Personal – "…because you matter!"

About Pain, Attitude, Breakthrough, Change, Character, Death of a Vision, Dream Again, Emotional Healthy, Future, Get Ready, Growth out of Pain, Identity, Now What?, Personal, Perspective, Spiritual Parallels, What's in your hand?

So, What Do You Have?

Every one of us can be caught in a shortfall mentality. When we have undisciplined thoughts, we can free-wheel into the squalor of despair.

The ancient story of Moses, his beginning and bargaining with God, speaks directly to, and parallels, our wallowing. In particular, the passage captured in the writings of Exodus 4:1-5 is my focus.

With a lifetime of coming up short, Moses has an encounter with God. He is eighty years old by this time. All he has left in the world is a shepherd’s staff, and God asks for that. The very last thing that Moses could lean on is asked for, “What is that in your hand?” (Vs. 2)

What captured my thoughts are not all the things that Moses didn’t have. Moses’ life had been virtually stripped bare. But, the question addressed the one thing he did have left, his shepherd’s staff.

We can commiserate all day over the things that we don’t have, the opportunities we should have received, how we came up short, the unfair, the slanted away-from-us world.

But God asked Moses, ‘what do you have?”

This encounter with God kept Moses, who wanted to go down the ‘woe is me’ trail, focused on what he had, not what he didn’t.

Author, songwriter, performer, and completely blind Ken Madema captured this moment in a stellar 8:46 sec performance. (Link below)

The story of Moses, in its entirety, is a fantastic account of how God involved himself with the Jewish nation. So much so that some want to disregard it with regards to historical accuracy.

The Jewish nation, however, was meticulous with regards to their writings. The fabrication factor just isn’t there. It was written and preserved just as it happened. The Jewish nation regarded Moses as their greatest prophet. They had good reason.

Back to the point, the greatest prophet before he entered the palace to stand before the Pharaoh had to be there entirely in the strength that God provided.

So today, right at this moment, “What do you have in your hands?” What is the last thing you are leaning on for your identity, your worth, and your significance?

I wonder what miracle would happen if you were to give it to God?

https://ca.video.search.yahoo.com/search/video?fr=crmas&ei=UTF-8&p=ken+madema+moses#id=1&vid=ed7ddb39fd5a7e8a84fd55e74631721f&action=click

Attitude, Christmas, Personal

Do You Hear What I Hear?

My wife and I had the exciting privilege in July of 2015 to visit the House of the Virgin Mary in Izmir, better known to us as ancient Ephesus, Turkey.

Folklore has this house as the place where the Apostle John, following Jesus’ last words on the cross, took Jesus’ mother Mary to escape persecution. Legend places Mary there where she with John lived out their final days.

Outside the house, on the path back to the parking lot, was this wall with a place to place your prayer slip of paper. Many hundreds of thousands of people, perhaps millions over the years, took this opportunity to leave a request in hopes of receiving an answer, a blessing to their innermost prayer.

A couple of thousand years earlier, when Jesus was teaching, in one of his controversial moments, a woman called out of the crowd, “Your mom is so blessed to have you!” (Loosely paraphrased) In the cadence of the moment, Jesus replied, “But even more blessed are all who hear the word of God and put it into practice.” (Luke 11:28 NLT)

I think we’ve all had them, you know, the idea in our head that we can almost hear. It may have come in the voice of our parents, a teacher, a loved mentor. You may have caught yourself saying, “It was almost audible.”

What if God wants to use that medium to bless you?

Do you hear what I hear?

“But even more blessed are all who hear the word of God and put it into practice.”

House of the Virgin Mary in Izmir, Turkey

Attitude, Character, Integrity, New Path, Owning your stuff, Personal

The Encounter. It’s My Fault!

“It’s me. Sir, it’s my fault. There is no one else to blame. I did it. Did you hear me, sir? It’s my fault!”

These words pushed out of my mouth as I was being berated, at a very large volume, at a very close proximity, with coffee still on his breath, with many colourful words, on a very busy Vancouver street corner, with a whole lot of people looking on. He went up one side of me and down the other. I knew with ample awareness and bountiful description that we, I, had created a mess.

I had committed the unpardonable sin by not delivering, on time, an entire job site’s paycheques on payday morning. This was long before Direct Deposit; in fact, this one occurrence may well be the reason for Direct Deposit. You’re welcome.

Yah, I would have been mad at me too!

