If it is to be, it’s up to me. This sounds a little selfish, but if you are focusing on personal goals, suddenly this is the mantra of the day. Expand that thought to your entire team and your personal spark may be what’s needed to challenge all to step in the batter’s box and swing for the bleachers! Who’s up to it?!
Who’s Up To Change?
The past few weeks keep dropping hints into my mind. We all face challenges. But taking personal responsibility is paramount! You must be the challenger to yourself and others who need to be challenged! So, accept the challenge to fly high!
Take a few moments and identify the changes you need in life. From relationships to career, and on to finances. Every segment of life requires attention and focus. You must get in control of “you” before you can challenge others!
Personally, I have some areas I’m working on. Yes, some areas are personal, as in physical and mental, but many areas are in the structure of life. Time scheduling is paramount. Trusting others to receive what I would like to delegate. Equally, I’m looking into the face of “65”, as in age, and questioning the next 15 years. Expand our church foundation and growth, physically and spiritually!
This list is not static. It changes all the time. Fill in some gaps, and new ones open. Accomplish some tasks, reach some goals, and the future extends itself into an entirely new direction. Everything we do requires analysis and decisions.
Are you up to change?
How do you fill your time?
Perhaps the greatest challenge to any growth revolves around what we spend our time focusing on. In a world of transition and dangling baubles, it’s easy to get distracted. Flashy things get noticed, squeaky wheels get oiled. What do you need? Sunshades to reduce the flash! A delegated assistant to carry around the oil can including the authority to slick up the noise!!
The greatest challenge we all face is apprehending our destination. Equally, we all know the steps to identifying our life – from where you are standing, eyeballing the goal or objective, then defining the steps it takes to get from here to the there. This is paramount!
Often our time is filled pursuing things that do not fit within our goal. It may be okay to enjoy some things, but if they are detractors, then they are not meant for you! Ask any surgeon and you will find their focus through their training years did not give them time to enjoy golf! Rather, the time would come when that enjoyment could be had, but not during an internship, or while building the practice!
Ready? Execute!
Hold the horses for just a moment! Before any of us can execute clearly, we must know who we are!
I was thinking about a baseball analogy. Field players, including the pitcher with the eye and hand coordination, along with the physical strengthening to propel the baseball to the catcher, attempting to make the batter miss! The batter has 1/3 of a second to read the pitcher, the pitch, and make a decision on the swing dynamics. Or, ducking! The catcher has signaled and now must play the ball in flight, all the while staying out of the way of a swinging bat! The umpire has to read it all and determine the outcome! Runners and fielders must play the hand they are dealt! The fans groan, yawn, or scream excitedly!
Self Analysis Time is important. What are you? Who are you? What's your skillset? Can you improve yourself? Do you want to? These, and other questions, are simply dying to know your answer to your self… Click To TweetTake a moment of self-analysis. Which position are you? You must know your role, and be content with your ability, calling, and skills to discern whether you have the ability to play the game!
Know Who You Are
This is not accomplished via a Jedi mind trap or a hypnotist trick, but you must grasp who you are! Not everyone is equal to the mental view they have of themselves! There are limitations at work! Some can be minimized, but others are simply the fact of life!
Back in early teen years, I thought it would be a blast to run “cross country“, even with a bum knee until I learned that only meant running around a track! Honestly, I thought we would be running through the woods, hurtling over obstacles, and vaulting creeks! That’s the way we did it in the country! Quick! Who can be the first to the lake? On your mark! Get set! Go!!!!
Many enjoy running a marathon through the city streets, but if you really want to challenge yourself, run the Mount Marathon in Seward, Alaska. Go ahead. Click the link. I know you. You cannot stand not knowing about the challenge!
It may be “all in a name” but when you think about how we choose to view life? I would much rather let the name define what I want it to be!
Here’s my thought today.
This thought splits into many directions. But there is one that simply speaks to me strongly. The power is in the name we give something!
After a successful career of being Moses’ right-hand man, one of the spies of the promised land, and then the leader of a nation into the land God gave them, Joshua, challenged everyone to know who they were, who they served, and to keep their focus.
“So fear the LORD and serve him wholeheartedly. Put away forever the idols your ancestors worshiped when they lived beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt. Serve the LORD alone. But if you refuse to serve the LORD, then choose today whom you will serve. Would you prefer the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates? Or will it be the gods of the Amorites in whose land you now live? But as for me and my family, we will serve the LORD.”
(Joshua 24:14-15 NLT)
His name, Joshua, means “Jehovah Saved“. This has haunted me for a while. Who, while in captivity, named their son Joshua? Was it the hope that maybe this child born would be the next deliverer? Or was it simply wishful thinking. Did this child grow into their name because it was God’s timing? How many other “Joshua’s” existed in the land?
The Missing Piece
Perhaps this is what’s lost on many today. Our names are not as importantly thought about, only uniquely given so they will stand out in a sea of humanity. Names mean something! In a novel with historical roots, I read this sentence and do some personal reflection.
“I will pray and ask the Lord to tell me what I should call my son.
A name is so important. It sets the course for a life.”
Thoene, Bodie. The Jerusalem Chronicles (Kindle Locations 4954-4955). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.
Before a child mirrors an image, they have an advantage of a name that means something! It helps to set their course for life! Give the child a strong name to grow into, and their future thrives! Saddle them with a poor name, and they will either fight against the meaning of the name or will simply carry that role forward.
Their name identifies them to the world! It’s not just a grouping of words to call someone by, it’s a meaningful definition of the possibilities that await! (Don’t get me talking about Johnny Cash’s, “A Boy Named Sue!”)
If you equate our life to a three-legged stool, we often focus on our physical and mental capabilities, but the spiritual leg has been lopped off. It's viewed as not equally important. Click To TweetThink with me for a moment. Solomon understood this. The wisest man in scripture! “A good name is rather to be chosen…!’ It’s better than riches unimaginable! (Proverbs 22:1) And just a few verses later, he makes this declaration.
Train up a child in the way he should go:
and when he is old, he will not depart from it.
(Proverbs 22:6 KJV)
One of the ways we direct our children into the skills they are born with is to give them a good name to help direct their paths! Maybe we need to pray on it a little more instead of choosing that group of words that simply sound good.
Come on now! Are you with me? The power is in the name we give something. And that power is in your hands! It’s your choice! Choose Wisely!