Line Charts, Moving One Direction or the Other

Let us make an assumption that if our lives were on a line chart or graph we would constantly be moving in one direction or the other as each day passes. Try to get that visual as we get started today. Straight line an arrow on each end of the line pointing towards an unknown end, and then several key events plotted along the line representing milestones that have occurred throughout your journey in life. Usually on this particular graph there is a zero in the middle and the numbers usually increase as you move to the right or they move the negative zone as you move towards the left. Ample description for our purposes today. 

Now think about what moves us along life's line chart one direction or the other, would it be safe to say positive choices equal a move to the right end of the spectrum, and concurrently not so good decisions would move us to the left or negative side of the equation. Simplistic as this may sound, we go about our lives with the idea in mind that the things we do don't really have an impact on our lives now or in the future. Well if the data we collect from studying a graph such as this is correct, the simple math of the matter would provide a different response. 

As we delve in deeper please note that I am in no way judging anyone with this simple observation, why truth be told, I would probably be the one with the largest variance of plots on the line if it came down to a statistical count anyway. So, how do we move on life's line graph? In life, choices either move us closer to God or adversely further away from God. That old saying "what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger" aptly applies here. Whatever happens to us, is in no way greater than He who is in us! (I John 4:4) 

What we perceive as good, or what we deem as bad is all relative in the scope of which direction we are moving on the spectrum of closer to God or vice versa. On the surface, nobody would say that Joseph being thrown into a pit and then sold off into slavery by his brothers was a good thing to have happen in your life. Add being lied about by his boss’s wife and then imprisonment, and it would be hard to say the events in Joseph's life were aiding him in moving closer to God, but they did. Joseph trusted that God had a plan, although he didn't understand the plan, He believed in the One that created the plan. Eventually, Joseph's trust and faith moved him to the place where God had intended Joseph to be, second in command of Egypt and all the lands it controlled. Would it not be fair to say that Joseph's decision to stay the course and continue to serve God moved him to the right of the line graph closer to God and provided Joseph with the strength to carry on and move forward or to the right of the line graph?

Yet not everyone on their line graph of life moves in the right direction. Consider Cain, son of Adam and Eve, living in the lap of creation, yet jealous of his own brother Able. Cain's jealousy stemmed from Able's sacrifice to God of a lamb, whereas Cain had brought crops to be sacrificed. God preferred the sacrifice of the lamb and the rest of the story is what it is. Cain's choice to get angry and take revenge out on Able caused Cain a lifetime of pain and struggle, moving him further away from God, and ultimately passing that legacy on to his posterity. 

The bottom line is in each of these scenarios the Bible character had a choice to make, and that choice either pulled them away from God and His plan for their life, or the person gravitated closer to God and in essence became more like God. Choices move us one way or the other on our own line chart. As we make the decision to spend more time in God's Holy Bible reading, reflecting, and studying we are naturally going to move towards God, it will happen without you even really trying. Thus, it is safe to say that as we move our lives away from God or if we never strive to know God, and we put our efforts into pleasing self over others, we move further away from Him. 

Life is one choice after another. How you look at adversity and affliction in your life is a choice that will either draw you closer to God, or it can completely do the opposite and pull you down into a pit of despair and a landslide of destructive choices. The good part is the choice is yours. Nobody said life was going to be easy, matter of fact struggles are what make us stronger if we make the choice to grow in our conflicts instead of submitting to the burden of conflict and moving ourselves further away from the only one that can save us from ourselves and the negative mental state we are headed towards. 

As we are preparing to start a new year take a moment to verify where you are on your line chart of life. After self-reflecting, if you don't like where you are on the spectrum of life, you and only you can make that change. Choose life, choose God, and make a concerted effort to move closer to God. Move to the light of hope and you'll find yourself on the right end of your life's line chart. 

Looking forward to the New Year 2021!

Coach Carter

No Free Lunch

 

I read a devotion this week that built off the premise that there is no such thing as a "free lunch". I liked it so much I thought I would shape it a little more Flat Tire style and share my takeaways with you. The idea of the old cliché "There's no such thing as a free lunch" centers around the fact that regardless of whether your meal today was free to you, somebody or in many cases lots of somebodies paid for it. I mean we can all agree that meals aren't just falling down out of the sky, right? "Buy one get one free", "Free to the next ten callers", or "Take one they're free while they last" are all slogans we have heard over the years and oh boy when we hear the word "free" we flock to it! I guess the question is, is a free lunch actually free?

