Giant or a Pea?

The other day I was catching up on one of my favorite TV shows, October Road. One of the characters said "When we are young we live like Giants... as we grow older we live smaller and smaller until one day we live as though we are as small as a pea." WOW... that is deep. That hit me like a ton of bricks! It's so true... think about it.

When we are young we LIVE, we really LIVE. We do what we feel, say what we feel, think what we want. We DREAM BIG dreams. We look at the world with fresh eyes, cynicism is not in our vocabularies. We LIVE like GIANTS!

But as we grow older we begin to change. We become a reflection of the let downs we have experienced. We don't accept things at face value, we begin to limit ourselves, our responses, our actions, our thoughts, our DREAMS, until one day we find ourselves very small... like a pea.

Ask a child you know what they want to do with their life, what they want to be, or make happen. I bet the answer will be so BIG, so GIANT like that you will almost want to tell them to adjust their dream just a little to make it more possible to achieve. That's the pea you at work!

We don't HAVE to be peas as adults. We REALLY can still live like a GIANT! I used to be a really small pea. Last year at this time I really had no friends, no goals, no dreams for myself. I was a shell of a person. Now, with each passing day, I become more and more the GIANT I was created to be. What's changed? I am doing life with GOD now. Last Easter, I was baptised. I have since dug in and rooted myself in an AWESOME place, Flamingo Road Church. Now, I have such good friends... quality friends, goals and dreams bigger than the ones I had as a child.

God created us to be GIANTS! Not peas!

Ephesians 2:10 NLT

"For we are God's masterpiece. He has created us anew, in Christ Jesus, so that we can do the good things He planned for us long ago."

In your life, are you living like a pea or a GIANT?

HOPE & a Last Lecture

I love the idea of HOPE... so much that it is my daughter's middle name. But there are times I struggle with finding HOPE. Next weekend's service at Flamingo Road Church is going to be about "HOPE" and people battling cancer. I have to tell you... when I heard that in church this weekend I thought but what about those people who have terminal cancer... what about those facing the end of their battle... how do they and the people around them feel hope?

Randy Pausch, a professor at Carnegie Mellon, is dying of Pancreatic Cancer... he was given 3 to 6 months to live (he just passed his 6 month mark on 2/15/08). When he was told he only had a short time to live he decided to give his "Last Lecture." It is an incredibly uplifting and moving lecture given by a man who HOPES one day when he is no longer here on earth with us, that his children will watch it and be affected by it.

There is a woman I greatly admire battling cancer.... I haven't known her for long... and I wish I had time to know her more deeply... but she and her legacy.. her family... have touched my life to the core... They are walking through this battle with incredible strength and grace. Their faith in God is something you can't miss... it just pours out of them all and though they face a tough time in their lives... if you sit with them... you will see HOPE.

I visited with her recently as she lay in a bed at a hospice facility... the meds and the cancer she is fighting make it very hard for her to really be present. Her husband on one side Kev and I on the other... she fought to open her eyes and connect with us... Then her husband.... said something funny... and that graceful fighter of a woman.... mustered up all the strength she had and she SMILED! Staring terminal cancer directly in the face and fighting with everything she has she took the time and expended the energy to SMILE. Now that's a woman that hasn't lost hope! She knows she will "graduate" and that time very likely is near.... but to me her smile evidenced her hope that in the time she has left she still could touch lives.... and she DID!

If you knew you were dying could you find hope?
What would your Last Lecture be?

God's Invite to Dance

Just returned home from an AWESOME morning at FRC! Pastor Troy taught us that God invites us all to dance with Him.

How do you "dance" with God? To dance with God the Bible tells us we must trust Him with our EVERYTHING! The way to really trust God with your EVERYTHING is to trust Him with your finances. God lays it all out for us in the Bible... He says it is a guage to measure whether or not we are truly "dancing" with HIM!

Last year my husband and I struggled with whether or not to tithe... we live on one income... and in South Florida that is REALLY hard. Money is ALWAYS tight! We wanted to so badly... but we were so afraid. Then we heard Pastor Troy give a teaching... very similar to the one we heard today. He said EVERY week we get the opportunity to demonstrate to God that we TRULY do trust Him with our everything! That was all it took... sure we were scared out of our minds. But the next time that offering bucket came our way we were SOOOOOO excited to get to show God that we really were ready to trust Him with our everything! In the Bible it says that if you do this God will open up the heavens and pour blessings down upon you. After about a year of tithing faithfully... I can tell you from experience... this is absolutely POSITIVELY true! We haven't regretted our decision for a moment. And God has taken care of us so well this year.

God is standing there with His hand outstretched inviting YOU to dance with Him... Will you accept His invitation?