and have to wait for us.

Here’s the thing: We are told in scripture to give our burdens to the Lord … but stress is a difficult burden to let go of when you’re in the middle of it. So first stop and recognize the stress, what it is, where it’s coming from, and how it’s affecting you. Then tell the Lord you want to give Him that stress. Third, focus, embrace, enjoy, immerse yourself in the task at hand. Doing that will shift your emotions and allow you to let go of the stress. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: How has stress got the best of you? Leave your comments below.

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When You Fall, Get Back Up

There is a saying that when you fall off a bike you should get right back on it again. 

The saying doesn’t specifically refer to riding a bike, rather it’s a reference to anything you fail at. You should get right back at it and do it again.

We’ve all followed that rule with many things in life, including riding our bikes. 

When that first date didn’t go so well, you didn’t stop dating; you got right back at it. When you didn’t make that team, you didn’t stop playing the game. 

When you failed a test you didn’t quit school, and when you stubbed your big toe, you didn’t stop going barefoot, and resort to wearing steel-toed boots to bed.

No, you got right back at what you were doing. That’s what we’re supposed to do. 

There are some things, however, that are harder to get right back to.

I remember one time as a kid that I got sick after eating corn on the cob. The corn had nothing to do with me being sick, but as I was losing my lunch over the toilet bowl, the sight of …. you get the idea and the picture. 

I couldn’t look at corn for a long time. After that incident I didn’t eat it at all for a few years. 

But slowly, my love of corn returned and I did eventually get back on the bike and start eating it again. 

In fact, when I was in high school at a youth event, in a challenge with another guy, I ate something like 18 cobs of corn! … No, I was not sick after that, but I did feel like I was waddling around for a few hours.

I say all that because, though we are supposed to get right back up when we fail or have a bad experience, it’s just difficult to do sometimes.

That’s what I’m experiencing these days. I haven’t been riding on a trail all week. There have been some days when the weather hasn’t been good, but many days when it’s been a perfect day for a ride. 

Instead, every day I’ve chosen to ride on the road.

The reason? The last time I rode my trail, I stopped to build a new section. When I got back to the cottage, I found another tick. (You can read about the first tick I brought home here.)

I’m two for two. Both times I’ve worked on a new section of trail, I’ve brought home a tick. … I hope it’s only been two! 

This one I found on the bath mat just outside the shower. I take it that the tick didn’t feel like having a shower with me.

I haven’t hit the trails since; these two ticks are keeping me out of the woods. I now have a partial trail that leads to nowhere. 

Fear of what could happen – and Lily not being too excited about the friends I’ve invited in – have stopped me so far. 

I may not finish that trail but I just have to get back to mountain biking. 

Here’s the thing: Sometimes it can be something very small – even as small as a tick – that stops you from going deeper with God. What does God want next for you? What failure, fear, or distraction is keeping you from moving forward with Him? Get back on your bike and ride. Go deeper with God. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What has ever stopped you in your tracks? Leave your comments below.

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The Years Have Not Changed A Pattern

It’s been over 30 years but nothing has changed … between me and my golf partner. Recently I played golf with him, the one who got me hooked on the game.

When I was in high school he belonged to a private golf course, but would play golf with me at a municipal course close to where we lived.

At first I would hit more bad shots than good ones, but over time it seemed that the good ones stuck with me and I forgot about the bad shots I made.

I think it’s something like giving birth: a mother forgets what the pain was really like so that she is eager to have another child. … Okay, it’s nothing like giving birth, but somehow the good shots I made – as few as they were – kept me coming back for more.

I think I was a slow learner because this friend would give me a lot of tips each time I duffed another shot about 20 yards down the fairway. 

He didn’t do it too much, though, because too many suggestions can really get annoying after a while. … I know because I’ve helped Lily with her golf game. I have to catch myself or she gets a little angry with me.

Over the first few years I started to get better at the game until I was making more good shots than bad ones.  

I would still have some holes where I blew up and shot an eight or something, but it always seemed, by the end of each round, that I had made a really good shot that caused me to think I could do that every time. 

As I got better, I started playing more with my friend and even eventually joined the golf club where he was a member. 

We had a few really great years of golf there before I moved out west to go to school and then work.

In those years that we played together, he would do something interesting. He would club me on almost every shot. 

I don’t mean that he took a golf club and whacked me over the head with it; he just told me what club I should use. 

He did it when I first started learning the game and he never stopped. 

It got so routine that sometimes I would just look at him and he would say, “use a 7 iron”. I would pull it out of my bag without a thought of questioning his suggestion.

He was right about 95% of the time … that’s if I hit the ball well.

That was our pattern. But that was also over 30 years ago. 

When I recently had the chance to play with my old friend again, I noticed something interesting. When I would get to my ball he, like clock work, as if it was automatic, would say, “use a 7 iron” … and I just pulled it out of my bag. 

There were even times when I didn’t say anything. I just looked at him and he would tell me. 

It was like we’d never stopped playing together; he was still helping me play better.

And somehow I had the same effect on him. He had his best round of the year so far.

Here’s the thing: Get in the habit of asking God for help, even with the little things in your day. If you start to include Him more and more in your decisions, and really listen for His response, then years from now when you are making some crucial decision, or even a minor one, God will whisper in your ear which club to pull. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: Who have you come to count on for help? Leave your comments below.