Did you know your words can have an impact that lasts for years, or even decades?
I used to work with a dude I’ll call Marcus. This was a guy who used to be a Green Beret in the Army. When he was growing up in the Midwest, still a young teenager, Marcus had a cousin who was some kind of all-star football player at the state level. I guess this cousin was also a beast in the weight room, because he could bench press, like, 400+ pounds, while he was still in high school.
I guess he started making a name for himself, and the cousin got to be something of a local celebrity athlete. As you can imagine, it lit a fire under his younger cousin, Marcus, to start hitting the weights. He began visiting the weight room pretty regularly, and started making some significant gains. He was excited when he finally put up 225 pounds. Now, you’re not going to win any competitions by benching 225 a single time, but it is a substantial milestone. This is kind of when you graduate to being able to lift some serious weight. Up until now, putting weights on the bar consists of a large iron plate on either side, accompanied by a smattering of smaller weights. Once you hit 225, you get to put two of the largest plates on each side, and this much cleaner appearance makes it easy for everybody to know exactly how much you’re doing.
Proud of his accomplishment, Marcus informed his grandpa of his progress. “Grandpa! I bench pressed 225!” The response wasn’t what Marcus was looking for. Instead of an “atta boy!” or “great job, Son!,” he got a different answer. “Oh, looks like you’ve got a ways to go!”
Much later in his life, when I worked with him, Marcus was 41 years old and had just benched 345 pounds in his basement gym. Twenty-five or so years after they were uttered, Grandpa’s words were still echoing in Marcus’ mind, taunting him.
Be careful with your words. The positive ones are nice, and are often encouraging, but they get drowned out pretty easily by all the noise out there. The negative ones stick around longer and have a lot more staying power. While it’s true that negative criticism can drive people to do things they might not otherwise be able to do, is it your place to offer that kind of “help?” Not everybody is able to turn those hurtful or thoughtless words into motivation and drive. Of those who can, many of them carry around needless stress because of it. Consider offering encouragement, and if that’s coming up short, only then consider alternative ways of helping them move toward their goal.
I used to go skydiving out of this tiny little drop zone outside a tiny little town in Texas. This place was out in the sticks. The airport also served as the base for at least one cropduster. There weren’t many drop zones nearby; this one took about 90 minutes for me to drive to. The little single-engine Cessna we used seemed to groan each time it lifted off the ground. The people were nice, and I just really wanted to go jumping, so I couldn’t be terribly choosy. I began showing up consistently and started getting to know some of the regulars.
One weekend something a little different happened. I’m not sure of the reason, but the regular pilot wasn’t available, and we had a younger, much less experienced pilot flying loads that day. I didn’t really think anything of it. Nobody seemed to have a problem with it. We had a very experienced jumper at this drop zone, Chad, who seemed to know a lot about not only skydiving, but also flight operations, so he was good to have around. (Incidentally, he probably saved my life one time.) Thankfully, he was on the same load as I was that day.
A bunch of us got in the plane and began our ride to altitude. Normally when people get on a plane, they’re actually headed to a destination on the ground somewhere. When you’re skydiving, your destination is “up high.” You pretty much just want to gain a bunch of altitude so you can hop out. That ride to altitude can look very different depending on how busy the local airspace is, what the winds are doing at different altitudes, and the aircraft’s capabilities. The pilot might fly a corkscrew pattern, a box pattern, or some kind of racetrack pattern, just for a few examples. These are methods used to gain altitude without venturing too far away from the drop zone.
On this particular occasion, whatever pattern our pilot chose involved a bad call. I’m not sure if maybe he didn’t do his homework, or if this is something that could have happened to anyone, but we ended up getting downwind of the drop zone, fighting against a pretty strong headwind. The climb to altitude took about the same amount of time, but we spent longer in the aircraft because it took longer for us to claw back lost ground distance.
It wasn’t really a big deal to me at the time, but the pilot started getting agitated. It turns out we were pretty low on fuel. The strong headwind meant we needed to burn fuel faster to reclaim ground, and the analog fuel gauges didn’t give very descriptive readings when they were very low, especially as fuel sloshed around in the wing tanks. You can imagine how this all added to the anxiety level of a young, inexperienced pilot.
