Today was a long day. It started early and of course now is ending early the next morning. I did not get to bed last night until very late and I couldn't fall asleep for the longest time. Needless to say I am tired. But there has been something on my heart and mind all day that I just had to get down before collapsing and doing it all again in a few hours.
Today was the day I was to teach the Job Search Basics Class for the Cove Church. This is the beginning of what I hope becomes a full lay directed ministry for our church focused on employment call Career Life Ministry. It will evolve into a comprehensive outreach that will assist those unemployed or under employed, people trying to improve themselves in their current employment, or help educate those who want to better there opportunities in the workplace. The timing of this ministry could not have been better in light of the current economic challenges we are facing.
On my way to my office this morning I stopped by "It Don't Matter" Cafe to grab a tea. I was in a hurry but being that this is a small town being in a hurry and stopping in a place like "It Don't Matter" doesn't match up. It's like Cheers in that everyone knows your name and will want to talk to you. Those of you that know me well know I never met a conversation that I couldn't extend. And today was one of those days.
I ran into a friend of mine who was sitting with a young minister and through various diatribes and exchanges about all of the crazy stuff I have going on somehow the discussion turned to people suffering in despair. I am sure it came up because I talked about the Career Life Ministry inviting her to share it with her flock. In the conversation it hit me that in despair we cry out to God to save us but it doesn't always have the quick result we crave. . In that darkest hour we finally are broken to the point that we yell out to God imploring Him to come save us. We are looking for some instant "beam me up Scotty" experience where by which God just snatches us out of or misery and makes everything right again. More often than not, that immediate rescue does not happen. Matter of fact, often times it seems as though that God didn't hear us at all and just leaves us there alone. We feel abandoned and lost and our depair is quickly magnified. Discouragement combines with our misery and often times our thoughts turn to questions about God's existence and participation in our lives. Hitting the prayer panic button it seems is a waste of our time and our hope no longer is there.
As I left the conversation and began walking to my office I thought about this and about a situation a friend of mine is facing right now and I wondered why God does not answer us in our time and it hit me that maybe the problem lies not in God's timing but our understanding of how God works in time.
Maybe, I surmised, had we been the obedient followers of Him and had practiced turning everything over to God, that we would have a better sense for God's timing and through that understanding manage our despair differently. Maybe, if we gave everything to Him, lifted up all of our anxieties, fears, problems, stress, failures, successes, blessings, gifts, family, everything God would use that continual dialogue to reveal time and again how He works in our lives not by our clock but by His timepiece. By practicing our followership of our Father through submitting everything to Him and praising Him for the blessings in our lives we would gather experience in God's timing. This understanding would help sustain us and motivate us to stand strong in our despair, submit to Him, and wait patiently for God to reveal His plan for us.
They say Practice makes Perfect. Practice turning everything over to God. You will be amazed at how Perfect God's plan is for your life.
1 Peter 1 3-9
.
3Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade—kept in heaven for you, 5who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. 6In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. 7These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. 8Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, 9for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Thursday, January 15, 2009
God Comes To Where We Are....
God is that Perfect Parent that will come to where we are and pick us up when we call on him with a contrite and repentive heart. Sometimes He takes us out of the situation and sometimes He leaves us there but the whole time He is with us. His love for us is unfailing and eternal.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
The New Year
In the storm that is the current economic downturn we are all facing in 2009 we can all get distracted from what is truly important. God wants us to bring all of our burdens to Him.
1 Peter 5:7
"Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you."
1 Peter 5:7
"Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you."
He loves us so much and wants us to be with Him for eternity. He sent His son Jesus to defeat sin and death for us. He has paid the ultimate price so that we do not have to pay it. No matter how hard things may get nothing will change this for us. When we accept the risen savior as the redeemer of our souls the ransom's paid.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Good Carving and A Great Pair of Loppers
Writers Note: This blog was orginally written on December 6, 2006 but yesterday I ran into Mr. Boan (see story) and it reminded me of this story.....
Good Carving And A Great Pair of Loppers
Today was a spectacular day (December 6, 2006). It was absolutely outstanding. So much so in fact, that during the middle of it I felt that it was so special that I begin writing this blog in my head. By this afternoon I had already decided much of what I had wanted to attempt to capture in words but at the very moment I felt like the day could not reveal anything better a simple sharing of a conversation with a neighbor changed it all.
