The Plumbline

Sorrow is better than laughter, for sadness has a refining influence on us. A wise person thinks a lot about death, while a fool thinks only about having a good time. (Ecclesiastes 7:3-4) A wise person thinks - those words popped out at me as I read through this passage today. A fool thinks, too. He may not think well, but he thinks! Focus does determine outcome in so many ways, does it not? We can ponder something so much, allowing it to consume our minds over and over again, until it actually forms the course that we take in life. If we ponder the better things, our course is more certain and brings meaning into our lives. If we ponder things unwise for us to pursue, our course may just be a little bumpier than we had hoped. Sorrow is better than laughter, for sadness has a refining influence on us. Ponder that one for just a few moments today. Sorrow actually 'refines' something within us. Whenever I have encountered something that brought sorrow into my life, it did caus...

The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings.  (Eric Hoffer) Lord, you are mine! I promise to obey your words! With all my heart I want your blessings. Be merciful as you promised. I pondered the direction of my life, and I turned to follow your laws. (Psalm 119:57-59) Perhaps one of the most difficult lessons to learn is that we don't 'earn' God's blessings. The more we spend time with Jesus, the more we will realize his blessings are vast and unlimited. The blessings of God are not linked to what we 'do' in this relationship, but their very presence within our lives might just prompt us toward obedience more and more each day. We aren't 'obedient' to obtain the blessings - the obedience actually flows from our lives because we realize how great grace is! Ponder the direction of your life every so often - it isn't always going the right direction. We need to take time to allow God to point out to us where ...

Since you have been raised to new life with Christ, set your sights on the realities of heaven, where Christ sits in the place of honor at God’s right hand. Think about the things of heaven, not the things of earth. For you died to this life, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God. (Colossians 3:1-3) The word 'since' suggests a completed act - it is based on something having happened. Between something happening (you having said yes to Jesus) and the present time, you have been raised to new life. You are no longer living according to the same standards, desires, or plans. Now we set our sights on something 'higher' than we ever set them before. Our focus changes - we no longer maintain an 'earthly only' focus but learn how to refocus our attention on Christ.  Too many times, we focus on the earthly things and don't spend very much time at all focusing on the things God wants us to learn about him. We get consumed by jobs, household chores, and all...

“Pay close attention to what you hear. The closer you listen, the more understanding you will be given—and you will receive even more. To those who listen to my teaching, more understanding will be given. But for those who are not listening, even what little understanding they have will be taken away from them.” (Mark 4:24-25) I remember being in the classroom as a kid, staring blankly at some object or view from the window, all the while daydreaming some big plan or fantasy in my mind. The teacher would be going on with some lesson in geometry, mathematics, or science, all while I was soaring through space in a rocket ship or sailing the blue seas in search of treasures. The imagination is a good thing when it helps us invent new things that help others, but it can be a distraction when it causes us to lose focus!  Christ used parables to teach the people because they could relate to those objects or tasks. Sowing seed was common. Lighting a lamp at sundown was everyday practice....

So if you’re serious about living this new resurrection life with Christ, act like it. Pursue the things over which Christ presides. Don’t shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ—that’s where the action is. See things from his perspective. (Colossians 3:1-2) Are you serious about following Jesus this year? The past three weeks should have cemented your determination to follow wholeheartedly, or maybe you have chosen to remain in control of your life and be a little too stubborn for your own good. Christ's call to us today is to 'get serious about living for him - stop waffling, buckle down, and 'get er done'.  Pursue the things over which Christ presides - stop shuffling along. A 'shuffler' walks that way because they are dragging their feet - they lack determination, are a little too resistant to the forward progress, or are so weighed down with life's cares ...

Oswald Chambers reminded us, "The whole point of getting things done is knowing what to leave undone." Perhaps a good start to our new year would be to look at the things we have labeled as 'important' in our lives but are really not all that important after all. When we begin to look at some of the stuff that has consumed our time, talent, energies, and finances, we might just conclude these have been a bit too focused on one thing at the exclusion of perhaps a myriad of other things. The most beneficial thing we can do at times is to evaluate where our priorities have 'drifted'. I use the term 'drifted' because we usually don't even realize we have been investing so much into something that isn't really all that good for our lives in the first place. ...let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on...

...the Lord God knows how to save those who are devoted to him. He will save them when troubles come. (2 Peter 2:9) We may not realize just how much God has his watchful eye upon us, or that he is hard at work protecting us from evil all around us, but he is right there, and he is 'at work'! God knows how to save us from ourselves, and he knows how to save us from all manner of evil that comes into our lives! When troubles come, look up. When anxiety reaches deep within your soul, praise God. When heartache seems to overwhelm every emotion, fall on your knees and pour your heart out to him. He is your Savior! Several examples are given to us in the previous verses - examples of good men who served the Lord in very difficult circumstances. Noah served God with an unwavering heart, even in the face of evil people all around him. He lived a lifestyle that "told people about living right." Lot lived among vile and unholy people, who engaged in terrible acts of evil, all t...

