The ultimate example

There are times at work that I think, "That's not my job."

But then I notice that my boss is outside mowing or is sifting compost or is grading the driveway, and I think "That's not his job either." It makes me realize that we all have to pitch in where we can to make everything successful.

It's important that a boss set an example for his or her employees, because if they see him or her only doing a small share of the work, then the employees will only do a small share of the work. If they see him or her coming in late, then they will think it's OK to come in late. If they see him or her talking rudely to people, they will think it's OK to talk rudely to people.

Conversely, if a boss sets an example of a positive atmosphere, most employees will probably follow that. If the boss sets an example of honesty and zealousness, the employees will most likely follow. If the boss sets an example of going over and beyond, then the employees will most likely follow.

That goes beyond just the workplace too.

Think of volunteers in your community. Think of people at church. When you are surrounded by lazy people, you can rationalize that you don't need to help out. But if you are surrounded by people who are constantly being selfless, you feel the need to do that too.

Do you see that in your kids? Do they follow your example? Do you see it in your spouse? If you are selfish, does that make them want to be selfless? No. If you are selfless though, it may inspire them to be that way as well.

Jesus set the ultimate example with his life, and with his baptism. When he went to John the Baptist to be baptized, Jesus didn't have any sin to confess. He didn't have to repent and be baptized like John the Baptist was encouraging others to do.

However, Jesus wanted to set an example. If he wasn't baptized, his followers could say, "But Jesus didn't get baptized. Why should I?" In his perfection, he wanted to lead by example. He wanted to submit to baptism to show he was living a life that was right before God and not just right before himself.

We have the ultimate perfect example to follow. Hopefully, if we follow him truly and with our whole hearts, we will inspire others as well.

Choose love

Confession: I watch "Real Housewives of Orange County."

I pretend like I don't. I hate admitting to Nate what I have been watching when he comes home and it's on. But it's my guilty pleasure. I've watched it enough seasons now that it's interesting to see how these ladies' lives turn out.

And it's like a train wreck. You can't look away.

But this week, one of the women said she is getting a divorce. She and her husband live apart and only see each other on weekends, and she said they realized they aren't "in love." They are best friends and attracted to each other, but they aren't in love.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again --- Love is a choice. It is not a feeling.

I just wanted to take her and say that. If you love him like a friend and are attracted to him, you can bring back your marriage. It may take some commitment. It may mean actually moving to the same town. It may mean work. It may mean change, but that is a choice.

I think people are so used to divorce being the ending of marriage, that they don't even realize that they can put in some work and make a marriage successful. It's like it's not even an option.

People put work into raising their kids right. People put work into making their job a success. People put work into making their hobbies successful. Yet, somehow marriage escapes the need for work.

Wake up each day and choose to love your spouse. No matter what it takes.

And if you don't believe me --- all the other women on the show were also confused. They have been through divorces and told her to not give up, to work at her marriage. If these crazy broads believe in trying to make a marriage work, you better listen....

A lesson in being Molly

We had to say good-bye to our pet rat, Molly, about a week ago.

She had come to us in an unusual, and unexpected, way. At my work, we had rats for a couple of years, but as they died, we were having trouble replacing them, because no local pet shops sold rats anymore.

We had one rat left, and she was only a couple of months old. So the question became, what do we do with her?

One male co-worker said, "Feed her to the snakes."

Another said, "Let her go in the prairie."

I grabbed my chest, horrified. "No! I will take her home with me."

I quickly texted my husband, to make sure that was OK, and he reluctantly agreed.

Almost two years later, Molly had become a beloved pet. We spent time with her at night, letting her run around, feeding her treats, watching her share a Nylabone with Novie, giggling as she drank out of Novie's dog bowl and clicking to her and seeing her run toward us to answer our call.

Like many rats, though, she started to grow cysts. They quickly expanded, and within two weeks she could barely walk and couldn't hold her food in her little hands without tipping over. It was heart-wrenching to watch, so Nate had to put her down. Her quality of life was gone.

It was sad to clean up her area and to dismantle her cage.

To so many people, rats are gross, even domesticated rats. The typical reaction when people found out that we had a pet rat was shock, mild disgust or at least a questioning look. We knew people thought we were weird.

But to us, that gross animal was adorable. We knew her, and she loved treats, people, scratches and exploring. She was a better listener than our dog and was a pleasure to have as a pet. She just loved.

We were so much bigger than her --- she only weighed a few ounces. Yet, she trusted us completely. She would crawl into our hands when we opened her cage, because she knew that we were going to let her play and bring her goodies. She didn't care realize that she was so small and insignificant, she knew she was loved.

I think that's kind of like our relationship with God. We are flawed beings, so icky that we shouldn't be loved. We make messes. We're so small. We're truly insignificant in time.

Yet, God loves us. He cares about us. He blesses us. He picks us up, wraps his arms around us and showers us with undeserved love. He picks us to cherish, even though we don't deserve it.

We loved Molly for reasons not apparent to others. God loves us for reasons that aren't understandable.

But she was thankful for love. And we're thankful for love.

Small, insignificant and treasured. Just like a little rat.

Take a moment to learn and be thankful for it

When political conversations come up, they often become angry, harsh and leave people with bitter tastes in their mouths.

Sometimes that is because you just can't understand why the other person would think the way he or she does. However, sometimes it is because you see a rational point in the other person's argument and don't know how to respond.