It was a simple mistake. No, it really was. I was supposed to deliver 711’s paycheques to their new location just under construction. The complicator? The job site was directly across the main intersection from the 711 store that was already there. I had delivered similar packages many times before. When I went to the store to give it to the person who’s name was on the parcel, the store attendant knew nothing of it and wouldn’t sign for it.

The simple solution was to deliver it to the correct address right across the street. But, who needs an address when you have the name like 711 directly on the package? So the next best solution was to take it back to the depot and let it be reprocessed from there. Had it been for something of lesser importance, that might have been the correct procedure, but not for this, and not for this day.

Then, to make matters worse, I finished my deliveries early, so I went for a leisurely lunch. My boss, who was almost unglued, rudely interrupted my solace when I got back to my truck. He required that I end my leisure immediately and deliver this package to the rightful owner, who would have had plenty of time to practice his communication skills. This was all done over the 2-way radio (before personal cell phones) with all my colleagues to hear.

So, 2.5 hours past the intended delivery time, the encounter.

Before this encounter, I had recently learned that when you make a mess, you have to own it. I didn’t realize then that I would be part of a practical exercise in this skill.

It absolutely worked. When the construction boss finally heard me, he immediately calmed and then lamely apologized for his overreaction. We were good, my company was saved, and I learned a LIFE Lesson with far-reaching applications.

When you screw-up, you have to own your stuff.

“So, the first step to getting free from conflict and staying free is for us to come out of denial and correctly process our lives. We need to live transparent lives by owning our stuff, our actions.” (Sovdi, Philip. Path Out: Eliminate the Swirl (Page 12). Kindle Edition.)https://philsovdi.com/book-offer/

Christian, Love, Personal

Is God Religious?

A couple of nights ago I was prepping a couple for their wedding this Saturday.

Part of the prep was to look at the ‘Love passage’ from 1 Corinthians 13. As we were going through it, it occurred to me that God isn’t religious.

I got to that thought by reading through and discussing, ‘what love is,’ with this couple. Then, in my mind, I linked the passage from 1 John 4:8, “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” (NIV)

Through the pen or stylus of John, God describes himself as ‘love.’ Love has nothing to do with protocol, although it can be included in the protocol. Love has nothing to do with tradition, although without it, tradition could be quite dry.

God could have described himself in an infinite number of ways, but he chose love. He didn’t say, I am the God of dotted ‘I’s’ and crossed ’T’s,’ he could have, but, he didn’t say that. From the pen of the one who spent three unbelievable years with Jesus, the one who heard him say, “If you have seen me you have seen the Father,” John writes, “…God is love.”

That’s it, that is all you need. That is all I need. Three up close and personal, very personal, years and searching for the right word John says it is ‘Love.’

John knew that Jesus wasn’t religious. He watched and heard him call those who were religious some pretty shameful things. He heard Jesus say, “You need to do what they are saying, the good things, but don’t be like them.” It is like John’s observation was saying, don’t switch the relationship from personal to performance. Jesus never did.

Why not take a walk with Jesus through the pages of scripture? Don’t read to prove something, instead, read to get the whole picture, and I think you will begin to realize that it was all personal with him. Jesus showed it was people that mattered to God, not religion. In fact, the only way that religion mattered at all was when Jesus said, “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” That statement was even more up close and personal as it came from Jesus’ half-brother James. (James 1:27, NIV) God then and now desired to have intimate, personal, connect with people who were being kept away from him by the religion that was supposed to bring them to him.

So, today, God isn’t looking for you to get religion. I kind of think he hopes you won’t. Instead, God is looking for us to have a personal relationship with him that is only available through Jesus.