If I keep my eyes on God, I won’t trip over my own feet. (Psalm 24:15) I don't know about you, but my 'feet' get in the way a lot! I seem to 'trip up' over some things others see coming a mile away. Sin is just like that for most of us - others can see it coming, while we are standing there totally oblivious to its soon coming attack! Why do we get our eyes off of God so easily and find ourselves looking in places for our help? I think it is because we have so many 'influential voices' in our world today - we just lose focus and don't even know we are allowing it to happen. It is as though our society has created the perfect environment for 'passivity'. God never wanted 'passive followers' - he wants followers who will keep paying attention, regardless of the circumstances. If I keep my eyes on God... That pretty much says it all right there. We must maintain our focus - God doesn't do that for us. We must train our eyes to 'retai...

Create in me a clean heart, O God; restore within me a sense of being brand new. (Psalm 51:10) Einstein said, "We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them."  He was so true in this perception!  The problems we create will never be overcome or changed until we change the way we have been thinking about them!  To change our thought process we often need to change what we are focusing on so often or intensely. If we always see the problem, we will never see the solution standing just beyond it! If all we see is the river in front of us, raging out of control and making it hard to pass over to the other side, we will likely not see the bridge being lowered from the other side! Restoration is a process of not only being "clean" of the sin in our lives, but of being able to look beyond the sin.  We can ask for forgiveness when we have done something we are not happy we have done, but if all we keep thinking about is that thing we asked...

Cynics look high and low for wisdom—and never find it; the open-minded find it right on their doorstep! (Proverbs 14:6) There are people in this world who believe that selfishness motivates people to do things. There are probably more than a few individuals like this, but once someone invites Christ into their lives, it is almost impossible to live that way any longer. A cynic has to believe every action has some underlying "ulterior motive". As we come INTO Christ, the "motivations" of our life begin to change - moving from being a little too self-centered to being "other-centered". The result of becoming more Christ-centered is that we also become more and more "other-centered". This is a good thing since our ego gets us into more scrapes than we might like to deal with in this life! Wisdom is only truly found when we are able to embrace it and as long as we are embracing everything that focuses on and pleases self, we will not be able to...

Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. (Romans 8:35, 37) There are lots of things and people working overtime to separate us from the pursuit of our first love - Christ. What? You say he isn't your 'first love'? Well, if he isn't, he needs to be! We will never experience any love so loyal, any grace so deep, or any peace so settling as what we enjoy in putting him first in our lives. Could it be we are so easily overcome or overwhelmed by life's hard things because we haven't given him 'first place' in our lives?  And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powe...

  In light of all this, here’s what I want you to do. While I’m locked up here, a prisoner for the Master, I want you to get out there and walk—better yet, run!—on the road God called you to travel. I don’t want any of you sitting around on your hands. I don’t want anyone strolling off, down some path that goes nowhere. And mark that you do this with humility and discipline—not in fits and starts, but steadily, pouring yourselves out for each other in acts of love, alert at noticing differences and quick at mending fences. (Ephesians 4:2) Have you seen the movie, "Forrest Gump"? One line from that movie, "Run, Forrest, run", really depicts a heart of 'steadfast commitment'. One of the most amazing things he says is, "You have to do the best with what God gave you". God tells us to 'run', not walk, because idle hands make for way too much opportunity for compromise. Our 'walk' is to be steady - consistent and disciplined. We can bare...

Quiet minds cannot be perplexed or frightened but go on in fortune or misfortune at their own private pace, like a clock during a thunderstorm. (Robert Louis Stevenson) I want you woven into a tapestry of love, in touch with everything there is to know of God. Then you will have minds confident and at rest, focused on Christ, God’s great mystery. All the richest treasures of wisdom and knowledge are embedded in that mystery and nowhere else. And we’ve been shown the mystery! (Colossians 2:2-4) Woven into a tapestry of love - not through human effort, but because God binds us together as 'interwoven members'. This should give us a sense of 'belonging' even when we don't feel like we 'belong' anywhere else. This should also give us a sense of being created for a purpose, not just to sit idly by as life passes us by. We are called to work together - not just the physical work some might think of, but that 'spiritual' and 'emotional' work of bei...

Life Hack #30: Do you know where your future lies? Our decisions TODAY impact out outcomes tomorrow, but we don't control ALL the possibilities of either day. We can "manage" as much as possible, but there are just "unknowns" we cannot really plan for. Knowing our future is important - especially in terms of where we are headed spiritually. If we haven't really made an "about-face" from doing things our own way, under our own terms, and for our own benefit, we might just be "play-acting" at this "Christianity" thing. Our future is as secure as our focus - that which we set our eyes on the most becomes the direction we take, and it also becomes what fills our "head". Don’t bother your head with braggarts or wish you could succeed like the wicked. Those people have no future at all; they’re headed down a dead-end street. (Proverbs 24:19-20) We might allow things we see or hear to fill our heads with ideas and ima...

