Author: Tim

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Quick Hit: Out of the Mouths of Babes…But It’s Not What You Think

If you’ve got kids, you know mealtime can be funny, frustrating, and a whole other host of emotions.

A few years back we were having breaded shrimp for dinner. My son is well known for being pretty quick to eat whatever’s in front of him, whereas his younger sister can take much longer to clean her plate. My son gobbled up everything in front of him and then more or less hung around while the rest of us caught up to him.

My younger daughter mostly ate the sides before starting on the shrimp. Looking around at other peoples’ plates, she saw little leftover bits of shell. When she asked about it, we showed her how to pinch the tails so she could get the meat without eating the harder shell. As she started getting the hang of it, my son spoke up and said “wait, those shrimp had tails?” It turns out he had eaten everything, shell and all, for each of the shrimp on his plate.

Although my son probably wouldn’t like this tie-in, the book of Proverbs describes wisdom as something to be received through instruction. (Sorry buddy, don’t take offense…) “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice.” -Proverbs 12:15

Sometimes we’re simply unaware that either what we’re doing isn’t the best way to do it, or that we’re missing out on something other people have insight into. Don’t be so impressed with yourself you don’t even take the time to consider that you might be able to listen and learn from others. With a little humility, you can learn from even the people you’d least expect.

The next time someone offers you some insight, don’t be too quick to dismiss it, even if it’s something you already know. People who don’t think like you can often package profound truths in fun ways.

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“Character Isn’t Developed in Ease and Quiet” -Helen Keller

Quite a bit of the Bible covers the idea of trials being used to teach believers to rely more heavily on God. That’s an important concept I think we overlook too often. God wants us to rely on Him. He wants us to take one step at a time even when we can’t see the path things are going to take. I’m going to put a twist on it, though. I’m not saying it will work this way for everybody, but I’d like to share a bit about how it’s worked in my life.

This hasn’t been true 100% of the time, but throughout our marriage, when my wife and I looked around at some of the people we knew who were in a similar life stage as us, we just seemed to have it a little easier. Maybe our version a particular challenge was less complicated, or our loved ones tended to have better health, or we just had trials that were fairly short in duration. It’s certainly been a blessing, but we didn’t want to grow accustomed to it. Concluding that God can take away as easily as He can give, we adopted the saying “to whom more has been given, more is required.” We considered ourselves blessed in certain ways, so we viewed ourselves as able to offer things others could not.

Years back, I finished some schooling I had been working on. It was such a relief! I took a bit to enjoy the sheer amount of free time after completing a years-long endeavor. Soon, though, I felt I needed to give some of that time back to the Lord rather than sitting on the couch and wasting it. I started looking for ways to use the gifts and talents He’s entrusted to me. After struggling for a bit with what that might look like, I settled on an idea. You can poke around the various pages of this blog and see I’ve had a bizarre collection of interesting experiences most people never come close to. I’m also able to write in a conversational, down-to-earth tone that people find easy to understand. The idea for this blog took shape and started getting off the ground, with the work I put into it following the same schedule my schooling previously did.

It didn’t stop there, though. A couple years after the blog started, the world got put on pause as covid spread across the globe. As you recall, the pandemic changed so many aspects of daily life. In our house, I worked from home for a long stretch of time. It was kinda nice…for a little while. Not having a commute was great, but missing out on the back-and-forth with folks at work drove my creativity to find new avenues of expression. A new, outrageous idea started forming. This time gave birth to the idea of a 10-part Christian speculative fiction book series.

To be sure, it’s an audacious goal, especially considering I’ve never attempted anything like it before. I’m excited about the series though, I’ve got the skeleton for the whole thing mapped out and I’m very far along on some volumes, but what I’ve found is that I get bogged down in the writing. I’ve put together extensive notes on each of the volumes, and it’s fun for me to base some of the characters on some of the people I’ve known in person, to write comedy into it, to write powerful emotional scenes, and ultimately point readers to Christ without making it preachy. But…the project has stalled because I simply don’t have the time, energy, or focus (or more accurately, all three at the same time) to make meaningful progress as far as getting words on paper. It’s incredibly frustrating for me to have what I believe is an epic story mapped out, but be seemingly unable to get it into a deliverable format that can reach the masses and become a tool God starts using to reach a new audience. This might sound a bit like I’m inflating my own ego, but in reality I’m simply treating it with gravity and a matter of urgency; I approach it as though the series will be part of what triggers or contributes to a large revival. Going back to the beginning of this post, the stalled nature of the project is something I’d consider a trial in my life.

