Brett Lawrie Hits An Umpire

(Sorry for the bad quality video but YouTube restricts copyrighted material)

There’s a good reason why Solomon tells us in Proverbs to watch you anger cause it could come back to bite you. Here we see Brett Lawrie get upset at a strike called high and rightfully so. I believe the reason the umpire called that high strike is because of Brett’s actions on the previous called strike that was juuuuuusst a bit outside. I should know. I’ve done it before while umpiring. If a batter doesn’t like a call  I made, the next pitch will prove a point; that what I say goes.

Unfortunately when we get upset, if we act out of stupidity, we’re going to reap the consequences. Brett, I’m very sure didn’t mean to hit the ump with his helmet and admitted so after the game in a press conference.

“That was not my intention at all,” Lawrie said of striking Miller with his helmet. “I’ve never, ever, done anything to go at an umpire before in my life, and I didn’t mean to tonight. I apologize for that. It just kind of took an unlucky bounce and I think it got him, so my apologies for that.”

But unfortunately for Brett, his helmet took an unfortunate bounce right into the umpire’s leg. Not only with there be a fine but a lengthy suspension as well.

Think before you act. This video shows what not doing so looks like.

Here’s a better video from MLB.

• Anger in Proverbs

Proverbs 14:17 – A quick tempered man acts foolishly

Proverbs 14:29 – He who is quick tempered exalts folly

Proverbs 29:22 – An angry man stirs up strife, and a hot tempered man abounds in transgression

The Last Song We’ll Sing This Sunday

Every morning I usually try to have a blog post so my blog stays active. Some mornings, I have nothing to say. That used to not be the case. I use to always have something to say about something but the more you dig into God’s word, the more you learn that quietness comes with wisdom, to learn to listen more and speak less. The beauty of learning this lesson is when you do speak others will listen because you are not always talking. You know where I’m coming from. We all know those folks who talk too much and when they start to speak again you close your ears and hearts because (s)he’s just blowing smoke again.

I don’t want to be that person.

I say all that to say this. This morning was another morning I had nothing to say. I woke up to see my family off to work and daycare, threw on my clothes, fired up the lawn mower ad cut the yard. I took a shower, sat down with a yummy glass of sweet tea on the porch with my computer to go over today’s news and social network updates. After that I ran through our set list for next Sunday to make sure my heart was prepared to worship God.

During the last song that we’ll be singing Sunday, God just touched my heart and reminded me how truly blessed I am. To have a loving wife and a son who adores me enough to imitate everything I do. I told my wife the other day “Imitation is the epitome of humiliation”. It truly humbles me to see my son want to be like me.

I grabbed some farm fresh eggs (with a chicken feather still stuck to an egg) from the fridge, scrambled me a couple and covered with cheese and tossed them on a tortilla for breakfast. As I sat and ate I couldn’t get past the words of the last song we’ll sing this Sunday.

I remember this last winter when I lost my job and Carrie and I didn’t know what to do or what will happen. We had people we can’t even name because they were anonymous donors give us money and food (boxes on my doorstep, cash in my coat pocket). We had prayers from so many people because the uncertainty of our future was leveraging our motives to fear the unknown. With a 1.5 year old needing food we were definitely curious how God was going to pull this one off. Thinking of that makes me think of the words of the last song we’ll sing this Sunday.

Monday mornings I get to be on the radio speaking to hundreds if not thousands of people about the grace and love of God. I get to help people with disabilities get jobs and having already done so, the reward outweighs the monetary paycheck. I get to spend time every day studying through the scriptures, and invest in our worship team a little more because I have that time. I get to invest in my family by making dinner for my family because I now have that time. And I can’t get past being able to do it because of the truth found in the words of the last song we’ll sing this Sunday.

Something I’ve dreamed about for a long time is being able to work for THE MAN for a living. It didn’t come easy. I brutally fought for it and have lost some relationships along the way while strengthening others. I have done damage that is irreparable to get the skills to be here today. I have fought a good fight of being as faithful as I could to God and others but I have failed miserably in doing so. In all I have done, unfortunately it never was up to me to get here. It was all because of Jesus and through the truth of the last song we’ll sing Sunday.