Chad noticed what was happening, and that the pilot kept switching the fuel feed back and forth between the left and right fuel tanks. With a cool head, he advised the pilot to relax and to stop switching; use up one tank until it’s dry, then switch to the other one. That way you’ll know for sure what you’ve got in that tank. If the second one runs out, it runs out, no amount of switching between the two would prevent it. Getting a little higher should help get us above the air current, so let’s press on before considering more drastic measures.
It started dawning on the rest of us what was happening. We weren’t real nervous; after all, we were all wearing parachutes and planned to get out of the plane before landing anyway. If that happened, our biggest problem would be figuring out where we landed and how to get back to the drop zone from the middle of what seemed like a thousand-square-mile field. The pilot, on the other hand, had an obligation to get the plane safely on the ground. Chad would probably stay with the pilot in the plane, and dropping several hundred pounds of skydivers should help improve the plane’s fuel efficiency, increasing the likelihood of safely getting back on the ground.
This is a little anticlimactic, I know, but thankfully we didn’t have to bail out early. We did end up jumping from a little lower than planned, but otherwise we made it to where we were supposed to go. The plane had enough gas to make it back to the airport safely. I’m not sure exactly how close the pilot (and us) came to disaster that day, but I imagine those wing tanks were much more full the next time the aircraft took off.
Sometimes in the midst of a crisis, all it takes is a steady hand and a calm demeanor to avoid catastrophe. Being present and just listening to someone who’s coming a little unglued, or offering insights that might be helpful can really walk someone back from panicking. While there are occasions where you kind of need to push somebody out of the way and seize control of the situation, as long as safety or time aren’t major issues, why not just offer support (and maybe guidance if they need it) as they work through the problem? Common sense and problem-solving seem like they’re becoming a little too rare these days, and helping someone walk through an issue can help pass along some lessons on good judgment, keeping calm, and solving problems. You might just find yourself in a position to make those rare qualities a little more common.
There are a lot of different kinds of people out there. Think about all the different personality types you’ve dealt with. There’s usually something specific that characterizes each one. Some people are amazingly creative. Others have a strong sense of loyalty, or compassion, or are optimistic, or have a dangerous temper.
It’s interesting to me that when you consider all the different personalities out there, when you boil down the essence of each of these types, that central thing is usually something that can be considered a trait of God. The things I just listed…there are examples in the Bible of God displaying each of those characteristics:
Creativity – With no point of reference, God just kind of…invented a huge diversity of living things, from centipedes to elephants, mosquitoes to squids.
Loyalty – How many times did the Lord get sick of the Israelites complaining and abandoning Him after leaving Egypt, but He stuck with them anyway?
Compassion – Multiple times in the Gospels, Christ was moved with compassion to help people, either because of their spiritual plight or because of the faith they displayed.
Optimism – Despite all the evil in the world, God knows how this story ends, and He’s shared enough of the story with us to give us hope.
Wrath – There’s some pretty intense stuff in the Old Testament about God’s wrath: putting down an insurrection against Moses, 10 plagues on Egypt, destroying the world with a flood, Sodom and Gomorrah, kicking the money-changers out of the temple, etc.
Normally when I think about the character of God, these “right brained” aspects are the first to come to mind. Something we don’t often think about is the highly ordered and symmetrical side of God’s character. There’s actually quite a bit of orderliness and symmetry God displays. We don’t often think about it because it’s usually in more macro terms than we think in, or it’s captured in parts of the Bible we don’t like to read.
For example, did you ever stop to think about how the Old Testament is arranged? There are 39 books in the Old Testament. You might think they’re thrown together in a random order, but their layout is quite deliberate and makes sense once you realize the arrangement’s significance. Those 39 books encompass history, wisdom/poetry/praise, and prophecy.
The book of Ezekiel captures a lot of God’s orderliness and symmetry. In the Millennial kingdom described in Ezekiel, the land of Israel will be broken down into 13 “zones,” one for each tribe plus one for the temple and public use. Within the temple/public use section, there are very deliberate instructions for how the land’s boundaries and layout are to be set up, including where the temple grounds are to be situated. This includes the temple itself, areas for the temple priests to live, areas for growing crops, other areas dedicated to public use, and two very large areas dedicated to the prince (the human governor or administrator of the land at that time).
