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So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering.

Romans 12:1

Seriously I think that verse kicks my butt every time.  Anyone else struggle with living their whole life as a worship?  Maybe it’s just me.  Sometimes I will do great.  But, let’s be honest.  A major part of my life is lived for me.  Painful truth.  He wants more from me than just my Sunday mornings.  More than just my Bible reading times.  More than my prayers.  More than my pre-deathdefiance promises.  He wants (and deserves) it all.  Every single ordinary thing.

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Change your mind

Yeah that’s right.  Billy Graham’s dirty little secret.  So what is Wild Bill’s secret?  Beats me.  Maybe he didn’t have one.  That’s not what this post is actually about.  Honestly I have no idea if he ever had a dirty little secret or for that matter ever sinned past the age of 11.  But the point is that it seems like we are just waiting for the next guy to fall.  Pastors, counselors, worship leaders, priests, etc.  It seems like every few months now we hear of another fallen comrade and we are just waiting to read about it.

Are we just waiting for our leaders to fail?  Ok, maybe we aren’t necessarily looking for it, but we sure wanna know when they do!  We see the headlines or read the Twitter and our first instinct many times is to click to find out more of what they did.  So and so had an affair.  This guy’s getting divorced.  He was arrested for drug use.  Whatever.  I know I’m guilty.  It’s hard not to.

A few weeks ago a leader that has some influence on me came tumbling down.  I had all the same thoughts as I have many times before.  I wanted to know what happened.  I wanted to know the gossip.  But then God changed my heart and showed me what I was thinking.  Showed me what I should be thinking.  My heart shouldn’t be digging for more details, but instead hurting for those involved and praying for God to shine through somehow.

So I have been working on that.  I still don’t know what happened.  I know that something did and I also know that our God is far more powerful than the stupid mistakes that we humans walk right into.  Now every time I remember or think about that person, I am trying to change my mindset and pray for everyone surrounding the situation.  It is not up to me to judge nor is it up to me to gather all of the information.  Any attempt for me to do so is me stepping out of line.  As Billy Graham put it, my job is to love.

They sinned.  Yes.  Let’s let those God has placed in authority over him to deal with him and the rest of us that have nothing to do with it can just pray and love.  Now we are reminded that they are not perfect either.  It doesn’t change how God has used them in the past.  It doesn’t stop God from being able to use them in the future.  God can still do amazing, life-changing, world-changing things through us even though we are screw ups.  So, next time you hear or see that someone fell off the perfect bus, remember you aren’t either.  Love them and pray for them instead of gossiping and tearing them down.

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Change your mind

Ever been stuck in traffic so bad that you feel like your grandpa using his walker with tennis balls on it would be going faster?  You sit in the back with countless cars in front of you just praying to go just 20 mph.  You have somewhere to be.  You’ve tried changing lanes when the other is going faster only to watch it stop dead and the first start up.  Yup.  Traffic sucks.

When you are sitting back there behind all the traffic, it looks as though there is no hope.  All you see is brake lights.  No one moving.  Nothing good.  We all know that it is easy to see life this way.  Things get rough and there is no hope.  Nothing giving.  Nothing moving.  Everything seems to be standing still.  Even moving backwards.  Yeah, when all you can see from your point of view is the insurmountable problems in front of you, it is hard to see what is good.

But there is hope.  There is a different view.  There are many other angles to see.  Each one shows the situation to be a little bit different.  If you move to the access road on the side of that packed highway you can see that there are cars moving.  There is space between them.  There is good coming.  Maybe you need to see the good in what was prevented.  You lost your job only to miss out on the scandal that was about to take place.  You got caught in your sin before it took you to a place beyond the reconciliation of your friendships.  Because you had to sit in that traffic you didn’t get to the intersection in time for the car crash that could have taken your family.

It is definitely hard to see the good when everything seems stacked against you, but God sees all the angles that we are incapable of seeing.  He knows the plans that He has for you.  For future.  For hope.  Next time you are backed up behind that impossible traffic, trust that you will get there.  In His timing.

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Change your mind

This is Dominic Balli.  He is a musician here in Southern California that is new to me.  I just heard him for the first time the other day (thanks Rich!) and wanted to share with you all!  So if you are into a little different flavor, then this may be your guy!  Check out his music on iTunes and maybe even follow him on Twitter!

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Change your mind