In this post I’m taking the long way to arrive at this point: even though I’m facing this trial, it’s related to the work I’m trying to do for God’s kingdom, rather than a trial related to my personal life (finances, health challenges, etc.). Of course I’m interested in getting this story out for public consumption as soon as possible, but I believe the challenges associated with that goal come at a smaller cost to me personally than the trials I’d likely be facing if I had decided not to do anything significant to honor God. I believe when people step into the calling God’s given them, He plows the road for them, removing obstacles that would have inflicted some kind of expense on them had they not followed His lead.

God’s going to allow you to face trials in your life. While you obviously can’t escape all of the personal challenges in life, it seems like you get to bypass many of the especially taxing ones when you’re living in the power of God and walking the path He’s invited you to travel. Had I waved off the blog idea and the book series idea, I don’t know what different set of trials I would have faced in the interim, but I’ve also got a certain degree of peace of mind knowing I’m genuinely taking swings at the pitches God’s giving me. I’m in no way qualified to write a 10-part fictional series, but I’m not afraid to give it a try when I feel God’s saying “here, try this.” I’m relying on Him and His timing, and trusting He sees me and has a plan. In the meantime, in the words of TobyMac, “if I can’t walk, then I’m crawling.” I’m still working on it when I can, always trying to move it forward.

I write this to encourage you. If you’re already following the path you feel God’s calling you down, that’s fantastic…keep it up! If, however, you’ve been feeling a sort of “tugging” in a certain direction you can’t explain, and you’ve been avoiding it because there’s at least some aspect of it that simply doesn’t make sense on any level, I’m going to extend a personal invitation to you to give it a try anyway. Paradoxically, the excuses you’ll think of first could be some of the first obstacles to get plowed out of your way when God starts clearing the road in front of you.

God knows you and knows what you’re capable of when He empowers you. You act in obedience, then He clears the road. It’s not the other way around. Try stepping out in faith and see what happens.

Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight. – Proverbs 3:5-6

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Well, This Could Get Real Bad Real Quick

Back when I worked as a teenaged lifeguard at a Christian conference center, the lifeguards often spent the morning cleaning the pool and running various errands in preparation for opening the pool in the afternoon.

Normally there were four or five of us, and it was fairly common for us to split the different tasks in a given morning. Rather than unlock and then lock the gate again every time one of us entered or left the pool area, we commonly replaced the lock in the gate and set it so it looked like it was locked when it actually wasn’t. It was important, though, that if there was ever a time when all of us left the pool area, the last one out secured the lock for real.

One morning I left the pool area to head to the resort’s main office for something. As I walked into the foyer of the dining room on my way to the office, I passed a couple of guys who were talking to the dining room hostess. One of the guys was very tall (probably in the 6’5”-6’6” range) and probably at least 240 pounds. She was on the shorter side, which made the guy’s size more pronounced.

As I was walking past, the guy was asking something like “is it okay if we go swimming in the pool before we come in the dining room to eat?” The way he asked it, he made it seem like he was thinking down the road to later in the day/week; the pool was only open in the afternoon and it was fairly common for people to hang out in the pool until it closed, then go right from there in wet swim trunks to the dining room for dinner. He seemed more courteous than most by asking. There was something more to it, though. There was something subtle about the way he asked it that made it sound a little off. She had no problem with the swim trunks thing since a lot of people did it anyway, so she shrugged and said “sure.”

I continued to the office to do whatever I was going to do, then not long after I headed back toward the pool. As I came around the corner, I saw these two guys swimming in the water, and there were no lifeguards around to stop them (or help them out if the need arose). I had no idea where the guards had gone, but right now they were nowhere to be seen. There in the gate, though, was a lock that wasn’t fastened.

I forget what I said, but I made it abundantly clear they had to get out. They gently protested, saying they had received permission from a staff member to go for a swim. Technically, that was true, kind of, but that staff member didn’t actually understand what was being asked, nor did she have the authority to grant their request. It was only coincidental that I happened to witness this exchange that I understood what they were talking about. Now it made sense that they asked in a manner that could be interpreted a couple different ways.

