A man, after 25 years with same company, doing the same old job and drawing the same old salary, decided to approach his boss for a raise and a promotion. While talking to his boss, he was outlining his justification for such a request. “After all,” he concluded, “I’ve had a quarter of a century of experience.”
“My dear man,” sighed the boss, “you haven’t had a quarter of a century of experience, you’ve had one experience for a quarter of a century.”
I wonder if the same might not be said about some of us… “You haven’t had a quarter of a century of Christian experience, but one Christian experience in a quarter of a century. Too often, we are also happy with one experience, instead of experiencing God each and every day. Others journey through life seeking dramatic experiences, climactic turning points, and instant solutions to spiritual problems instead of seeking God’s face. But neither of these define the Christian life.
Christianity isn’t an event that happened at a camp, at a retreat, or at a difficult time in our life. Christianity isn’t our activities as a deacon, a Sunday school teacher, or a group leader. Christianity is experiencing God day by day.
Like the oak, whose growth you cannot see, you may be able to define when the seed was planted, when the tree sprouted, but growth takes place almost invisibly day by day and moment by moment.
So next time, instead of looking for an experience, choose to experience God day by day.
“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day…. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” (II Corinthians 4:16, 18)
“But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers.” (Psalm 1:3,4)
“Be still and know that I am God…” (Psalm 46:10)
Author: Ken Sapp – copyright 1999 – Permission granted for non-commercial use
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A man wrote to the department of agriculture to find out how to cope with the crabgrass that was spoiling his lawn. They gave him a number of suggestions, and he tried them all, but nothing worked. Finally, he was completely frustrated, and sought help again, informing them that every method they’d suggested had failed, and his yard was still filled with crabgrass. He got back a rather short reply which read, “We suggest you learn to love it.”
I am fish-sitting for one of the children’s Sunday School classes again. The last time I did this we had one casualty. There’s only five goldfish, but it reminds me of the days when I had three aquariums of various sizes. My prize fish was a Tiger Oscar, with orange and black stripes. I also had a Plecostomas, which was like a little spotted shark with a suction cup to eat all the garbage in the aquarium. It resided in the back of the aquarium during the day, but if you quickly turned on the lights at night you could see it sucking on the glass. The Oscar slept at night so I guess you might say they had different social schedules. I don’t think they liked each other much, probably because the Oscar would have made a meal of the plecostomas if he could have, but he couldn’t quite swallow him. There were also some spotted catfish in the aquarium. Oscar actually tried to eat one of them once and instead received a bad case of indigestion as it was caught in his throat. He almost choked as apparently none of the other fish knew the heimlich manuever. Fortunately, I found him in time and he recovered. Unfortunately, the catfish didn’t recover.
In Roman mythology there was a god who was the guardian of doorways,
Not only did the star lead the Magi far from home but the star didn’t stop where they expected it to stop.
St. Augustine said, “What difference does it make that Christ was born so long ago in Bethlehem, if he be not born in me?”
• A multitude of wonderful Christmas smells filling the month of December.
In the wonderful book THE BEST CHRISTMAS PAGEANT EVER the Herdmann children (the rugged, undisciplined, rabble-rousing children from the neighborhood) volunteer to play the key roles in the Christmas pageant. It makes for some pretty funny moments. But at the end of the book something happens to the Herdmans. They begin to understand what the Christmas story is all about.