I can only thank you for reading my words. You may be wondering by now what that song is. I’ll tell you.

Great is Thy faithfulness, oh God my Father;
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not;
As Thou hast been, Thou forever wilt be.

Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

I’m Too Sexy…

I was one of the worst at trying to fit in. I never could find my place in this world. As you can see from the picture, my sophomore year, I tried to hang with the preps but I never felt accepted because I didn’t have the money nor a car. By my junior year, I went western because my brother came home on leave from the Army dressed as a cowboy and doing some rodeoing and I thought it was the coolest thing so I got into country music, wrote some country songs, created an embarrassing tape that still exists to this day for my girlfriend and went cowboy. You can’t see it but that shirt I’m wearing has skulls of longhorns on it with neon lasers. It’s a Brooks & Dunn thing!

By my senior year, I was so depressed that my friends and I started the goth movement in our town and I went dark, grew the mullet, and wrote some depressing stuff in my journal I can still revisit to see how messed up I really was. My parents got a hold of my journal and sat me down to talk one day because they thought I was going to commit suicide.

I never could find where I belonged. I tried all sorts of things but never really fit in. It wasn’t till I was in my late twenties that I made a decision that I needed to be who God created me to be. But who was I? I finally came to the conclusion to stop letting the world tell me who I was. Instead I started learning who I was myself. If I liked it, I did it. If I didn’t like it, I didn’t do it regardless of what every one else was doing. By this time I was also a Christian, so I started there. Is this who I want to be?

From that point, I looked at other things. I was a musician. I was dating. I was a writer. I was a factory worker. I was trying to live a life but I wasn’t sure whose life. I decided I needed to start with God and work from there. I came across this verse.

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. ¹² Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you – Jeremiah 29:11-12

That’s when I realized I’m too sexy for this world. Quit trying to compete. Be who God has called you to be. Today, it doesn’t matter to me to “fit in”. I once met a cowboy named Slim and he gave me some of the greatest advice I have ever received.

“One day, you’ll hang style up for comfort.”

I did. And I want to encourage you too if you’re battling to find out who you really are. Quit trying to fit in the mold everyone wants to put you in and be who God has created you to be. Hang up style for comfort; that is, give up trying to be cool and be you. That is way cooler than you think. You may be trying too hard to be someone you’re not and it’s dragging you down. If you’re like I was, you are. God has plans for you right where you are. Bloom where you’ve been planted; in your city, in your state.

I haven’t enjoyed life more than when I gave up trying to be someone I’m not. God knows the plans He has for me and the plans He has for you and trying to be someone you’re not isn’t fulfilling those plans. His plans are far more important than yours.

Be YOU!

In The Morning

Have you ever seen 50 First Dates with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore? I love that movie. What’s crazy is (CAREFUL: SPOILER ALERT) they get married at the end and every morning she wakes up she has to watch a video explaining who everyone is and why she can’t remember anything. That’s got to be a tough way to live.

Imagine if you were Henry (Adam) and every morning (if you’re married) you have to convince your wife to fall in love with you again. Every morning, you have to remind her of who she is and why she has the life that she has. Imagine if every morning, she wakes beside you and the confusion she has before she watches that video or however you set it up that she may be reminded that she has a family and a new life.

Now, imagine that there is a God that does this every morning for you. Because it’s true. Every morning God reminds you that his mercies are new every morning. Every morning He has to remind you that you are not consumed because His love is everlasting and what you did the day before is forgiven. His compassion for you is so strong, he gives you a new day for another chance. He has new mercies to bestow upon you… every morning.

Lamentations 3:22-23
22 Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. 23 They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.

What Is Your Mind-Set

“The major obstacle to glorifying God is a secular mind-set that begins with man as the starting point of life and reality. With this mind-set, problems and successes are defined by us and our goals and priorities. But the biblical mind-set is completely opposite. Here the starting point is God. His rights and goals define reality.”