Zooming in even further, Ezekiel chapters 40-43 describe the layout and dimensions of the temple yet to be built. The largest building’s main opening faces east. There are inner and outer courtyards, multiple gates, kitchens and storage areas for the priests, and the altar. It’s arranged in a very detail-oriented manner, with each element serving a purpose.
This is one of the things in the Bible you probably don’t pay all that much attention to, but it’s definitely some supporting evidence that God doesn’t just cater to those who are strong on intuition/creativity/holistic thinking. He definitely has a logical/analytical/detail-oriented nature to Him, too. If you’ve been looking at the Bible and wondering why there’s so much emphasis on the emotional, artsy side of things, maybe you just need to look in the right places to find more rational thought, sequential logic, and specific instructions.
Praise You, Lord, for the immense variety of life and personalities You’ve created. Since we are made in Your image, the good things in us are reflections of some of Your personality traits, and we thank You for that ever-present reminder. Help us remember even if someone is different from us, they, too, are made in Your image, and need to hear the good news about You. Amen.
Well, the Charlie Kirk saga has been covered pretty extensively by now, but I figured I’d throw in my two cents, too. Prior to a week or two ago, I don’t think I’d even heard of him, but now he’s a household name.
Sorry, but I have to get political in this post. I ordinarily try to avoid that, but it seems necessary to help explain some of this. There’s an old political saying that goes something like: “If you aren’t a liberal when you’re young, you have no heart, but if you aren’t a middle-aged conservative, you have no head.” The strategy of the Left (by which I mean Democrats/Liberals) is to appeal to peoples’ feelings; they tug at the heart strings rather than appeal to logic.
Donald Trump has effectively confounded the Democratic Party in the United States. Right now Democrats struggle to even articulate what their platform is. All they do is oppose whatever Trump advocates for. Party leaders stoke anger in their base because when you keep people seeing red, it reduces their capacity for rational thought. At this point fostering rage is the only thing they have. That’s how we’ve arrived in our current absurd situation; even if something is a good idea, if Donald Trump happens to support it, it is to be violently opposed. We now find ourselves in an environment where the Left opposes cracking down on violent crime and drug use, releases those with violent criminal histories, and opposes the enforcement of laws that have long been on the books, simply because Trump supports them and they believe there’s no possible way to find common ground with someone they label as so terrible.
The politicians themselves don’t believe the statements they’re making about how dire the situation is. It’s theater. It’s for the cameras. They don’t really believe Trump is going to throw them in jail for opposing him. If they did, they’d flee the country or go into hiding. It’s simply the rhetoric they use to keep their base engaged and fired up. A normal human being understands these people don’t believe the things coming out of their own mouths. For a while they tried the whole “he’s a threat to Democracy” thing, but that approach lost a lot of its effectiveness when the landslide electoral victory which installed Trump in the White House a second time was the direct result of Democracy in action. The Left, decimated and leaderless in the wake of the election, then had to crank up the rhetorical intensity, to the more recent claims of aspiring fascist dictator.
The problem is that when you keep things at a boil for so long, even if you don’t buy in to what you’re saying, there are people listening to you who do. They figure “a Representative/Senator gets to see it up close each and every day, they know even better than I do what a $@&#! that guy is.” The average Joes and Janes who get hyper political tend to spend time surrounded by people of the same opinion. Then, when they search things on YouTube, it follows each video with suggestions on similar videos. They don’t hear any other viewpoints, so they get further entrenched in their own. The boil builds further.
After living in an echo chamber of hate and vitriol for so long, eventually somebody from the more easily influenced among us says to themselves “here’s this threat, this guy who’s a danger to the country, and even to the world, who shouldn’t be president. Everybody I talk to knows it, but nobody’s doing anything about it! You know what? If nobody else is willing to do anything about it, I will!” This type of rhetoric and environment already radicalized two men enough to attempt to assassinate Donald Trump. One guy actually pulled the trigger and even struck then-candidate Trump, and the second attempt was foiled before the shooter had Trump in his sights.