Here is what this Blog was supposed to be about:
After spending the majority of yesterday working on the condo in Greensboro with my wife and going down to the Milestone in Charlotte to support the boys in Sapco today was to be my day to skate. I had plans to meet Bertman down in Concord and hit a new hill and check out some other spots around town. After getting up early and making the hour drive to the town I grew up Bertman and I had an awesome morning down hilling session on this super long 4 lane wide hill that had a nice grade and was close to ½ mile in length. We also checked out some other hills around Concord and out at the Charlotte Motor Speedway. It was great to be riding with a new rider who I had met through the internet and had come to compete in the downhill at the Dixie Cup. Bertman has the stoke and is hooked on skating again after several years away. (Sound familiar?). After showing Bertman a street in town known locally as "Fools Hill" back in the 70's and early 80's we made plans to put on a big session there in December. In a word this hill is SICK. It has the grade of Hobby Park but is twice as long, has a small bend at the bottom, and has a huge hill as the run out. The DHB will be turning out in force for that session I am sure.
I stopped in to check on my father while I was in town before I returned back to Statesville. My dad still lives in the house where I grew up, is retired from three different jobs, but still works over 32 hours a week as a Wal-Mart greeter. He is not your typical door person though, on the contrary. My dad was Greeter of the Year at his store and is loved by all of his co-workers and the regular customers. I give him a hard time because he has added quite the personal touch to his standard duties of handing out the carts, welcoming the customers, giving smiley stickers to the children, and marking returns. When ever he sees a woman he is familiar with from church, around town, or through his volunteer activities, he not only shares a smile but also shares a HUG! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, my Dad gets and gives more hugs in a shift of work that most of us get in weeks! For 80 years old Tom knows how to work it!
After the visit and a stop a local eatery (The What-A-Burger) to catch a tasty but unhealthy burger I returned in the early afternoon to Statesville. Emily was out of town. Hannah was sleeping off a slumber party from the night before that had little slumber and a great deal of party, and Donna, her normal workaholic project freak self was back in Greensboro painting the cabinets we had sanded the day before. I found myself free to do what ever I wanted and decided to grab another one of my boards and just skate about the neighborhood. I grabbed my Landyachtz Evo with Randal 180's, and 97 mm Flywheels, my helmet, and set off to just carve the neighborhood streets. I live in the historic district in town and within a block of my house are four very good hills of various lengths and grades. On my initial run it hit me that this day of skating was the first one in at least eight months where I was not practicing or racing. It was at this point the blog began to materialize in my head. I realized that rather than doing everything in my power to get to the bottom of the hill as fast I could I found myself actually going as slow as possible. Each run I took big wide sweeping carves with as much style as a 6 feet tall, 220 lb skater could exude. I found myself smiling at every turn and remembering why I was drawn to this sport in the first place. You see, skating for me back in the day was all about the simulation of surfing. Growing up poor and 200 miles from the ocean I only got to surf on those rare occasions we headed down to the coast for a family camping trip at the beach. Like many other skaters, a skateboard, a good hill, and some nice carves with style, all combined to make me feel like I was a surfer. Here I was today with that same flashback feeling and it was making me grin. To use my much overused phrase, Yes, I was STOKED!
This is what the blog was supposed to be about. Riding my board for FUN! Simple, pure, fun!.....but then, on the walk back up Kelly Street the conversation took place and well, in a paraphrase of Paul Harvey, here is the rest of the story :
Our neighborhood is a beautiful mix of homes built around the turn of the 20th century and the 20's, 30's and 40's, all surrounded by massive oaks, maples, and pin oaks, which over the last couple of weeks, have shed their last remaining leaves, requiring many a rake session by the neighbors. This day was no exception and the warm weather had several people out in their yard performing the Fall ritual. One of those people was Mr. Boan (Pronounced 'bone"….Mr. Boan upon introduction brought this to my attention, " Some people pronounce it "beau ann" but I prefer "bone"…..this rolling off his tongue as though it had always been apart of who he was).
He was about halfway up the block and was standing on the side walk using loppers (a limb cutter at the end of two handles) to cut a pile of limbs he had obviously trimmed up from around his yard to a shorter length for sidewalk pick up.
As I passed by him I said, "You know the man that invented the loppers knew what he was doing. You can get a lot of work down with a good pair of loppers."