Life Hack #26: Rescue the perishing; don’t hesitate to step in and help. If you say, “Hey, that’s none of my business,” will that get you off the hook? Someone is watching you closely, you know—someone not impressed with weak excuses. (Proverbs 24:11-12) None of us do things in a vacuum. Every action or inaction on our part not only affects another, it is observed by many, but especially one person - God himself. The times of 'disengagement' or inaction are just as significant as when we engage or take action. Why? We have been commanded to be "active" on behalf of those who need us to step in and help - inaction on our part is actually disobedience. What we do with the opportunities we miss are maybe more important than those we actually embrace! God knows and understands our hearts - he sees into the very core of our being, knows our thoughts, interprets our intent, and is comfortable exploring the recesses of our reasoning. He doesn't have a whole lot of p...

So let God work his will in you. Yell a loud no to the Devil and watch him scamper. Say a quiet yes to God and he’ll be there in no time. Quit dabbling in sin. Purify your inner life. Quit playing the field. Hit bottom, and cry your eyes out. The fun and games are over. Get serious, really serious. Get down on your knees before the Master; it’s the only way you’ll get on your feet. (James 4:7-10) Does this sound close to what we are seeing today in our world: Wars, quarrels, wanting our own way, lusting for what we don't have, but probably also don't need? If you said "yes", you are probably observing some of the same things I am. The problem begins with the "war within" each of us - wanting things we really don't need or things which will eventually be our undoing. Life deals us all kinds of options - learning how to sort through those options is imperative to living well.  Getting so close to the things this world has to offer can actually lead to u...

Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love. Make every effort to keep yourselves united in the Spirit, binding yourselves together with peace. For there is one body and one Spirit, just as you have been called to one glorious hope for the future. (Ephesians 4:2-4) A moment of confession here - I am not always humble - my pride gets in the way a lot of times. I am not always gentle - my desire to be first, be right, be whatever brings out some of the harshness of my human nature. Am I always patient? Nope, I don't have that one down either! Do I see your faults and just want to roll my eyes? Sometimes - until I look in the mirror and see my own! Then I just hush-up and hope you haven't noticed I have the same faults.  Living together in peace is the goal - but all this 'human' stuff gets in the way at times, doesn't it? We waste a whole lot of time arguing over things that won't matter a...

We cannot change our past. We cannot change the fact that people act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. (Charles R. Swindoll) Who is like the wise man? And who understands the meaning of anything? A man’s wisdom makes his face shine. The hard look on his face is changed. (Ecclesiastes 8:1) What are we truly able to change? Many times, we think we can change others, but that probably hasn't worked so well for any of us. We have a hard enough time trying to change ourselves, much less another! We might think we can change the circumstances upon us, but most of the time we can just 'adjust our attitude' toward them. We sometimes believe we could have changed the world, but the world likely didn't want to be changed as we wanted it changed! Change is inevitable, but our attitude toward it is not. We choose the attitude by which we will face change as it comes. We don't ...

The desires of good people lead straight to the best, but wicked ambition ends in angry frustration. (Proverbs 11:23) Desires go a long way in determining the end results. Integrity - lives lived out according to God's plan and purpose, with honesty and humility. Anytime we have "twisted desires", it leads to "twisted hearts" and the outcome will be less than good. I think twisted ambition is what gets us so frustrated most of the time. We get our undies in a wad - either at another individual, over something we cannot control, or totally because we are mad at ourselves - all because of some "twisted" desire or ambition. When we learn to "untangle" our lives a little bit, it is amazing how much differently things actually appear! Life is filled with all kinds of choices. There are "good" or "best" choices, aren't there? Sometimes the difference between the two is a very fine line. I have been guilty of making a ...

Lord, who shall dwell [temporarily] in Your tabernacle? Who shall dwell [permanently] on Your holy hill? He who walks and lives uprightly and blamelessly, who works rightness and justice and speaks and thinks the truth in his heart... (Psalm 15:1-2) Men and women of understanding know there is a time and place for everything. The events of today prepare us for those of tomorrow. We may not always see clearly today what tomorrow holds, but we do know if we conduct our affairs to the best of our ability today, listening intently to the voice of God as we do, we will be in a better position for what tomorrow brings. Most of us think of living 'uprightly' as being in line with what is right, but it also means being directed vertically. In a spiritual sense, we are to conduct our "business" of today - directed vertically, upward in our focus. The opening statement of this psalm causes us to consider two aspects of our walk - the here and now, and the future state of ou...