Tag: needverse

288 – Deserved Leadership

Don’t be instantly put off by problems in the world. Jesus puts foolish companies and incompetent governments to oversee people who aren’t ready for more. Maybe the people don’t know enough or maybe they are too irresponsible. A few more Bible-based morals—not to be confused with religious institutions—among the masses would surely help their society improve faster. Trying to improve one’s self, do one’s best, keep learning, look out for others—those ideas began in God’s Word and are hard to argue with. But, even with plentiful Biblical morality in a society, Jesus may have reasons why he keeps a society oppressed by fools in government and big business.

Don’t get in Jesus’s way.

If you spite the fool in charge—and it doesn’t make sense to you that the people deserve that fool as their leader—you might be just like that fool. We often despise people who share our own problems; it’s the mirror we despise. Psychology calls it “projection”, like looking through rose-colored glasses where the red color we see everywhere actually comes from us and only exists in our altered view of the world.

Desire to overthrown the fool in charge basically presumes that Jesus won’t grant people a better leader if the people are ready for it. That leads to failed revolutions or “regime planning” in other nations by toppling foreign governments to mask under the table imperialism. It usually backfires. Don’t meddle in other people’s problems; those problems are well-deserved, no matter how much those problems’ people would have you believe otherwise.

A worthy revolution or overthrow of government only succeeds because the overall society is ready for more competent leadership, thus Jesus gives the nod for a regime change.

Jesus is already King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He appoints those leaders and he does so for a reason.

It can be difficult to fathom that a society deserves it’s leaders. But, think about laziness itself. Lazy people only wake from their slumber when they have enough problems. By having constant problems from bad leaders, people must think and ponder more, actually making them better people. We have what we deserve more often than not.

287 – Play All Mistakes in Forte

Quietness is overrated. Don’t disturb neighbors with meaningless noise. Don’t waste time with the noise of distraction when you should spend that time practicing to perform better. But, don’t be quiet just because you’re afraid others will know you exist. Everybody exists. So, get comfortable with yourself—your true self—at whatever level of growth and maturity you find yourself at each new day.

Loudness can be useful. Alarms are discordant by definition. The louder you are, the more likely you are to make your vital message known, especially if you play a few wrong notes. No change happens without the changers feeling somewhat annoyed. Volunteer if no one else is up to the task of necessary nuisance.

Intended mistakes aren’t mistakes, they’re sabotage. Mistakes are acceptable because they are honest and a vital component of improvement. Never confuse God’s forgiveness as a license to sabotage rather than a license to learn.

You can make a huge difference as long as you don’t remain silent forever. Heaven will always listen to real people; once in a while Earth will too. Prayer moves God’s heart, but only after our hearts conform to His. God forgives, so blunder, grow, learn, conform your heart to God’s so your prayer requests make more sense to Heaven. God can’t teach you from mistakes you never make. He wants you to practice and improve. Don’t make the bigger mistake of never trying at all.

Many travel the rigid road devoid of fumble and excellence, only boasting that their road is empty of error. Your fumbles in forte will derail those who travel that road. Simply live your life as it speaks for itself, striving to make every day better than the day before. This will offend whoever thinks too highly of himself because your improvement and your mistakes will prove to the pretender that we all have much to learn and that he is no exception.

Pursue what you hope for most and don’t fear fumbles along the way. Neither conceal nor flaunt your errors, but play wrong notes loud enough to hear. Seek leadership from anyone who encourages erring aloud and, once in a while, even thanks you for it.

286 – Money Barriers

One of the biggest lies that keeps people poor, wanting, jealous, overspending, and financially irresponsible is the idea that they understand enough to judge the financial thinking of people—whether bad or good—who have more earned money than they. Equally, another big lie is that wealthy people can understand those who have less money than they ever had; this idea usually brings the downfall of the wealthy and powerful. We only understand enough to judge the financial worldview of wealth or poverty that we have already had ourselves.