Well, you would have thought I had asked this man about his grandchildren. His face lit up like a Christmas tree as though it were actually he that had invented this yard tool. He smiled back at me and said, "Yes, you're right but I actually made my pair better." With the pride of a father showing off his child, he held up his loppers to reveal that he had made a major alteration to the handles by replacing the stock wood ones with two metal pipes extending the lengths by over a foot. "With this added length and strength to the handles I can actually cut through bigger branches with much more force" and with this phrase he demonstrated it for me by snapping a 2 inch diameter limb as though he was a using a good pair of scissors on rice paper. He beamed as he watched my reaction to his improved loppers. It was impressive I must say.
For several minutes our discussion centered on this obvious enhancement of his limb cutter but as conversations go with me more often than not it digressed into various topics. Mr. Boan, it seems was a retired electrician who had done some work for my back fence neighbor, had a daughter who lived a couple of blocks west of me, was familiar with the previous owners of my house, and loved working in his yard (which showed…his place is the envy of his neighbors). It that somewhat brief interchange I learned also that his nephew was quite the salesman, that “Martha” my neighbor had used him for electrical work often, and that she was great but he wasn't as sure about “Martha’s” husband (which by the way is a standard joke around our small town, "you live beside the Smiths (names have been changed to protect the innocent)? Isn't “Martha” great?" followed by no mention of "Mr. Smith.")
This made my day. Here I had made a connection with someone I had never met before but hand seen working his yard countless of times. Because I was out just having fun there was no pressure to get back to the top of the hill for another run. I was able to linger there, standing on the side of the road, discussing loppers, family, neighbors and other topics of interest. Flashbacks of my grandmother and her gift of entertaining people with good conversation flooded my mind as Mr. "Bone" and I went through our interchange.<> >Those memories warmed me as I soaked up every word as though I was famished for lack of personal contact with anyone.
As all things must do, so must a good lopper conversation come to an end and I proceeded to finish my walk up the hill more than thirty minutes after I had began, which normally takes five minutes. After finishing the run and working my way back to the house I realized that the day was not about skateboarding. It was about being out and interacting with others. It started out with time spent with a new skating partner Bertman and concluded with Mr. "Bone".
It was once said, "Strong fences make good neighbors." I disagree. From now on, in my mind, what makes good neighbors is a great "lopper conversation".
Good Carving And A Great Pair of Loppers
Today was a spectacular day (December 6, 2006). It was absolutely outstanding. So much so in fact, that during the middle of it I felt that it was so special that I begin writing this blog in my head. By this afternoon I had already decided much of what I had wanted to attempt to capture in words but at the very moment I felt like the day could not reveal anything better a simple sharing of a conversation with a neighbor changed it all.
Here is what this Blog was supposed to be about:
After spending the majority of yesterday working on the condo in Greensboro with my wife and going down to the Milestone in Charlotte to support the boys in Sapco today was to be my day to skate. I had plans to meet Bertman down in Concord and hit a new hill and check out some other spots around town. After getting up early and making the hour drive to the town I grew up Bertman and I had an awesome morning down hilling session on this super long 4 lane wide hill that had a nice grade and was close to ½ mile in length. We also checked out some other hills around Concord and out at the Charlotte Motor Speedway. It was great to be riding with a new rider who I had met through the internet and had come to compete in the downhill at the Dixie Cup. Bertman has the stoke and is hooked on skating again after several years away. (Sound familiar?). After showing Bertman a street in town known locally as "Fools Hill" back in the 70's and early 80's we made plans to put on a big session there in December. In a word this hill is SICK. It has the grade of Hobby Park but is twice as long, has a small bend at the bottom, and has a huge hill as the run out. The DHB will be turning out in force for that session I am sure.
I stopped in to check on my father while I was in town before I returned back to Statesville. My dad still lives in the house where I grew up, is retired from three different jobs, but still works over 32 hours a week as a Wal-Mart greeter. He is not your typical door person though, on the contrary. My dad was Greeter of the Year at his store and is loved by all of his co-workers and the regular customers. I give him a hard time because he has added quite the personal touch to his standard duties of handing out the carts, welcoming the customers, giving smiley stickers to the children, and marking returns. When ever he sees a woman he is familiar with from church, around town, or through his volunteer activities, he not only shares a smile but also shares a HUG! Yes, ladies and gentlemen, my Dad gets and gives more hugs in a shift of work that most of us get in weeks! For 80 years old Tom knows how to work it!