I was pretty peeved about this. It felt like there was intentional deception involved. I wasn’t laid back about kicking them out, I was pretty to-the-point. I stood by the gate the whole time, with it wide open while they got out of the water and collected their things. Then as they drew near the gate, the size of the big dude once again became apparent. I was probably 16 or 17 years old, around 6’3”, and about 180 pounds. I wasn’t a little guy, but if this dude decided he didn’t want to comply, there wasn’t a whole lot I could’ve done about it. As they passed me, the big guy stopped very close to me and just kind of stared me down for a moment. It’s not often I have to look up at somebody. Then he took a step closer, so our faces were only inches apart. If this guy wanted to throw down, he could’ve throttled me. Something about his demeanor told me he was just trying to get me to back down. I sure hoped my judgment was right. I didn’t flinch, blink, or step back. After a very anxious few moments on my end, he walked out of the pool area.

You’d better believe that gate was locked within the next 30 seconds.

In a way, this guy reminds me of Satan. By every measure Satan has the capacity to harm you and the advantage he needs to do it…size, power, speed, drive…but he’s limited in the sense that he has to seek permission to cause you physical harm.

One thing he does NOT need permission for is to mess with you. He can harass you. He can snipe at you. He can do lots of stuff to make you have a really bad day, and he can do it repeatedly, in an effort to get you to back down, to get discouraged, to quit whatever you’re doing for the Lord’s sake. He can intimidate you to no end if you permit it, but if you belong to Christ, you can confidently stand your ground and not flinch when those intimidations come.

If you’re following God’s lead and doing things contributing to His kingdom, you’re making yourself a target in the realm of spiritual warfare. Don’t let it get you down. View it as encouragement that you’re doing something important enough to be considered dangerous to the powers of darkness. After all, why would the bad guys waste time harassing someone who’s not a threat to them?

God, it’s so easy to fixate on only the things I can see and hear. Help me remember there’s more than what I can see, and that if I’m living for You, You’re in my corner and are helping pave the way for where You want me to go. Help me recognize and be an encouragement to others that might be experiencing some of that intimidation and harassment. I ask in Your name, Amen.

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That is One Nasty River

There’s a story in 2 Kings chapter 5 we can all learn from.

Naaman was a great General, a mighty soldier, that his king viewed as a great and honorable servant. Naaman was a rich man, accustomed to walking the great halls of the high levels of society, and was constantly around the finer things of life. Unfortunately for him, he had a disease no amount of money could cure him of: leprosy.

He caught wind of someone in Israel who supposedly had the ability to perform medical miracles, and when he told his king about the prospect, the king facilitated his journey. Naaman brought an excessive amount of money and gifts to the land, ready to perform all kinds of bizarre rituals or to complete difficult quests for the sake of being healed. Skip ahead to when Naaman arrived at the prophet Elisha’s door, he expected to be received with the rolling out of the red carpet, then be given a personal ceremony where Elisha prayed and performed some kind of dramatic routine, then be healed supernaturally.

Instead he got something much different. Elisha didn’t even bother to meet him. He sent a messenger instead. “Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored to you, and you shall be clean.”

Naaman was furious. Didn’t this prophet know who was standing here at his doorstep? The Jordan River was dirty and muddy, and there were far more prestigious rivers where he came from in Syria. He could have easily washed in one of those if that’s all it took! He stormed off in anger.

While he was still livid, his servants approached him. They said something to the effect of “hey Boss, not for nothing, but when you came here, you were prepared to do all kinds of elaborate or crazy things if this guy told you to. If he told you to do something easy, why not give it a try? What’s the worst that could happen?”

The text doesn’t really say how much Naaman deliberated over this; it just says he went down and did what Elisha told him to do. And wouldn’t you know? “His flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean.” I wonder sometimes if we make things too difficult. I think a lot of us know God can use us for mighty things if He chooses, but we don’t often think about the easy things or the small things.

One of my favorite lessons from the Bible is the idea of God saying “if you’re not faithful in the little things, why would I trust you with the big things?” What if, instead of looking for that big dramatic thing that happens infrequently, we focused on trying to be faithful and willing to do the small things on a regular basis? My worry is that we might spend so much time on the sidelines waiting for something “truly worthy of our standing” that we miss smaller opportunities God places in our path much more often. Let’s grab the opportunities that are already there instead of waiting for the ones that might come along further on down the road.