For a while people on both sides started to realize the heat had been turned up too high. They backed off for a little, but a 24-hour news cycle demands something to report, even if nothing’s there. News cycles of this sort are incapable of toning things down; they can only ratchet things up. (Case in point – the word “unprecedented” has been used so often the word’s now lost a lot of its impact.) News channels simply cannot throttle back; they have to up the ante just to maintain ratings. Try going back and watching news coverage from the days of George W. Bush, who at the time was a highly controversial president. You’ll long for those “simpler” times. Is it any wonder people who watch a lot of news coverage for any length of time experience increased levels of anxiety?
Well, imagine you’re someone who’s been radicalized enough to become violent. You’ve seen Trump survive two assassination attempts, and figure he’s a pretty hard target to reach and his security has only increased. So who else can you take a look at?
Details are still emerging, so I don’t want to speculate on specifics, but evidently the shooter at the Utah Valley University campus determined it was acceptable to snuff out the life of someone who espouses a viewpoint contrary to his own. Charlie Kirk voiced such an opinion, was a known Trump supporter, and presented an opportunity. The gunman saw an opportunity and took it.
I’ll concede that while neither side is completely guiltless of exaggerating the rhetoric, it’s far easier to find inflammatory remarks from the Left than it is from the Right. (For every Marjorie Taylor Greene there’s a “Squad.”) I’m not sure why higher numbers of radicalized criminals come from the Left than from the Right. Maybe it’s the Left’s dependence on emotions, or would-be Right-leaning radicals having the viewpoint of “as long as Government stays out of my business, I don’t care.”
We need a reset. We need to be willing to listen to people with different opinions. Republicans: continue pointing out that this level of highly charged rhetoric contributed to the loss of life, and it can’t continue. Democrats: turn down the heat and for goodness’ sake, come up with a platform that appeals to people in the center rather than on the fringe. You’re on the wrong side of just about every 80/20 issue. Both sides: You need to work together to get something done. Start with some bipartisan stuff like stopping Daylight Savings Time or something easy for both sides to agree on. News media: diversify your coverage! With multiple 24-hour news channels there’d better be more than six to eight main stories…there’s more going on in this world than politics; mix in some good news, too, even if it means your ratings take a hit. Don’t worry, you’ll still get sponsors as long as people are watching you.
We’re losing our capacity to accept that not everyone thinks the way we do. Charlie Kirk didn’t spread hate; he challenged the basis for viewpoints. Healthy debate over ideas used to be an important thing in this nation, but we’ve moved from attacking ideas to attacking their supporters. Pray we’d all take a step back from the brink and see those with opposing viewpoints for who we are…fellow humans.
Today we mark another somber anniversary. Believe it or not, it’s been almost a quarter century since one of the darkest days in the nation’s history.
For those on the younger side, I’m sure you’ve heard of 9/11 and you know what happened and all that, but it’s hard to really convey everything the nation went through that day and how it changed things for us. Imagine the nation as a whole feeling a blend of confusion, horror, fear, anger, grief, patriotism, and rage, all at the same time. As strange as it sounds, people of just about every political persuasion got along with each other in the weeks that followed, because being Americans united us more than it divided us.
There were three sites physically impacted that day: the field in Pennsylvania where the plane whose passengers rose up against their hijackers ended up crashing, the World Trade Center in New York City, and the Pentagon near DC. Watching the images from the site in Manhattan had the biggest effect on me; I had been up on the observation deck multiple times before, and within the previous year or two I’d had lunch with my Mom, Dad, and sister in a park made famous by a picture of an exhausted firefighter. Even though the Manhattan site was the most personal to me, there were lives lost in all three areas, either airline passengers or unassuming souls on the ground. Even though it’s 24 years later, that memory is still powerful to me, and I’m sure many people have similar powerful memories of that day.
This probably isn’t the last time we’ll get a bloody nose (or worse) as a nation. What I can tell you for sure, though, is that it’s not going to be the last time you see a wicked scheme succeed.
The Bible addresses incidents where wrongdoers seem like they’re getting ahead in life. David saw it and wrote about it. In Psalm 37:7-9 we read some of the most difficult instructions in the entire Bible: when you see wickedness seem to prevail, be patient.