Dennis Prager segmented out Republicans versus Democrats in the argument that when conservatives find something wrong in their argument, they are happy instead of angry, because they want to fix it. I would use the example that my mother-in-law posted a meme on Facebook that said Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton were in favor of 36-week abortions, which a leftist relative pointed out was a false accusation. At that point, conservatives are usually happy to take down the meme and fix it. If the opposite was the case, the expected reaction would be that leftists would instead get mad and shout back.

This is obviously a generalization on Prager's part. Not all conservatives are happy to fix mistakes, and not all leftists are angry and obnoxious about mistakes being pointed out.

I think it's better to look on this as a moral point rather than a political one. It doesn't matter what side politically you're on when you think about how you react to someone pointing out an error in your thinking.

When someone rationally says that something you thought to be true is actually incorrect, and can prove in with facts and not opinion, how do you react? Are you upset and stick to your guns, even when you realize that you are, in fact, wrong? Or are you grateful that you can now fix the error for the future.

What about when it is something you have done? When you make a mistake at work, do you own up to it and try to fix it for the future or do you get mad and try to blame what happened on circumstances or something else?

I think it's important that, as hard as it is, we all take responsibility for our beliefs, our actions, our words. When we are legitimately wrong, it's important that we are grateful to find out our faults so we can fix them and not be obstinate in our wrong-doing or wrong-believing.

If we all were a little more open to realizing that we are human and capable of wrong, our pride wouldn't get so much in the way. We could make ourselves and the world around us better if we took moments to learn instead of moments to get mad.

What do you think about?

What do you think about when there's nothing to think about?

This question came up as a part of a discussion during our church small group a few weeks ago, and the "Sunday School" answer was supposed to be God/Jesus.

When you're bored, when you're relaxed, when you're rocking in a chair on the porch or sitting around a fire --- what do you think about? Are you praising God for how awesome he is? Are you contemplating how can you make a difference in someone's life? Are you thinking about how blessed we are that Jesus died on the cross for our sins and rose again to beat death?

I doubt it.

I started contemplating the question. What do I think about when there's nothing to think about? I think about my husband. I think about my grocery list and what meals I can make next. I think about the to-do list at home. If conditions are right, usually when sitting around a fire at night, looking at the stars, I do think about how small I am and how big God is and I praise him for caring about me, even as such a small speck in the history of time and space. But for the most part, what I'm thinking about when there's nothing to think about is not about God.

Out of the fulness of the heart, the mouth speaks. I would also say, where your heart is, where your priorities are, that's where your thoughts trail to.

So, although it's not a bad thing that my mind tends to wander to my to-do list and my meal preparations, it's not necessarily where my priorities should be.

I have thought a lot about my shortcomings lately, and I have decided that I should stop trying to fix myself and fall more in love with God, and hopefully, out of the fullness of the heart my mouth will begin to speak. Hopefully, the closer to God we all become, the more we think on him, on good things, on truth, on holiness, on love. The more we fall in love with God, the more our minds will also speak where our hearts are.

Sin is like a bucket of chicken

While at a girls weekend recently, I went to my best friend's church and her pastor gave a great analogy about sin.

He said it's like going for a run carrying a bucket of chicken. You're trying to eat what you enjoy, but it's hampering your run. It's not good for you, it's difficult to do, it looks silly to those passing by. That chicken is holding you back.

So put it down. Put it down and run the race.

I thought about that picture for a minute, and it truly does look silly. I thought, "Put the chicken down and you can come back and eat it later. Focus on what you're doing."

But, how many times have I come back from a run and wanted to eat something greasy like fried chicken?

Never.

(OK, I don't run all that often either, but still, I know enough that I wouldn't want fried chicken afterward.)

That makes even more sense when you compare it to sin in our lives. We think we want something and that it's delicious and we cling to it. But if we just put it down and run the race of this life, we will soon find that we don't even want that yucky sin anymore. Suddenly it doesn't even appeal to us. We want something better, something healthy, something that is going to help us run even harder.

What bucket of chicken are you carrying? Do you realize how silly it is?

Put it down.

Run the race.

Let go of your sin, and leave it behind.

Playing in the parking lot

I spent a wonderful weekend with my college girlfriends, celebrating two new babes on the way and reminiscing about old times.

My best friend told a story about her trip to California a few weeks ago with her husband and her 2-year-old son.

She had bought her son some new sand toys, and they headed to the beach to see the Pacific Ocean for his first time.

When they got the little boy out of the car, he was so excited to use his new toys that he started to dig in the sand in the parking lot. When his parents wanted to head to the beach he said, "No, I'm digging in the sand."

She pointed and told him, "The beach is not here, it's over there. Follow me up the hill and you'll see the whole beach and the ocean. You don't want to play in the parking lot."

But he was having fun there and didn't understand that the beach would be so much better, so he refused to go with his parents.

Finally, they just picked him up and carried him to the beach, where he could dig so much deeper and had so much more fun than in the parking lot.

What a profound metaphor for our walks with Jesus.

How many times have we been content where we are, unable to move, even when we feel God prompting us to go?

"No, it's nice here. I am enjoying myself."

"But my child, I know what's over that next hill. It's wonderful. It's so much better than here. Just follow me."

"I don't want to!"

Sometimes it takes tears. Sometimes it takes God picking us up and forcing us to move. Sometimes we miss out on something that could be so much better because we just didn't want to move.

Is God telling you to leave the parking lot? Does he have something so much better over the next horizon?

Don't be afraid of what you can't see. God sees it all. He knows what he's doing.