Well if you adhere to the cliché, the quick answer is an emphatic "No". The support for that summation is readily available, which makes the case for "No such thing as a free lunch" that much more plausible. Think about it, if someone buys your lunch today it was free to you, but only because your friend purchased it. Let's advance that a bit and put it in the context of programs that provide "free" or reduced priced meals to those that will benefit from the assistance, are those meals free? Obviously, none of us believe that those meals are bona-fide free, yet to those in need receiving the meal it is without an upfront cost to the recipient. So maybe it is free? If I receive it and I don't have to pay for it, would that not be the definition of free?  On the surface that is true, but the underlying theme of "no free lunch" is that somewhere, someone paid the price due for that meal.  The farmer paid for that meal with his hands and the land he purchased that produced the crops. The company that manufactured the processed products in that meal paid their workers to produce the food. The restaurant or person cooking the meal had to pay for the ingredients that make the meal, and then if by chance you received that meal for free someone paid the price for everything that went into that meal from the farm to the table. It definitely wasn't free.

Hopefully everyone knows where I'm headed with this one. My salvation is free. The mercy and grace that has been given to me that allowed me to be forgiven for my sins is free. God gave it to me even when I did not deserve it. That is a gift, much like a free lunch wouldn't you agree? So, when we are talking about a free lunch and the understanding that it really can't be free, how does that fit into the notion that we receive our redemption from the sinful life we have led free? 

We can work and serve, serve and give, give and pray, yet none of that in itself will buy our salvation. In Ephesians 2:8-9 Paul explains that, "... by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast." So, the work we do is a by-product of the faith we possess. What then is our faith supposed to be? Our faith is the understanding that God, the all-knowing, all seeing God of all creation, sent His Son to live with us and then die for us before ascending back to His Father so that we could be forgiven of our sins. If, and only if we believe. That is where our faith equals the free lunch we've been discussing. 

There is no such thing as a free lunch, I believe we can all agree on that. Someone has to pay the price at some point in the process. For us our salvation is free. We can ask for forgiveness and we are then forgiven, but if we are forgiven we also understand that the gift cost Jesus his death on the cross. That certainly equals a price paid so that we can be forgiven. The free side of this equation is that we don't have to have a list of things we have done to pay for redemption and salvation. God offers it to us for free and then we serve Him by serving others, thus our works basically are an outcome of our faith not a price to pay to receive God's free lunch!

Believe, submit, and then accept. The lunch is free, you just have to come get it! My prayer is that each person, each family, and all those that you come in contact this holiday season will accept God's offer and the free gift of salvation that Jesus paid for you and for me!

Merry Christmas, 

Coach Carter

Day 2133

 

I've been on a 30-day challenge for a while now, and each morning for the past 2137 days I have logged the days of my challenge as I go. Well on day 2133 this week, I suddenly paused and contemplated for a minute about the uniqueness of this particular day. As I entered my prayer time, I asked God to not let me take for granted this day that had been given to me. I'd like to share an excerpt from that prayer with you for our Flat Tire moment today:

"Lord, as I wrote down "Day 2133" a thought ran across my mind, "Do I take for granted that tomorrow will be "Day 2134" and the next "Day 2135"? Or, do I just say tomorrow will be and then go on? Do I write today's "Day 2133" and then not give thought to how unique this day is, how blessed I am to have this day? Father the uniqueness of today is that it has never happened before, and most importantly it will never happen again. What do I need to do today Lord that will allow me to serve you and give this day you have given me purpose? You call us to serve you today not on Sunday and then hang that hat on the wall until next Sunday. No, instead you call us to serve you today, the day that we have been given, "Today is the day that the Lord hath made I will rejoice and be glad in it" (Psalm 118:24) If I am truly glad in it then let me show that gladness, let others hear it in my voice and more so in my actions. May I step up, step out, and do something today!... Amen"

The crisis of the global Coronavirus pandemic is real, children go to bed at night cold and hungry, those who have thoughts of harming themselves or act on those thoughts are on the rise, the drug epidemic is as much of a pandemic if not more than COVID-19, and one out of two marriages are ending in divorce. That is just a sampling of the myriad issues and concerns that are running rampant in our communities, cities, states, and around the world. Pick you place and make a mark. 