One of the best-kept secrets about money is that everyone has exactly what he has, no more or less. Another secret is that God makes money vanish and appear as He wills, yet that is not why most rich and poor are rich and poor. To recognize how much money you have is the first step to mastering money so that money—whether wealth or poverty—doesn’t master you.

The “moral amount” of money is neither great nor small. Morals and money are not measured in dollars, pounds, yuan, dong, or shekels. Morals about money are about we as humans mastering our own money.

Your worth in Heaven is not measured by your neighbors, nor by the numbers in your bank account today, but in your ability to generate, to dig, drill, to strike oil, water, and gold—to put your sweat in the right place and the right amounts and to encourage and guide others as they do the same. But, none of that can happen if you think that you can understand people who have an amount of money that you never have.

Wealth can be unsatisfying, but so can poverty. Thriving includes wealth for the mature. Wealth comes from hard, smart work, combined with a share of luck. We create our own luck by trying again and again and again, not giving up, no matter the sweat and blisters from our weary hands. But, you can’t understand things you haven’t been through. So, don’t pretend. Focus on what you have and what you need to do. Neither despise nor covet anyone else. Rather, seek to master whatever you have by first mastering yourself.

285 – Original Sin

All of us were born in sin and we all need forgiveness. Those who don’t forgive quietly presume that a past sin is a reason someone is eternally bad. They don’t seek perfection, though they claim to; they seek to destroy the good contribution people can only make after growing up, repenting, being forgiven, and becoming better people.

There will always be people who preach the message of “past sin”—that we should remember what other people do wrong—even what we have done wrong ourselves. They think that by not forgiving—either themselves or others—they are adding “training weight” to “remember” the horrific past, thereby making everyone stronger. The past must be learned from, but to learn from it, the past must be forgotten, not memorized.

Repent, move unto hope, and move on. Carrying the past’s failures around makes as much sense as carrying training weights all day long. In the gym, weight training can make us stronger after we put down the weights and go out into the world. But, carrying 40lb dumbells all day won’t make anyone stronger; it will interfere with everyone’s day.

People who won’t let go of the past are a poisonous destruction to society and must never be silenced, but always ignored by those who understand the Bible’s teaching that everyone has been forgiven.

Refusal to forgive is actually an trait of Paranoid Personality Disorder, meaning it is deeply connected to fear. Forgiveness involves forgiving others along with being forgiven by others. People who struggle with fear might struggle with forgiveness first.

Every single person needs forgiveness. This is the ramification of the Christian teaching called “Original Sin”. We were each born with sin from Adam, therefore we will commit more sin, therefore we are born needing forgiveness and are born inclined to do more things that will need more forgiveness. Never let the doctrine of “Original Sin” become an excuse to judge, let it be a reminder that everyone falls short of God’s standard.

While we strive to become perfect, and hopefully we get better at non-self-destructive decisions with age and maturation, you and I will always need just as much forgiveness as the worst criminal.

283 – Evil Feeds on Fear of Evil

Acting like problems aren’t problems can make problems disappear for a reason: Evil feeds on the fear thereof.

There are demons that actually eat the emotion of fear. It makes them stronger. The main thing they do is make people afraid. Imagine it working in a circle.

When a demon or spirit of fear makes you afraid, then eats your emotion of fear and grows larger, it won’t hurt you. It needs you to remain healthy so that it can make you more afraid. Like a parasite, it latches on to you—sometimes resting like a growing red snake, other times perching with talons of a bird—and does whatever it takes to keep you producing an endless supply of its food: fear. If it injures you too much, then you won’t be afraid anymore. So, as it grows, it uses its new strength to either whisper fears into your heart or to provoke others to say and do things, then whisper into your heart that you should be afraid of them.

It’s a parasitic relationship. The last thing it wants to do is make your fears come true, only to make you afraid that they will.

