A Note From Tom: August 26th, 2011

Hey, everyone!

Or as they say at the beach where we were last week,”…

Well, actually, I’m not sure what they say. I think they say the same thing we do.

Anyhooo…

The beach of North Carolina just blew us away ! Not in the way it’s about to do tomorrow morning when hurricane Irene lands (pray for folks along the Eastern seaboard!...that as the winds blow, they can hold on! To Him!) but just with it’s beauty and amazingness! To not do anything but BE! With kids, grandkids, each other, and with Him!

All I can say is,” Duuuuude.”

I did learn some interesting things tho…

In one of the houses we stayed in, there were several copies of “O Magazine”. From the cover photos, and pictures on several of the inside pages, “O” apparently stands for Oprah Winfrey. And it is full of advice about everything! I learned how you can make a blackberry jam and peach jam pie with a lattice crust out of those pie crusts that are in the can you bang on the counter! And they look like you’ve worked for days on it!

There were also articles like…

“Are your eyebrows communicating a false message about you” It seems that one big problem some folks have is that their eye brows may make them seem more upset or tired than they really are! Did you know that? "Even subtle variations in the brows had a significant effect on how the woman's mood was perceived," says John Persing, MD, professor of plastic surgery at Yale University School of Medicine.

Who’da thunk it?

So O  “challenged master eyebrow expert Eliza Petrescu to set things right.”

And this article…“Is your handbag killing you?” I’m not sure how it could but apparently they have ways.

And “What do you do if you have to wear a bridesmaid’s dress and that week your chest breaks out in pimples?”

You can’t stop the wedding! What do you do?!

But the major article in this “O” issue was about how to follow your intuition.  Check this…

“Learning to trust your instincts, using your intuitive sense of what's best for you. That whispery sensation that pulsates just beneath the surface of your being, is paramount for any lasting success. I've trusted the still, small voice of intuition my entire life. And the only time I've made mistakes is when I didn't listen…the more we can tune in to our intuition, the better off we are.

For all the major moves in my life—to Baltimore, to Chicago, to own my show, and to end it—I've trusted my instincts… Get quiet so you can hear the still, small voice—your inner GPS guiding you to true North.”

One of the examples she gave was the wife of Ulysses S. Grant. She had an intuition that they shouldn’t accept an invitation to go the Ford’s Theater with the Lincolns. Whew! What if they’d gone?

Only problem with all this is that tons of times what I feel inside is right, isn’t what God wants for me. My “inner voice” is lots of times whiny, scared and selfish, when the voice of my Lord calls me to be quiet, brave, and self-giving.

I remember a super popular Christian book that advised guys in particular to follow their hearts. But Jeremiah said about his heart…and ours…that “it is deceitful and desperately wicked. Who could know it?” There probably isn’t anything worse to follow than my heart!

That book also said that you should follow your dreams. Now think about some dreams you’ve had. Follow those? Seriously?

Check Proverbs 14 .12…“There is a way that seems right to a person, but in the end it leads to death”

Proverbs 3 tells me to do the opposite of listening to my voice inside. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and DON”T lean on your own understanding…and He will direct your paths!”

So many of the things Jesus says to do are counter-intuitive! Just the opposite of what you’d think!

“Give, so you can have!”

“Die, so you can live!”

“Weep, so you can laugh!”

When the Grants turned Abe down, Major Henry Rathbone and his wife went to the play with the Lincoln’s. He had spent most of the war in offices and turned out to be mentally unstable in the end. What if Ulysses had said to the Mrs., “Honey, I know you have that ‘feeling’ you get, but let’s go anyway. Our President needs us!” The General had fought across Tennessee, Mississippi, and Virginia and turned the whole thing around! He might have stopped Booth at the door! If the worst had happened to him in doing it, Jesus said…counter-intuitively… “Greater love has no man this…!”

Instead of following the voice inside of you, it’s always better to follow the often counter-intuitive voice of Him Who told folks to do seemingly illogical things like…

 “Give Me those five loaves! Let’s feed all these people!” (“But what are these among so many?”)

…and “Let’s roll that stone from Lazurus’ tomb!” (But, Lord, by now he stinketh!”)

One symbol the very first Christians used for Jesus was the letter “X”. It’s the first letter in the Greek word, Xristos. It means “Christ the King, the Lord”

Instead of following the advice you read in “O”

…instead of following the voice you hear in “U”

…why not listen to the voice of “X”!

It’s only the only way to “C” what He wants you to “B”!

“OK?”

On the other hand, if you want to make a delicious pie really fast, or have problems of pimples on the wedding day, there’s some good stuff in there!