“7 Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; do not fret when people succeed in their ways, when they carry out their wicked schemes.
8 Refrain from anger and turn from wrath; do not fret—it leads only to evil.
9 For those who are evil will be destroyed, but those who hope in the Lord will inherit the land.”
This Patriot Day, take the time to pause and remember the innocents who lost their lives, but remember as a Christian that two wrongs don’t make a right. When you witness evil succeeding, be patient and wait on the Lord; He sees it and will deal with it in His time.
One nice thing about having very young kids is having the freedom to vacation without being at the mercy of the school calendar. Before our kids were old enough to start school, we took them for a beach vacation the week of Labor Day, when rates dropped but the weather was still warm.
The Labor Day weekend was packed, of course, with lots of people wanting to cram in one last beach trip for the summer. Once Tuesday rolled around, though, we had the beach to ourselves. Even the lifeguards stopped working. The kids could chase seagulls all they wanted without worrying about anyone else on the beach.
While the kids ran around on the sand, I noticed a guy who was probably in his 50s standing in the dunes, just kind of keeping an eye on us. He was almost, I don’t know, disapproving in the way he watched us. After awhile he came walking across the sand to speak to me. He wanted to remind me that there would be no lifeguards on duty at all that day, and that “even he” wasn’t going to stick around much longer. In my mind I thought “dude, if you left, I’d probably be more at ease. Don’t stick around on my account.” He added something like “it would be a real shame” if we let the kids get too close to the water and something happened to them. Thanks buddy, we drove all this way to come to the beach and not watch the 3-year-old and the almost-2-year-old. I just assumed he was some kind of senior lifeguard switching off summer mode, but without introducing himself, the whole “even he” statement and his “helpful” advice landed in a way he probably didn’t intend. I believe he meant well, but without even introducing himself or stating his role, you can imagine that he just kind of came across as a little condescending.
Have you ever tried to tell people about Christ without taking the time to “read the room” first? Even if you have the purest of motives, people don’t often take kindly to folks who jump into a conversation with them and tell them how they should be living their lives. I’m not saying God can’t use the encounter, but it seems prudent to consider how the people you’re engaging perceive your entry into the conversation. Maybe at least try a little chit chat to demonstrate your willingness to listen to their perspective before hitting them with fire and brimstone or “sinners in the hand of an angry God.”
I’ll concede, though, that if it comes down to a choice between having a curt discussion about the need for Christ and saying nothing at all, being curt takes priority. The Gospel doesn’t get spread without people spreading it. My point here is simply that when you’re about to tell people they’re destined for eternal punishment because they’re living life apart from Jesus Christ, it’s best to have a little empathy because making people defensive right off the bat tends to help them reject what you’re saying.
Going back to the guy on the beach, nothing he said was incorrect. I even think he meant well. It was his attitude and delivery that overshadowed his message and made me want to tell him to buzz off, and I want to prevent anything like that from getting in the way of someone’s acceptance of Christ as their Savior.Lord, I know You call us all to spread the message. Even if I don’t feel well-practiced, give me the words and the boldness to jump in when I feel you calling me to do it. Help me remember that even though I could obsess over not “doing it right,” You can build poor attempts into something magnificent, and are pleased by my obedience.
It’s funny how the concept of individual responsibility and discipline has faded into the background. When I was a kid, there were plenty of limits on how much junk food I ate, how much video game time I got, and what I did with my money. As you grow up, you’re less at the mercy of someone else’s limits on your choices, and you determine your own circumstances.
I don’t know if anyone’s told you this or not, but you are responsible for the choices you make. Those choices take many forms, but please don’t fall for the false narrative our culture as a whole seems to push on people: you’re not to blame for the consequences of your decisions.
While it’s true there are some things outside our control that restrict the choices we make (car accidents, inherited medical conditions, etc.), the things I’m about to cover usually aren’t the result of one or two choices, but the result of patterns of choices. Let’s start with something we can probably all relate to.
How can I say this lovingly? Gaining five pounds is not a huge deal. I’ve come out of weekends weighing about five pounds more than I did going in. Gaining 10 pounds more than where you want to be…well…that might be okay if we’re between Thanksgiving and New Years. Putting on 20 pounds more than your desired weight…please tell me you’re noticing this?