The best way out of the vicious cycle of fear is to just ignore it. Recognize self-justifying fear for the cyclical, codependent parasite it is. Identify the specific fears. Notice carefully when you ignore one fear and another crops up as if on cue—because you are up against an invisible sentience. Whatever good thing you are most fearful of, trust that God will forgive you if you are wrong and go do the right thing, no matter how much emotion drive you away from it.

If you never feel fear at all, then you might not be doing anything valuable in your life. Good things disrupt demons and an easy response is to send a cyclical demon of fear to weigh down good people. If demons of fear haven’t haunted you then you probably haven’t done anything good enough to disturb them.

Don’t do whatever you fear just to break out of fear—keep doing what is good and fear will flee as fast as it came.

282 – Shine Confidence, No Matter the Complaint

Don’t fear people who tell you that you are too confident. Don’t despise people merely for being self-confident. Look to truth. Look to learn. Don’t worry about pride, whether to keep it or lose it. Focus only on the task before you, whether to work or learn. Finish.

If you are right, if you have the answer for the moment, it helps no one to claim otherwise. Humility and being wrong have this in common: Once you know you are, you aren’t. As for humility, don’t give it one more care. As for being wrong, seek to discover when you are as often as possible. Only the arrogant even care about humility. Only a fool seeks to “be right” according to the records.

Learn where you are wrong, bless anyone who can teach you, grow into the truth everywhere you can, and march forward without looking back, left, or right. Your value and good nature is not defined by how you match-up to those next to you. You’re in a competition against no one but yourself. In Earthly terms, you are your greatest enemy and your greatest ally.

Keep learning, but don’t doubt your instincts. When you are proven wrong, call a time-out and re-evaluate to the true, deep, underlying cause. Then, get back in the game.

Welcome jeers from spectators. It’s better to try and offend than to stay on the bench. This is called “growth”.

Champions improve with time. It’s no crime to be young. Don’t indite others for their age and don’t let others indite you for yours either. Everyone’s best days remain in front of them. When you confidently walk into the better and better future, someone will object. The best thing you can do is ignore it and keep walking.

Arguing won’t help dissenters. Rather, shine and show them that the road continues. By your light of hope, they are likely to mind less about other people’s manners and get going on their own journeys. Often times, we object to what we learn while we learn it; don’t “interpret” that when people do it to you. Don’t argue with complaining bystanders, whether teaching or complaining. Just mind your own path.

281 – Enjoy Voyages

Enjoying your trip as you travel starts with the foundational skill everyone must first learn to earn victory: being present. When you have complete focus on your current place and time—task, obstacle, and mission—things are most likely to go the best they possibly can. Not only will your current task achieve its best, other tasks your mind might wander off to will more likely see their best if you keep your mind from wandering off to them too early.

While you focus your energies in one place, secondary thoughts in your mind start solving problems not in the room, without your knowing. When your mind is most focused on your present predicament, you are most likely to realize the solution to another predicament out of the blue. God’s answer to tomorrow’s problems is to focus on today’s. Most of today’s problems are leftovers from yesterday because we were too busy thinking about either the day before that or the day after tomorrow.

Don’t burn bridges because people need friends and society needs infrastructure. But, once you reach the shores of your new home world, burn your ships. Stay focused where you are. Make a burnt sacrifice to eliminate whatever gives you a distracting sense of so-called “hope” of being able to bail on your goals for some “Plan B”. Don’t commit arson and don’t destroy anything important, but let go of any hopes for returning to your world across the sea before you complete your mission. God doesn’t write “Plan B” because He doesn’t fail.

“Contingency plans” are for the unforeseeable, saving strategic details until closer to a target when vision is better. Some things can’t be seen from far off. But, once you actually make your plans, either those plans should be final or you have too much left unlearned. So, focus on where you are, planning based only on what you know with certainty, always ready so make a huge shift when new circumstances dictate.

The vast majority of what we need is right around us. Take good steps “right here” and your entire journey will be its best. “Now” prepares us for “next”. A job well done won’t need redoing.