After the visit and a stop a local eatery (The What-A-Burger) to catch a tasty but unhealthy burger I returned in the early afternoon to Statesville. Emily was out of town. Hannah was sleeping off a slumber party from the night before that had little slumber and a great deal of party, and Donna, her normal workaholic project freak self was back in Greensboro painting the cabinets we had sanded the day before. I found myself free to do what ever I wanted and decided to grab another one of my boards and just skate about the neighborhood. I grabbed my Landyachtz Evo with Randal 180's, and 97 mm Flywheels, my helmet, and set off to just carve the neighborhood streets. I live in the historic district in town and within a block of my house are four very good hills of various lengths and grades. On my initial run it hit me that this day of skating was the first one in at least eight months where I was not practicing or racing. It was at this point the blog began to materialize in my head. I realized that rather than doing everything in my power to get to the bottom of the hill as fast I could I found myself actually going as slow as possible. Each run I took big wide sweeping carves with as much style as a 6 feet tall, 220 lb skater could exude. I found myself smiling at every turn and remembering why I was drawn to this sport in the first place. You see, skating for me back in the day was all about the simulation of surfing. Growing up poor and 200 miles from the ocean I only got to surf on those rare occasions we headed down to the coast for a family camping trip at the beach. Like many other skaters, a skateboard, a good hill, and some nice carves with style, all combined to make me feel like I was a surfer. Here I was today with that same flashback feeling and it was making me grin. To use my much overused phrase, Yes, I was STOKED!
This is what the blog was supposed to be about. Riding my board for FUN! Simple, pure, fun!.....but then, on the walk back up Kelly Street the conversation took place and well, in a paraphrase of Paul Harvey, here is the rest of the story :
Our neighborhood is a beautiful mix of homes built around the turn of the 20th century and the 20's, 30's and 40's, all surrounded by massive oaks, maples, and pin oaks, which over the last couple of weeks, have shed their last remaining leaves, requiring many a rake session by the neighbors. This day was no exception and the warm weather had several people out in their yard performing the Fall ritual. One of those people was Mr. Boan (Pronounced 'bone"….Mr. Boan upon introduction brought this to my attention, " Some people pronounce it "beau ann" but I prefer "bone"…..this rolling off his tongue as though it had always been apart of who he was).
He was about halfway up the block and was standing on the side walk using loppers (a limb cutter at the end of two handles) to cut a pile of limbs he had obviously trimmed up from around his yard to a shorter length for sidewalk pick up.
As I passed by him I said, "You know the man that invented the loppers knew what he was doing. You can get a lot of work down with a good pair of loppers."
Well, you would have thought I had asked this man about his grandchildren. His face lit up like a Christmas tree as though it were actually he that had invented this yard tool. He smiled back at me and said, "Yes, you're right but I actually made my pair better." With the pride of a father showing off his child, he held up his loppers to reveal that he had made a major alteration to the handles by replacing the stock wood ones with two metal pipes extending the lengths by over a foot. "With this added length and strength to the handles I can actually cut through bigger branches with much more force" and with this phrase he demonstrated it for me by snapping a 2 inch diameter limb as though he was a using a good pair of scissors on rice paper. He beamed as he watched my reaction to his improved loppers. It was impressive I must say.
For several minutes our discussion centered on this obvious enhancement of his limb cutter but as conversations go with me more often than not it digressed into various topics. Mr. Boan, it seems was a retired electrician who had done some work for my back fence neighbor, had a daughter who lived a couple of blocks west of me, was familiar with the previous owners of my house, and loved working in his yard (which showed…his place is the envy of his neighbors). It that somewhat brief interchange I learned also that his nephew was quite the salesman, that “Martha” my neighbor had used him for electrical work often, and that she was great but he wasn't as sure about “Martha’s” husband (which by the way is a standard joke around our small town, "you live beside the Smiths (names have been changed to protect the innocent)? Isn't “Martha” great?" followed by no mention of "Mr. Smith.")
This made my day. Here I had made a connection with someone I had never met before but hand seen working his yard countless of times. Because I was out just having fun there was no pressure to get back to the top of the hill for another run. I was able to linger there, standing on the side of the road, discussing loppers, family, neighbors and other topics of interest. Flashbacks of my grandmother and her gift of entertaining people with good conversation flooded my mind as Mr. "Bone" and I went through our interchange.<> >Those memories warmed me as I soaked up every word as though I was famished for lack of personal contact with anyone.
As all things must do, so must a good lopper conversation come to an end and I proceeded to finish my walk up the hill more than thirty minutes after I had began, which normally takes five minutes. After finishing the run and working my way back to the house I realized that the day was not about skateboarding. It was about being out and interacting with others. It started out with time spent with a new skating partner Bertman and concluded with Mr. "Bone".