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Quick Hit: I Wouldn’t Have Paired Those Two, But it Worked

Little kids can be fun, man. Years ago I was playing with my youngest two, my son and my younger daughter. While I was in the midst of an intense Nerf shootout with my son, my daughter walked right through the hail of orange-tipped little blue bullets, serving me pretend soup. As I lunged out from behind cover to retrieve ammo laying on the floor, she brought me odd combinations of sides, asking me what else I needed or would like. Any time I asked for a spoon, a napkin, or anything else, she walked unafraid through the fire to get whatever was missing, all while my son tried to land kill shots on me.

It’s interesting to see how sometimes God will take people with hugely different combinations of spiritual gifts and interests and put them in a situation that weirdly works. You might find yourself teamed with others who can easily do things you find very difficult. Likewise, you could be the one to effortlessly provide the missing ingredient to an incomplete situation. Strange as it may seem, God saw it coming, and made arrangements for you to work together.

So the next time you find yourself partnering with someone with a totally different skillset and focus than you do, don’t focus on the weird; celebrate the variety of talents and interests, and that you get to be part of something that expands your horizons a little bit.

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Future You Will Thank You

Let’s get practical for a bit and talk about retirement. For some, it’s a long way off. Others may have already begun.

While finances certainly aren’t the only consideration, they’re often the most important factor behind any given individual’s ability to move into retirement. This post isn’t going to solve all your retirement problems, but it might point you to a unique opportunity that will help you years from now.

For most people, an Individual Retirement Account (IRA) or a 401k through an employer are the most accessible ways of saving for retirement. That’s where you set aside a certain amount of pre-tax money from your paycheck into your retirement account. It saves you money on taxes right away (by reducing your taxable income), but you’ll have to pay taxes on it later. You invest it for years, and the balance (hopefully) grows, and then as you withdraw it from the account during retirement, Uncle Sam finally gets his bite at the apple.

On the flip side is something called a Roth IRA. This is a retirement account where you use money from your take-home pay (you’ve already paid taxes on it) to put in your retirement account. Your investments grow (hopefully) over time, and then when you need to start withdrawing money from that account in retirement, there’s no need to pay taxes on the withdrawals because you’ve funded the account using money that’s already been taxed.

Ideally you’d want a mix of both types of accounts as you approach retirement. Many people only have 401k assets. The tricky part about them is they’re a little misleading. Whatever balance you see in that account is not actually the amount you get to use for your expenses; depending on your tax bracket, Uncle Sam could take a huge bite (in addition to state taxes). One nice thing about a Roth IRA is that the amount you see in your account is what you get to keep (minus any fees from your administrator, etc.).

The biggest question then is: “should I invest in a 401k or in a Roth?” The mathematical answer is: it depends on when you’re likely to have the lower amount of taxable income; if you’re in the lower tax brackets right now (10-12%) and can afford to contribute to retirement accounts, pay your taxes now (use a Roth IRA). If you’re in a moderate or higher bracket right now and you expect to have lower taxable income in retirement, it probably makes sense to delay paying your taxes until you withdraw cash from the account (use a 401k or traditional IRA).

Early in this post, though, I mentioned a unique opportunity. Right now the U.S. probably has the lowest federal income tax rates we’re going to see for a very long time. With the amount of debt we as a nation are carrying right now, it actually doesn’t make sense that our income taxes are as low as they are. I personally find it difficult to believe I’ll ever see lower tax rates than what we currently have. If you believe politicians are more likely to raise future taxes than they are to lower them, you might consider doing what’s called a Roth conversion.

A Roth conversion is the process of converting pre-tax (401k/traditional IRA) retirement money into retirement money that won’t be taxed again. You’re essentially using a special maneuver to pay taxes on the money being converted, eliminating the need to pay taxes on that money in the future. You move the money administratively, and then you settle up with the tax man when you do your annual taxes by the following April 15th tax deadline. There are a few important things to keep in mind, though.

