17 Things I Learned in 2013
This time each year, I sit down and net out the most significant things I learned. Good, bad or ‘rained out,’ here’s this year’s list . . .
1. We trust someone who wants something for us. We fear someone who wants something from us. Our God not only wants something for us, but wants to be with us. And beyond that, His spirit lives within us.
2. When you sense God’s urging or ‘hear’ His voice, obey. When he gives direction, it’s accompanied with enough faith to act. If you doubt, the faith disappears.
3. It’s a big deal whether we’re approaching God wanting Him, or wanting something from Him.
4. We’d rather be with people who are easy to love than with people who need love. It’s natural to love people like ourselves, but God will lead us to the unnatural act of loving those unlike us . . . those who are lost, needy and downcast.
5. “Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world” can mean ‘church world.’ Being “transformed by the renewing of your mind” means listening to God and being transformed by His guidance and obedience to it, not just doing what “church” and ‘church people’ say.
6. Compassion must first be allocated to myself before it can be given to others.
7. Shame comes not from doing something bad, but from believing I am something bad. And it usually seeks someone to blame over personal responsibility.
8. I don’t deserve anything but I am worth a lot. I have ‘worth’ because God loves me enough to send Jesus to die for me. There’s a healthy tension between selflessness and worthiness.
9. Part of God’s joy is watching the faces of His adopted children when they arrive in heaven, especially those who barely got there. They believed, but when they first see His Glory ‘up close and personal’, it’s a lot of fun, both for them and for God.
10. In raising kids, you can’t prioritize popularity and Godliness at the same time. “Focus on success and God will find his rightful place” is American Christianity’s default position. Parents haven’t personally decided between God-centric lives or successful lives so they build this struggle into their children.
11. You will only be remembered by the people who know you now. Building a personal ‘brand’ is futile.
12. Your legacy won’t be what you leave behind for people. It will be what you build into people.
13. Transformation is the fruit of a changed outlook. First our minds are renewed, then we are transformed, then everything is different even if it stays the same.
14. The power of a lie is it’s half truth. Lies that are pure lies . . . outlandish tall tales, the kind of bizarre claims the tabloids tell, these can be spotted at long distances. It’s those that have the veneer of credibility that we want to believe . . . lies like “You can’t do anything right,” and “it doesn’t really matter.”
15. When someone pays you a compliment, visualize a rose. Receive it gently into your hand, smell it . . . fully enjoy it, then pass it on to Jesus. Never let it stop and stay with you.
16. Live your life – Don’t get so involved in analyzing and archiving life that you forget to live it. The person who takes the picture or video exits the reality of the moment and, in trying to preserve it, destroys it for himself.
17. You may never know that Jesus is all you need, until Jesus is all you have. Once Jesus becomes all you need, Jesus can become all you want.
Happy New Year!
Question: Do you have ‘nuggets’ you’ve learned this year? Will you share them with the Radical Mentoring ‘tribe’? Click here to post them.
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