If you’re 30 or 40 pounds overweight, we’re not just talking about a couple days’ worth of bad decisions. This is a pattern. It’s a little tough to believe you didn’t see it coming. The consequences are now much more likely to negatively affect your health (and by extension, your bank account). The risk of problems with blood pressure, cholesterol, and heart disease are all now needlessly increased. Yes, you can probably take medicine for some of them, or you can bypass the need for most of those medications by addressing the problem instead of the symptoms. I have to give credit where credit’s due; the country music singer Jelly Roll hit a max weight of 540 pounds a few years ago, but has since lost about 180 pounds to drop below 360. While 360 pounds is still morbidly obese, I have to tip my cap to him; losing 180 pounds is a tremendous accomplishment. At his max weight, I wouldn’t have given him another 10 years. I’m rooting for the guy, and I hope he’s able to achieve his goal of dropping enough weight to someday go skydiving with his wife, even if it means he needs to find a new stage name. (“Pop Tart?”) If you find yourself wanting to drop some extra pounds, start with simple changes like swapping sugary drinks for water (aim to eat your calories instead of drink them). A soda or something like a lemonade every day adds up fast. (Don’t switch to the diet version, just cut it out completely.) Also, while exercise is important, diet is more important. Cardio is good for your heart and mind, while strength training builds muscle, and increased muscle mass burns more calories even while at rest. None of it makes much difference if you’re consistently taking in more calories than you burn.
Let’s talk finances. If you’re living beyond your means, that’s something to try to change right away. I’m not talking about cases where you’re temporarily between jobs, or you’re paying back a big medical bill or something like that. I’m referring to situations where you’re spending more money than you’ve got without having a better reason than “because I want it.” Yes, we all need clothing, but why does it have to be designer? If you truly need a vehicle, brand new cars are a lot more expensive to own and insure than cars a few years older. Dining out or having food delivered is convenient, but expensive, especially if it’s multiple times a week. Consumer debt is a trap you don’t want to have to deal with. If you can’t pay your credit card bills in full every month, maybe you shouldn’t use them (unless the vendor doesn’t take cash). Pay in cash when you’re out and about. Physically handing your money over to someone has a way of helping you question whether the purchase is really worth it or not. Swiping a card and using “invisible money” is so easy, you don’t even realize how much you’re pledging to pay, and the bill piles up fast. If you can’t seem to help yourself, ask your credit card company to lower your credit limit. Keep in mind that if you drastically lower your amount of available credit, your credit score will take a hit. If you’re applying for a mortgage or other loan soon, you may want to hold off on lowering the limits until after you get the lender’s decision.
Finally, are you always short on time? Why is that? If you made a pie chart of the activities you do during your free time (not when you’re sleeping and not when you’re at work or engaged in other responsibilities), which slices would be the biggest? I’m guessing a screen is involved. I don’t know if this is true or not, but the other day I heard on the radio that on average, we scroll a whopping 95 miles per year on our phones. It can’t all be worthwhile. Video games are a black hole for guys, especially. I knew guys in college who would skip classes to play video games. Too much of that and your grades suffer, and college is a pricey thing to give a half-hearted effort to. Unless you’re able to make money off your video game prowess, consider whether the time investment is worth it. I understand wanting to decompress and relax, but good grief, set a limit on how much time that takes. Other time-suck activities: binge-watching shows, watching six hours of football in a given weekend (or single day), and aimless meandering on the internet.
To sum up, you’re in charge of you. If you can’t do it on your own, ask a trusted person for help with your weak spots. When my kids were little, my wife and I were pretty careful about how many sweets we let them have. Occasionally, I’d come home from work and have some ice cream. Once in awhile, one of them would say something like “I can’t wait until I’m a daddy so I can have ice cream whenever I want.” Yeah, life as an adult comes with some privileges, but Spiderman was right: with great power comes great responsibility. Take ownership of your choices. The buck stops with you.
Ever feel like you’re the only one in your circle who trusts what God’s doing?
Sometimes even other Christians’ faith seems to wilt in the face of apparent obstacles. It can be tough to believe you should pursue something God’s called you to do, especially when your senses are telling you to go the other way.