  1. Even though it’s for retirement, the amount of money you convert counts as taxable income during the tax year the conversion occurs. If you’re single and have $60,000 of taxable income, then you convert $10,000, not only is your taxable income now $70,000, but you’ve actually also elevated part of your income into the next tax bracket. For that demographic, income above $64,200 gets taxed at a higher rate. If you’re going to do a Roth conversion, keep an eye on what the conversion amount is going to do to your total taxable income for the year. You may want to strategically spread out the conversions over several different tax years.
  2. You should have cash on hand to pay the bill come tax time. Don’t try to convert a chunk and assume you’ll end up with a smaller percent of it because the taxes get withheld from it. It doesn’t work that way. It’s like any other reason you owe taxes come April 15…you need to pay what you owe, and you don’t ordinarily do it using retirement money. Only do a Roth conversion if you’re going to have cash on hand to pay the extra tax. If you’re in the 12% tax bracket, every $500 you can throw at a Roth conversion will get you $4,167. If you’re living in the 22% bracket that same $500 loses some oomph; in that bracket $500 will only get you $2,273. Before the tax rates we currently have, the 12% bracket would have been the 15% bracket (and you’d only have converted $3,333 rather than $4,167 for every $500) and the 22% bracket would have been the 25% bracket (netting only $2,000 instead of $2,273 for every $500 you spend).
  3. It’s probably not a good idea to convert 100% of your retirement assets into the Roth category. Even though you’d effectively have zero income to report to the IRS come tax time, the standard deduction still gives you some money tax free. For 2026, the standard deduction for single filers is $16,100 (and twice that for married filing jointly). If you spend the money to convert everything you’ve got into Roth assets, you’re foregoing an opportunity to get a free pass on that amount of taxable money. Married couples can take up to $32,200 from their 401k without paying any federal taxes, and then on top of that still have quite a bit of cap space to further convert additional assets to Roth at a low tax cost if they have spare cash on hand. Additionally, now through 2028, people 65 and older get an additional $6,000 deduction on their taxes. (You can also use charitable donations from your 401k/IRA to satisfy your Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs).
  4. This discussion is for federal taxes only; it doesn’t consider state taxes. States vary widely in their taxes, especially when it comes to determining whether or not to tax your social security benefits. Converting a big chunk of retirement money might force you to pay taxes on your social security when you otherwise wouldn’t have needed to, or increase your out-of-pocket Medicare costs, and that’s probably moving you in the wrong direction.
  5. Talk to a professional advisor/tax preparer to get the best advice on your particular situation.
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I’m In Over My Head (But This Time it’s on Purpose)

You gotta have fun at work, man. I know not every job is amazing, but it’s the people that make all the difference. You often spend more of your waking hours with your coworkers than you do with your own family. Might as well try to have some fun in the process, right?

It’s been awhile since I had this kind of fun at work, but back when I worked as a lifeguard, we’d spend the morning cleaning the pools, swimming laps, practicing rescue techniques, doing chemical treatments, straightening up chairs, mowing the grass, doing preventative maintenance, etc., and then we’d open the pool in the afternoons. But sometimes…we’d just plain goof off.

Right around that time, disposable underwater cameras hit the market. I think I grabbed one or two each year I worked as a lifeguard, and we usually came up with some wacky stuff. Pictures started out pretty generic and got more creative or complex over time. At first they’d just have one or two people in them, doing a stupid pose in shallow water.

Then we got more ambitious and brought in more people or prepared more elaborate setups. In the course of doing do, we learned a few things. We learned the best pictures came when the photographer didn’t let their own bubbles get in front of the camera. We learned the more people you were trying to pose, the trickier it became to get them all into position at the desired time. Some people couldn’t hold their breath very long, other people took such a huge breath that they’d start floating to the surface before the picture got snapped. We had two different pools, and we normally did pictures in whichever one had the better water clarity. If that happened to be the deep pool, we also learned it was tricky to get everyone all the way to the bottom and have them stay there for long.

I’m not suggesting you organize a pool party with your coworkers (I mean, unless you want to). I’m saying as long as you’re getting your work done, try to have a little fun in the process. Morale counts for a lot. The person you’re working with is probably not going to become your best friend, but if you can improve things from “bristling at the sight of them” to “getting along with them” or “laughing along with them,” your work day is going to go a lot better. Similarly, imagine how much better things would be if you can graduate from “counting down the days until retirement” to “eh, it’s not so bad” or better yet “yeah, parts of the job aren’t great, but the people make it alright overall.” Anticipating the drudgery of work will suck the life out of you. The whole equation changes when your workplace isn’t a place you dread.

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Happy 250th Birthday to the Good Ol’ US of A!

On Saturday we’ll celebrate America’s 250th birthday! I’m sure you’ve heard it, but let’s take time to recognize that we live in a pretty great place that’s the envy of the world, and it’s okay to spend some time celebrating this great nation.