It was once said, "Strong fences make good neighbors." I disagree. From now on, in my mind, what makes good neighbors is a great "lopper conversation".
A Little About North Carolina
I realized that the majority of people who I connect with over the internet, through skating, or through work are NOT from North Carolina. With the exception of a few months in 1980 when I was an exchange student in Plymouth, England and the two years in the late 80's when I lived in Florida, I have lived my whole life in North Carolina. Because you may be unfamiliar with the Tarheel State, I thought I would share a few facts (well, mostly factual) about this State of Mine (pun intended):
Here the word BARBEQUE is a noun. It is not a verb like what you do with an outdoor grill but it is cooked outdoors (mostly) or in the ground like in certain parts of Eastern North Carolina. It is mostly pork. This state is the second largest producer of pork and pork products (read: spam) in the country behind Iowa. Way to go, Iowa!! ………….. It can also be chicken. North Carolina is the third largest producer of poultry products (read: chicken nuggets, spam…"parts is parts") in the US. See a pattern here?
DUPLIN COUNTY in Eastern North Carolina (a long way from where I live) has more pigs than people. Matter of fact, they have 46 pigs per person! What are they doing with all those pigs?.......... To get a visual, the next time you are on the city sidewalk with other people imagine they all, including yourself, have 46 little pigs following behind each of you……………….Then imagine now all those pigs are ready for market (read: ready to be made into bacon). That is a bunch of (fill in the blank with the modifier or modifiers of your choice) pigs!!!!!
There is a wine called DUPLIN WINE. It is made in Rose Hill, Duplin County, North Carolina. You know, the place with all the pigs? Their most popular wine is made from SCUPPERNONGS. What's a "scuppernong"? It's a greenish, or bronze, version of the MUSCADINE. Oh, a "muscadine"? Well, it's basically a native American grape. …just a little bigger, and great to throw at people (read: other kids in my neighborhood when I was a kid) when they are not fully ripe. Forgive me Mr. McKee for wasting a bunch of your muscadines on Ricky….but, hey, he deserved it!....................................THE YADKIN RIVER VALLEY, near where I live is fast becoming a large wine region in this country, with new vineyards and wineries opening every year over the last several. They call it the "Napa Valley of the East."………………..Well, I made that up but that sounded cool, huh? It's not up to that standard but to hear the North Carolina Wine Makers Association's press releases they are getting close. ….Of course, they are paid to say that stuff………………..I'm not a big vine snob but my favorite is called RAGAPPLE LASSIE. It's fairly pedestrian (read: tastes like Boones Farm) but what a killer name…..Ragapple Lassie! ….Beats the heck out of other wine names like "Goats Do Roam" (South Africa vineyard) and "Toad Hollow Cacophony Zinfindel (Sonoma, CA)…..But I like "Riunite On Ice" so what do I know?
Speaking of GOATS, North Carolina is the fourth largest producer of goats in the country.……… Ok. I made that one up too, but the pork and poultry numbers are real.
The flagship soft drink of the second largest soft drink mega company in the Universe, Pepsi Co., was invented in Eastern North Carolina in a town called New Bern (the town my wife grew up in. I don't think she likes Pepsi….not sure). PEPSI was invented by a pharmacist named Caleb Bradham in 1893 in one of the local drug stores there that is now the "Birthplace of Pepsi Museum and Gift Store." They sell everything "Pepsi"…well, that and some Mt. Dew crap. I'm not much of a Pepsi drinker so that's about all I know about the cola.
Over time I will educate you "foreigners" on North Carolina some more. We've been talking mostly about Eastern North Carolina. I live in the Western part of the state. I know a great deal more about this end. Stuff like where they hung the REAL TOM DOOLEY (sing: Hang down your head Tom Dooley, Hang down your head and cry. Hang down your head, Tom Dooley, poor boy you're bound to die). Matter of fact, I have attended meetings of various civic organizations that I am a member of in the train depot practically weekly where he was hung on May 1st, 1868 for the murder of his fiancé Laura Foster. Tom Dula (the correct spelling but still pronounced "dooley") was from the Yadkin River Valley. You know, the place they make Ragapple Lassie?
Here the word BARBEQUE is a noun. It is not a verb like what you do with an outdoor grill but it is cooked outdoors (mostly) or in the ground like in certain parts of Eastern North Carolina. It is mostly pork. This state is the second largest producer of pork and pork products (read: spam) in the country behind Iowa. Way to go, Iowa!! ………….. It can also be chicken. North Carolina is the third largest producer of poultry products (read: chicken nuggets, spam…"parts is parts") in the US. See a pattern here?
