What Was I Thinking?

I went to the boys' and girls' championship games this past weekend. We may not have won the games, but I was won over by the mighty efforts of our GGCA athletes. I did not walk away from the games feeling disappointed, because I had seen young men and women give their all and that made me proud. I say it is no shame to give 110 percent and walk away without a first place trophy. Our guys and girls can hold their heads up and move on with their lives knowing that what happens on a soccer field or volleyball court does not define them as winners or losers.   Sure, it's awesome to win and to feel the exhilarating rush of victory as fans cheer and your teammates celebrate. But I like to think that we don't play sports just to collect a banner or a trophy or to get people's admiration. I hope that we play sports for the same reason we do other things as Christians - to develop and use the gifts and talents God has blessed us with, to participate in an activity with fell...

Have you ever thought that God was trying to tell you something? I have. "Be holy as I am holy." Great, God, just great.   I am so NOT holy.   Holy holiness! How can I be holy?   (I can't even be halfway good most of the time, so how can I be holy?) God is holy and I am nowhere near being like Him. The standard of holiness is just too high for me.   (Heavy sigh.) I know this is from my everyday experience - my thoughts, my attitudes, my habits - so many of them are so much dross. The Holy Spirit convicts me and I beg God's forgiveness and move on with my life by grace. The Spirit whispers, "Be holy as I am holy." I know this from the messages I hear from the pulpit and even on the radio as I am driving in to school. Last night, Pastor Schaller spoke from 2 Corinthians 6 and told us how God expects us to come out and be separate from the world. This morning I heard a preacher talking about being sanctified and conformed to Christ's image. The biblical ide...

It was hard getting out of bed this morning. The weather having cooled considerably made my comforter oh-so warm and snuggly... I looked at my yellow moonbeam alarm clock and saw it was 5:30, so I closed my eyes... and opened them again to see that it was 5:45. Where did those fifteen minutes go? I steeled myself for the cold air that would embrace my body as soon as I threw the covers aside, then forced myself out of bed and made a beeline to my closet where I flailed around in its dark recesses hoping to lay my hands on the bathrobe I had not worn since last spring. Once wrapped in my fuzzy robe, I managed to find my way into the living room and lay my hands on my iPod Touch before I realized that I had left my spectacles on the nightstand beside my bed. Usually I settle on the sofa for my morning Bible reading, but today it turned out that I would have to return to bed with the iPod to find out what happened next in 2 Chronicles, Ezekiel, and John. As it turned out, Solomon dedicate...

I was hoping that might get your attention. I Stink! is the title of one of the books I may be reading to some first graders this afternoon during library time. Library time is usually Mrs. Lange's gig, but since she is out of the country, I am the reader during library time today, and I have picked out some books that I think are pretty funny and cool to share with the first, second, and third graders. I'm hoping they like them as much as I do, or it is going to be a L O O O O O N G afternoon in the old library. (By the way, I Stink! is the story of a garbage truck and it includes an alphabetical list of the garbage he likes to eat.) Some of the other titles I have chosen include: The Runaway Dinner (Melvin the sausage decides he doesn't want to be eaten by a boy named Banjo Cannon, so he runs away); Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! (a pigeon begs, wheedles, and cajoles readers to let him drive a public transit bus); Mail Harry to the Moon! (a boy whose life has bee...

I just finished speaking to a new student here in the office. This student was pretty sad because only one person in his class had been friendly toward him. That really bothered me. Here we are celebrating GGCA Spirit Day and he feels downcast because he hasn't been accepted by the students in his class. That's not the GGCA spirit that I was celebrating today when I proudly wore my maroon and black. The GGCA spirit I was celebrating was the godly spirit of family love we have here, the spirit that gives us the unity and encouragement we need in the classroom, in the hallways, in the lunchroom, on the soccer field, and on the volleyball court. Our school may be small, but our family unity makes us greater than the sum of our individual parts, and we do awesome things working together as a team that we could never hope to accomplish by ourselves.   Psalm 133 speaks about a unity that commands God's blessing. If we desire to experience God's blessing in our lives here at s...