I got a little curious about how old other countries are, and where the U.S. falls in that list. Without sounding too much like a book report, it turns out the average age of countries in the world is a bit under 160 years. If we listed all of the UN’s 193 countries by age, the U.S., surprisingly, is older than 170 of them.

Sadly, the percentage of folks who are proud to be Americans has been on the decline lately. While I’d attribute that to a variety of things, I think it’s time for a little reminder about some of the things that help make America special.

While there’s no single thing that sets the U.S.’s style of government apart from all others, there is a very important combination that helps distinguish it from others.

  • The U.S. Constitution (1789) is the world’s oldest written national constitution still in force. Many older countries have rewritten their constitution multiple times.
  • The U.S. has a more rigid separation of government branches than most nations, providing more stringent checks and balances on any one branch’s power.
  • We’ve got a strong Federal system in addition to independent State governments. The Federal Government cannot simply abolish or overrule certain aspects of State Governments. States have their own constitutions, legislatures, and laws that vary across state borders.
  • It’s hard to amend our constitution. There has to be very broad agreement to pass an amendment, (two-thirds of both houses of Congress or a convention called by two-thirds of the states, and ratification by three-fourths of the states). In addition to the 10 amendments in the Bill of Rights, there have only been 17 other constitutional amendments since the Constitution was written.

This style of governance has proven flexible enough for the country to survive numerous peaceful transitions of power, a civil war, multiple government overhauls, various government shutdowns, natural disasters, two World Wars, a decades-long Cold War, and a host of smaller crises. The government is intentionally slow and demands broad agreement to take any action, preventing an erratic establishment of laws. So while it can move frustratingly slow, that’s part of the key to its flexibility and success.

What about the way this translates to the lives of everyday people?

We’re a Capitalist society. That means when it comes to earning money, you’re free to either work for an already-established business (the route most people take), or strike out on your own to provide goods or services you believe others will pay for (if you’ve got a good idea, have the means to do some prototyping, and are willing to bet on yourself, you have a potential pathway to building a successful business). The market is not forgiving or kind, but it leads to businesses that can adapt and provide things people are truly willing to part with their money for.

Obviously, we’re not perfect. It’s very expensive to buy or rent a place to live here. Political gridlock is at an all-time high while approval for politicians is at an all-time low. People believe their intense anger justifies the harming of other people or gives them permission to infringe on others’ rights. Any time you have people with diverse schools of thought, you’re going to have disagreement, and the scope, manner, and intensity of that discord manifests itself in different ways. We’re still the envy of the world. Other countries and other people want what we have. It’s very easy these days to find Americans who are dissatisfied with their nation, but you’ll notice it’s not so terrible for them that other countries become more appealing to move to.

We’re moving into a period in history where there are new challenges, new threats, and different types of instability in a multipolar world. It’s no longer the US vs. the Soviet Union; it’s varieties of alliances and “sometimes” partnerships that make governing more difficult and complex. That’s probably something that’s not going to get any simpler anytime soon.

In the meantime, let’s be grateful for the blessings we enjoy here in the U.S. We have clean, potable water in every zip code in the country. Americans have an extremely low chance of dying from starvation. Very high percentages of the population have access to hospitals, emergency services, the internet, cell phone service, reliable food sources, ranch dressing, and Amazon/Walmart delivery. It’s not like that in many places in the world.

We’re not perfect as a nation, but we’re blessed to live here. As we move beyond 250 years as a nation, let’s be thankful for each other, the freedoms and privileges we enjoy, and the fact that we get to argue about ideas rather than necessities. Let’s be tolerant of ideas we don’t always agree with, but not manufactured or manipulative rage. It’s okay to disagree, but it’s not okay to belittle the people who hold to principles differing from yours. Let’s return to having a civil discourse, criticizing ideas instead of people, intolerance of prejudice (sexism, classism, racism of all types, ageism, etc.), and working hard not only to get ahead, but to make your community and country better. If you’re American, the American flag should be something you can be proud of and be united behind. “United we stand, divided we fall.”

Happy birthday USA, and thanks for everything so far!

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It’s Not the Florida Keys…it’s the Delaware Keys!

When I was in high school I worked a few summers as a lifeguard at a Christian conference center in eastern Pennsylvania. Besides working at the pools, one of the things lifeguards at this place did was guide groups of guests in canoes down a few-mile stretch of a nearby river.