DUPLIN COUNTY in Eastern North Carolina (a long way from where I live) has more pigs than people. Matter of fact, they have 46 pigs per person! What are they doing with all those pigs?.......... To get a visual, the next time you are on the city sidewalk with other people imagine they all, including yourself, have 46 little pigs following behind each of you……………….Then imagine now all those pigs are ready for market (read: ready to be made into bacon). That is a bunch of (fill in the blank with the modifier or modifiers of your choice) pigs!!!!!
There is a wine called DUPLIN WINE. It is made in Rose Hill, Duplin County, North Carolina. You know, the place with all the pigs? Their most popular wine is made from SCUPPERNONGS. What's a "scuppernong"? It's a greenish, or bronze, version of the MUSCADINE. Oh, a "muscadine"? Well, it's basically a native American grape. …just a little bigger, and great to throw at people (read: other kids in my neighborhood when I was a kid) when they are not fully ripe. Forgive me Mr. McKee for wasting a bunch of your muscadines on Ricky….but, hey, he deserved it!....................................THE YADKIN RIVER VALLEY, near where I live is fast becoming a large wine region in this country, with new vineyards and wineries opening every year over the last several. They call it the "Napa Valley of the East."………………..Well, I made that up but that sounded cool, huh? It's not up to that standard but to hear the North Carolina Wine Makers Association's press releases they are getting close. ….Of course, they are paid to say that stuff………………..I'm not a big vine snob but my favorite is called RAGAPPLE LASSIE. It's fairly pedestrian (read: tastes like Boones Farm) but what a killer name…..Ragapple Lassie! ….Beats the heck out of other wine names like "Goats Do Roam" (South Africa vineyard) and "Toad Hollow Cacophony Zinfindel (Sonoma, CA)…..But I like "Riunite On Ice" so what do I know?
Speaking of GOATS, North Carolina is the fourth largest producer of goats in the country.……… Ok. I made that one up too, but the pork and poultry numbers are real.
The flagship soft drink of the second largest soft drink mega company in the Universe, Pepsi Co., was invented in Eastern North Carolina in a town called New Bern (the town my wife grew up in. I don't think she likes Pepsi….not sure). PEPSI was invented by a pharmacist named Caleb Bradham in 1893 in one of the local drug stores there that is now the "Birthplace of Pepsi Museum and Gift Store." They sell everything "Pepsi"…well, that and some Mt. Dew crap. I'm not much of a Pepsi drinker so that's about all I know about the cola.
Over time I will educate you "foreigners" on North Carolina some more. We've been talking mostly about Eastern North Carolina. I live in the Western part of the state. I know a great deal more about this end. Stuff like where they hung the REAL TOM DOOLEY (sing: Hang down your head Tom Dooley, Hang down your head and cry. Hang down your head, Tom Dooley, poor boy you're bound to die). Matter of fact, I have attended meetings of various civic organizations that I am a member of in the train depot practically weekly where he was hung on May 1st, 1868 for the murder of his fiancé Laura Foster. Tom Dula (the correct spelling but still pronounced "dooley") was from the Yadkin River Valley. You know, the place they make Ragapple Lassie?
Thursday, December 4, 2008
Dressing For Eternal Success- Ephesians Chapter 6: 10-17
I imagine all of you have heard of the book by John T. Malloy called Dress For Success. Originally published in 1985 and updated several times over the years it still is considered the definitive book regarding appropriate styling and dress for business, interviewing, and even everyday life. Million of copies have been sold and its influence on the business world in particular has been quite spectacular to say the least. In my executive recruiting business I still refer candidates to this book as a great resource in that it covers such a wide variety of topics providing practical yet powerful advice on the appropriate attire for a large number of situations. It is a great resource and its admonitions are valuable when followed.
Having said all of that, did you know that the Bible also offers great advice on how to "dress for success"? The success referred to here is much more powerful and important than any business opportunity or need to influence others. We are talking about "ETERNAL SUCCESS". Paul in his letter to the church at Ephesus which most scholars agree was written by him while imprisoned in Rome gives us that instruction:
Ephesians Chapter 6: 10-17
10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.
11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.
12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm.
14 Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness,
15and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace.
16 In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one;
17and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God…”
Paul so clearly lays out what we have to do to protect ourselves and lay a foundation for success into eternity. Put on the full armor of God. Arm yourself with His word.
How did you dress today?
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