-John Piper

What does God see as a success in our ministry? What kind of goals does God put on our ministry? What does failure look like to God? How do I know if I’m “doing it right”? These are questions that popped in my head when I read this quote from John Piper. We can easily set goals and priorities and measure success by human standards. It’s done every day in corporations and businesses around the world. But what do these things look like when God is the center and starting point.

We revolve around Him, not Him around us. He is the center of the universe and everything else is needed by him for survival. So when we consider ministry efforts, how are we lining up to what goals He has defined in His word? How are we measuring up to what God defines as success? Because if we’re not living with Him as the center, then we’re not living in reality!

How To Hear The Holy Spirit’s Still, Small Voice

I’ve been asked numerous times how I hear God. Is He audible? Do I really hear a voice that may sound like James Earl Jones? How can I tell? Let me just say no, He doesn’t sound like Darth Vader and I can just tell. My relationship with God is going on 16 years and it took a while to understand what his voice sounded like to me. It sounds like my voice in my head. It really sounds like I’m talking to myself. Kind of like when you read a book, you don’t hear the author’s voice, you hear your own.

When Jesus left, He told His disciples He was sending a helper (John 14:16). I understand this because my job with the State of Tennessee is to help. It’s not to yell, criticize, condemn, or tear down. It’s to help my clients succeed. This means there are times when I do things and He speaks to me in my own voice, “Are you sure that was the right thing to do?” He has a subtle way of convicting.

The Holy Spirit stays true to God’s word always but will convict different people in different ways. We all have our vices and we all sin. We all have those little things that in the grand scheme of things don’t matter but because God is all-knowing, and sometimes what we may think is ok is not really ok at the time. He’s working on you to mold you into someone better.

Let me explain. I don’t think it’s any secret to any of my readers I smoke a pipe. Recently, I posted a picture of me studying theology on my deck with my pipe sitting near by. To pipe smokers, they’d ask what’s the big deal. To nonsmokers, they’d ask if it was necessary. After I posted, I got to thinking. What was my main purpose? Did I want to show people that my morning consisted of knowing God more, or did I want to poke a rib and show my pipe.

After a small talk with the Holy Spirit, I realized I gained nothing from the pipe being in the picture. It wasn’t necessary. To most, they’d tell me it’s no big deal. But when the Holy Spirit wants to grow you, things that seem harmless is a BIG deal.

So let me encourage you who wonder what God sounds like, what conviction feels like, how a relationship can grow deeper. Listen to the small things because most times it’s the small things that make the big things big.

Dream Dreams and Your Dreams Will Star You

The 84th Academy Awards was all about the silent movie genre with The Artist picking up five awards and the The Fantastic Flying Books of Morris Lessmore picking up one. Who knew this genre would still win a little gold man years after it had faded in the limelight. Yet somewhere deep inside, someone fell in love with a style of art that had passed way before they were born and felt the need to reinvent this passion in movie goers.

I was astonished at the Thank you speech from William Joyce and Brandon Oldenburg last night as they picked up the Oscar for Animated Short Film. They were humbled by saying they were just a couple of swamp rats from Louisiana.

The difference?

They had an idea as a child and didn’t stop. When asked what was their biggest challenge while making this film, they said, “Not giving up.” They claimed that the movies have been part of their DNA since childhood and knew this is what they wanted to do.

They scored an Oscar on a short animated film! Did you get that? Most people want to go all out. Get best leading role, or best director. These guys followed their dream which was to create an animated film. It seems like a small dream yet there they stood on the platform along with all the other “giants” of Hollywood receiving the movie award.

Do you have dreams? I do. No matter how big or small they may be, go after them. Get off the couch and dream in reality. One day, you may be standing on that platform, regardless of how small you think your actions were. You might receive an award that is the same size as the best leading dreamer.

DON’T GIVE UP!

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