Whenever I went on a canoe run, I traveled light. No room key, no wallet, nothing I wasn’t prepared to go into the water with. Swim trunks, ratty sneakers, life jacket, rescue tube, paddle, and little medical fanny pack. A lot of people going on these trips seemed to think they would stay dry the whole time. Most people didn’t flip their canoe or fall in the water during a canoe run, but it wasn’t uncommon for it to happen. That’s why when we all gathered around to get ready to start a trip, it was kind of part of my routine to size people up and see what kind of personality they were going to be and if they looked like they were prepared to end up in the water.

On one occasion this dude showed up with an enormous key ring clipped to his belt loop. It’s like he was a cross between a janitor and a prison warden. I have no idea why the guy felt like he needed to bring it along on a canoe trip while he was on vacation. Since it was clipped to his belt loop though, I figured it was probably alright. After all, he must be willing to risk it if he was bringing it canoeing, right?

During the course of each canoe trip, we encountered two or three sets of rapids. When I say “rapids,” I’m not talking about huge whitewater, but areas where the water is turbulent. Sometimes the water was very shallow (less than a foot deep), and other times the water was probably waist deep but moving very swiftly and creating eddies and weird currents behind large rocks. In this case the guy with the key ring and whoever else was in the boat with him managed to flip the canoe in a set of very shallow rapids. It happened far enough in front of me that the pair had recovered and were righting the boat by the time I got there, but the guy started to panic when he realized his key ring was no longer attached.

For the people who know me, “compassion” is probably not in the top 10 traits they’d use to describe me, but I can assure you that I was even worse as a teenager. My job was to get these people safely from the start of the canoe run to the end of it. There were canoes from our group downstream who were getting further and further away from us at this point, and I was responsible for their safety, too, so I had to get moving. I rather callously urged the soaked paddlers into their boat so they could get moving again. As they begrudgingly got back in and set off again, it occurred to me that a heavy set of keys like that was probably going to sink pretty fast and not get pushed real far downstream on a rocky bottom. Since I had seen where they tipped over, I had a pretty good idea of where to look. As they paddled away, I took a slower pace, scanning the area for the keys. Yep, there they were. I scooped them up and I think I attached them to the rescue tube laying at the bottom of my boat.

I didn’t let the guy know right away, either. I waited until we were past all the spots where boats were likeliest to flip, then pulled up next to their boat and handed them over. He was hugely relieved, but he probably spent a good 20-30 minutes thinking he’d permanently lost his keys. (I would probably do it a little differently if I were going to do it again.)

Sometimes you’re going to be in a position that allows you to use your experience or knowledge to easily help someone who’s a little out of their depth. The expertise you bring can be such an easy thing to invest, but it can make a huge difference for someone who’s not operating in their natural element. Keep an eye out for the folks you can lend a hand to without even exerting much effort. You might be on the other end of that transaction sometime.

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Your Best is Your Best, Regardless of Scope

Every now and then God will call somebody to do extraordinary things and change the way people think. Many of these people end up being giants of the faith. Charles Spurgeon. Billy Graham. D.L. Moody. Jim Elliott. C.S. Lewis. Joni Eareckson Tada. Some live long, full lives of service, others endure great misfortune that God uses for His glory. God uses all of them for His purposes.

But what about us “normal” people? What about those of us who aren’t going to fill a stadium or hold a revival, or be overseas missionaries?

I’ve got two things to offer for those folks.

The first is that just because you don’t feel like you have a grand purpose right now, that doesn’t mean you never will. Ask for a way you can use your life and your talents to honor the Lord. If you haven’t found a calling and you want one, you should ask for one. Ask every time you pray. Pray for it all the time. Keep praying long enough, and He’ll show you what to do. (Just don’t be surprised when it’s something bigger than you expected, and once that happens don’t be put off by it.)

The second is that even though we can’t all be Billy Grahams, we can be faithful to what God’s asked of us. He asks different things of different people, and somebody else could very well have been called to do something cooler than what you’ve been asked to do. We rarely know ahead of time God’s reasons for doling out tasks the way He does. Some things are little, others are big. The important thing is that when God asks something from you, you endeavor to give Him your best and follow through on it, even if you don’t understand why He would ask it of you.

It’s also important to keep in mind that your role may not be confined to a single function. Your calling could involve one big thing, lots of little things, or something in between. Sometimes the thing God wants from you is surprisingly ordinary. Just show yourself to be reliable. If you can’t be faithful with little things, how can you be trusted with big things? Love God, be faithful, and show love to others, in that order.