Accurate Measuring, Attitude, Breakthrough, Future, Personal, Trust

Joseph Series: You Cannot Move Forward Until…

Owning your stuff, finding forgiveness, and trusting in the one who can make a difference, is the new normal; it was for Joseph’s brothers.
The brother’s lives depended on it, and they couldn’t move ahead without it.
Joseph had his brothers, his father, and their entire families move to prime real estate, the best Egypt had to offer. They moved from absolute need to unbelievable provision all because of who they trusted. They once despised him, but now they trusted Joseph with their entire lives and future.
Joseph’s brothers could not have been saved from their dilemma without this trust.
Joseph was a picture of God’s provision to his siblings and all of their families. He was deliverance from their dilemma, healing from their past, hope for their future, and their new way of life.
History shows; the Bible shows; even Broadway shows that they made the right choice and they trusted the right person. It took them a while, it took incredible hardship, but they finally got it right.
Joseph was left for dead, despised, rejected, and unjustly suffered alone. He was raised to a position second only to Pharaoh himself. Joseph used the new position of ‘fortunate’ to provide for everyone else, especially his brothers.
Anyone else in Egypt couldn’t have and wouldn’t have provided for the brothers. Only Joseph had the answer and the help for their deepest needs; it could be argued that this was unfair to others, narrow and extremely exclusive or it could be accepted that this provision was uniquely designed for their personal lives.
Your future life, your new purpose, your hope for what is yet to be are found here; just as Joseph foreshadowed his family’s future hope and provision, so Christ foreshadows yours.
Now, it is your story, your new normal.
Joseph and The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat has its foundation in a true story, which when applied, will change your life.

Approval, Attitude, Comparisons, Personal, Perspective

Personal Care

So, I read a story today about a guy when he was young, who, almost cavalierly, asked God to fill his life with the power of the Holy Spirit. He accounts that God immediately answered and he felt God’s power. His life went on to be amazing. The events of his life took a positive graph position, up and to the right, and, looking at his life today, that appears to be exactly what happened.

That is not what happened to me. Oh, when I was young, I felt God amazingly fill me, but my life went anywhere but up and to the right. This reading today was an emotional GPS moment of truth versus feelings for me.

I would like to be able to tell the story of success and accomplishment, according to my version of those things, according to the way that story I read today worked, but that is not my story. Rather my story is one of a very Blue Collar, slug it out, and figure it out type of life. The two books I have written, Blue Collar Theology and Path Out – Eliminate the Swirl, tell some of these accounts.

My point?

Does God show favouritism? Do some get the “Blessed or Easy Way,” while others of us get to clean up the mess? Sometimes it seems so. But, it is not so!

God carefully, amazingly, intimately, and personally cares for you. He is working a plan that supports and includes you, even if it isn’t immediately obvious.

He wants to connect with you in such an incredible and purposeful way. All you need to do is what I did: Acknowledge him in all your ways, (this includes your emotions at the moment) Proverbs 3:5&6, and choose truth over feelings.

Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
    the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
    and his understanding no one can fathom.
He gives strength to the weary
    and increases the power of the weak.
Even youths grow tired and weary,
    and young men stumble and fall;
but those who hope in the Lord
    will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
    they will run and not grow weary,
    they will walk and not be faint.

Isaiah 40:28-31

You Don’t Have To Live; You Get To!

Attitude, Personal

35 Years and Love

Things I have learned from 35 years of marriage:

Forgiveness – I have learned how to give forgiveness, and probably even harder, how to receive forgiveness.

Faithfulness – I have learned how God has shown up every time to help, heal and renew. I have observed how to imitate Our Father In Heaven in learning to be faithful.

Grace – Grace is not just a burp in God’s justice, but an enabling of his purpose in our lives and our marriage.

Change – I have learned that I need to change and that I cannot change my wife.

Repentance – I have trafficked here way too often and have had to seek forgiveness with repentance – and if not, how to repent anyway.

Courage – We are living our lives, unscripted, unrehearsed. We live to face the music each day’s song with a smile and hope for our future.

Respect – I have had to learn to respect just because. Respect is paramount to our success and our ability to move forward.

I have learned to communicate – She doesn’t always think my thoughts the way I think she should. Nor do I think hers. Thus, we’ve needed to talk and listen to each other.

Humility – Realizing that I am not what this is about. We are walking together; we are side by side; we are equally engaged and responsible. We, us, our, are our pronouns of choice. If I hurt her, it hurts us. If she hurts me, we ‘smart’ together. If I give up my life, I get ours. I win by giving.

Giving – We have decided that it is not 50/50. If we are giving, it is all in 100%/100%. What is mine is ours. What is hers is ours. We have given and had given up, but what we have given up we have gained back in spades. I would have us, we, and ours all over again. She and the marriage that she shares with me are so worth it.

Love – How much time do you have? – We have loved each other deeply from the heart. We believe that “Love never fails…” (1 Corinthians 13:8, NIV)

Love is a four letter word and sometimes it is plain old work. Sometimes it is spelled, WORK.

These are some of my thoughts about today.

Here is my thought about my wife, “Linda I love you so much. You are the one that I adore, honour and serve with my entire life.” I love you, babe!

Phil

You Don’t Have To Live; You Get To!