That’s exactly what Caleb and Joshua came up against as they neared the promised land. After God led them out of Egypt, but before entering into the land God had arranged for them to take possession of, He told Moses to take 12 men, one from each tribe, and send them in pairs to spy out the land to see what it was like.
They did just that. Five of the six pairs came back and lamented about how difficult it would be to conquer the land. The people were too strong, the cities were too fortified, etc. They lamented about how futile it would be to try to take the land by force. The last pair, Caleb and Joshua, were excited. “God promised us this land; whoever or whatever obstacles lay in front of us are inconsequential. We only need to move when He says to move, and He’ll take care of the rest to fulfill His promise to us!”
Despite the enthusiasm of these two, the people of Israel decided things were so bleak, they should reject the leader God had given them (Moses), appoint for themselves a new leader, and head back to Egypt! The people even started talking about stoning Caleb and Joshua! (Numbers 14:10) At that point the Lord stepped in. Exasperated with the Israelites, He spoke with Moses about their faithlessness and declared His intent to ensure no Israelite who was age 20 or older would live long enough to enter the promised land. The only two exceptions would be Caleb and Joshua, who believed God and advocated for His path.
There were roughly two million Israelites at this point. Out of those two million, there were only two who had the faith and focus on God to please Him. When you average it out, these two men of faith were literally one in a million.
Popular sentiment does not guarantee alignment with God’s will. There will likely be times when, even among other Christians, you’re in the minority about believing God’s promises or pursuing what He’s called you to do. When you’re the only one God’s given a particular assignment to, don’t be surprised when nobody else understands it. If you’re consistently in God’s word and you’re regularly in prayer, He’ll lead you in the direction He wants you to go. Follow God’s lead even if nobody else sees it.
Lord, it can be hard to step out in faith, especially when it doesn’t make sense. Thanks for this example of two men who believed in your power and promise, and help me to recognize when You’re moving me toward something You want me to do. In those times, give me clarity of vision and boldness of heart. Amen.
I used to really enjoy kneeboarding. It’s an activity where you’re kneeling on a board while being pulled behind a boat. The boat’s wake makes a ramp you can use for jumping or sliding around on. I was able to master a couple of minor kneeboarding tricks, but for some reason I really had my heart set on doing a barrel roll.
I’ll let you in on a little secret. I didn’t realize it at the time, but that particular trick wasn’t possible to do with the setup we had. The boat we used only had the factory/stock pylon, which is where the ski rope connected to the boat. For this trick to work, we needed an extra tall pylon or a ski/wakeboard tower, so while you’re still mid-air, the rope is pulling you up, rather than straight ahead. It allows you to get a little extra hangtime, resulting in some additional rotation.
Of course, I was blissfully ignorant of this. I figured I just needed to work harder on my technique. I’d get halfway, maybe three quarters of the way around, then crash into the water. Sometimes my face would be the first thing to hit. Other times I didn’t know what hit first; I’d bob to the surface with my neck suddenly sore from an awkward entry into the water. Every now and then the kneeboard would go flying high into the air in a spectacular wreck. The life jacket was nice because I’d be so disoriented upon being thrashed into the water, I didn’t know which way was up. Thankfully, it pointed me in the right direction.
I couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong. We tried different speeds so the shape of the wake changed, but we determined the speed range to get the best shot. I figured “well, I probably just need to hit the wake faster and tuck tighter so I can rotate quicker.” Looking back I don’t know if this trick was even possible, but I sure tried hard to squeeze every bit of rotation out of each attempt.
At the time, I had a video camera, and I had someone in the boat film so I could try to figure out how to get better. I could probably show you snapshots from 20+ failures when attempting the roll, but I found something I thought was more interesting. Like the post’s title says, it’s funny what a big difference a single second can make. I grabbed a couple of snapshots of one particular attempt.
In the left picture you can see me setting up for the jump. I’m trying to pick up as much speed as possible before hitting the wake. I’m zeroed in on what I’m trying to do. Just one second later, in the other picture, it’s perfectly obvious everything has completely fallen apart. There’s a crash landing in progress, and the board looks like it decided to travel in another direction than the one I did. Chalk this one up to failure.