Our superintendent of schools is giving a drink tumbler to all employees in our school district this Christmas. Inscribed on the tumbler is this fitting quote from Esther 4:14 "Perhaps you were born for such a time as this." Perhaps I was born to do something on "Day 2133"? Perhaps YOU were born to do something today that needs to be done? Perhaps you are the one that has an answer to one of the countless problems and issues that are facing our students, our parents, our co-workers, or our neighbors. The apostle Paul encourages us to "Bear ye one another's burdens", and the prophet Isaiah shared his declaration of service over self with this reply to our Savior, "Who should I send as a messenger to my people? Who will go for us?" And I said, "Lord, I'll go! Send me." Isaiah 6:8. 

Each day is unique, this past Monday was day 2133 of a challenge that started almost six years ago, yet I am not promised tomorrow, I have been given today, so today is when I have to step up, step out, and do something about whatever it is you and I were individually created to do. You won't realize what that something is if you don't set out to find it. You won't make the difference you were created to make if you don't step out today. Someone's life, may depend on you taking that first step today. Today hasn't happened until you live it, and tomorrow isn't guaranteed to any of us, so I challenge you today to realize that YOU were made for such a unique day as this, live it well, live it out!

Coach Carter

 

Your Job or Your Work

 

You may have read the title to this week's FTM and thought what's the difference? Well, the semantics are in the same ballpark, yet if we dig a little deeper there is a wide gulf between the two. Let's look at these two words and see if we can clarify and prioritize where your bang for the buck is going to come. 

Goal one for me as a Career and Technical Education supervisor in our school system is to assist each and every student that graduates from our high schools to have post-secondary and career plans in place. I tell groups of students of all ages that if you are fortunate enough to be doing what you are really good at and something that you like to do, and something that people will pay you to do, then you probably won't ever feel like you are working! I know because I love my job as an educator. I have been involved in education for almost 30 years and each morning I wake up, I bounce out of bed and am eager to head into my job. Not going to sit here and tell you there haven't been "those days" along the way, but overall I am one happy educator! 

So that is my job. I have been a classroom teacher, an elementary school administrator, and now a district wide supervisor and each has been rewarding and all three have enabled me to support my family financially. That's what a job is supposed to do, make living possible. A job provides us with a certain standard of living based on our income which allows us to buy the things we need and also enjoy the little extras in life along the way. Definition of job: A paid position of employment. So, what's the difference in the phrase "your work" to the this definition of "your job" you ask?  Let's move in for the takeaway today.

I heard a segment on NPR's Story Court the other day that caused me to draw this distinction between a job and the work you do. In it the narrator shared a story about his grandmother and the sacrifices she had made throughout her life working to support her family. Lola, the grandmother in the story didn't finish high school, because of an untimely death in her immediate family that created the need for her take on a job. Throughout her life, she took several hard jobs just to provide for her children. As a widow and sole provider for her children, this "uneducated" mother was only qualified for laborious jobs that paid little, so she often took on multiple jobs to make the "ends meet". Later in life, she moved in with her daughter and grandson's family and still cooked food items to sale to supplement the family income, one more job that Lola had over her life. The key moment in this brief two minute segment is when the grandson, Tan, noted that what he had learned from and gleaned from his grandmother was not necessarily about her jobs, but about the love and dedication to her family that she had demonstrated over the years. Tan's takeaway is best described by his statement, "We leave our job at the end of the day, but what we leave behind at the end of our life is the product of our work." Wow, that hit home really quick. 

We all have jobs, at least I hope you have a job that provides for you and/or your family. We each also have an ongoing work that we are doing or should be doing. Our jobs provide sustenance for the day to day life we live. Our work, on the other hand, should provide a legacy that will last long after we leave this world. Work ethic, persistence, perseverance, grit, resiliency, integrity, compassion, empathy, love all of these should be the byproduct of the work you are doing. Above any of these there should be an underlying theme of faith. "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen" Hebrews 11: 1 Our work here on earth should have a direct correlation to our faith. We hope in spite of circumstances that appear overwhelming. We provide hope when others give up and quit. Our hope should not be in man, but instead our hope is in direct proportion to our belief in a higher power. Believing in God means that regardless of what happens to us, it could never be bigger than He who lives in us! 

Hi-Ho, Hi-Ho it's off to work I go, every day, every minute of each day God grants me to live! Leave a legacy that will encourage and motivate those you live with, work with, and share life with each day. Make the world a better place because of the work you did while you were a part of it! 

Coach Carter

We Are Her Legacy NPR link