In fact, chalk them all up to failure. I never landed that trick.
Now, I’m not saying I would’ve been able to crack the code on this trick if I’d had more time, but I’m saying a situation can look very different even if two different snapshots are only a second apart. Have you ever been in a situation where you found that to be the case?
Last summer I visited some family in Kentucky, and while we were there we took the opportunity to go visit the “Ark Encounter.” If you’re not familiar with this attraction, it’s a full-size replica of Noah’s ark, built to the specifications listed in the Bible.
There’s no getting around it…the thing is huge. I mean, it’s massive. One of the questions I had before showing up was “okay, yeah, Genesis lists the external dimensions of the ark, but it doesn’t say a whole lot about what the place looks like on the inside. What would it look like?”
Well I’ll be the first to admit that the replica’s designers took liberties with some of the things they displayed, but it was still interesting to see. This is one way it could have looked (though probably without water fountains, restrooms, and handicap-accessible decks). “Here’s how they could have stored this or that.” “Here’s how they could keep some of the bugs contained.” “This is one way they could have managed all the waste.” “During nice weather, they could have opened the roof like this.” They did present interesting ideas like “We usually imagine the animals on the ark to be full-grown adults, but since God’s pretty smart, He may have chosen to do something else, like bring adolescent or juvenile specimens to Noah’s doorstep. After all, a pair of 2-year-old elephants would take up a lot less room, eat a lot less food, and have time to produce a lot more offspring than a pair of 50-year-old elephants.” Hmmm, I never thought about that; that’s a good point.
One of the things I thought was most interesting was an explanation of Evolution after the flood. When we think of Darwin’s version of Evolution, the theory supposes that when an organism needs to gain some kind of function for the sake of survival, it simply adds to its DNA. Mutations occur, adding new combinations of DNA base pairs. When confronted with scientific reality, the chances of this happening in a single generation (“evolve or die”) are pretty remote. It’s much easier to look at a different type of mutation: deletion.
Instead of adding to our DNA, what if the different species on the ark were so genetically rich and diverse that they were all able to lose a great deal of their DNA to deletions over multiple generations and still lead to specialized species differentiation? After all, if all the humans on the planet, in all their vast genetic diversity, came from the same pair (Adam and Eve), those two progenitors must have possessed the DNA necessary for every genetic trait we can observe in present-day humans. The only difference between all the different people is the DNA that got dropped over the years.
That’s a fantastic amount of variety! After the flood humanity spread around the planet, but often clustered together into gene pools with similar traits. At the very general level, Asians looked like Asians, Europeans looked like Europeans, Africans looked like Africans, and so forth. It’s not that one race of people somehow evolves into another, it’s more like the physical appearance of these different groups have become more specialized over time through generation after generation of people that have offspring with people who are similar to them. Over time the genes become less diverse, not more diverse.
Things are different in the modern age. The original trunk of very diverse humans split into many smaller less-diverse trunks, but now the convenience of modern travel has made the world smaller, and it’s become much more common for people of mixed races to have children together. Though I’m sure it pales in comparison to what it looked like at the beginning, it’s injecting gene pools with big doses of genetic diversity.
Dogs are another example. If there were only two dogs on the ark, every breed of modern dog you see today came from that one pair. Chihuahuas, Schnauzers, Great Danes, Boxers, Hound Dogs, Pugs, Border Collies, and Teacup Poodles all came from the same ancestors, but breeders intentionally isolated particular genes to produce specialized types of canines, dropping the genes they’re not interested in. A mutt has more genetic diversity than a purebred dog does.
Regardless of whether an individual person has a lot of diversity or almost none in their DNA, they are our neighbor. They need to hear about Christ and His offer to pull us out of a future of eternal condemnation, and they need to hear about Him through you and I. If you’re talking to someone who doesn’t want anything to do with the Bible, though, stuff like this is one way you can point to the idea of Intelligent Design. Life didn’t just spontaneously spring into existence; someone put it here, and the Bible says how God did it.
Anyway, I thought that visit was interesting. God and science co-exist. I hope you can use stuff like this in your conversations with unsaved folks.
