Where Are You Invested?

I’m a “baby-boomer” getting ready to embrace a new adventure in my life as I enter into my sixties. I look forward to this new era of great expectations. This is going to be an exciting time for me and others who will be embarking upon this phase of our lives where we want to make an impact. As I look ahead, I also look backwards to see how my investments have grown over the years.

I needed to know whether I invested well over the time spent and gone. It’s time to see if I’ve gained any interests on those investments. It’s time to cut the fat, lose the useless and count up the cost of becoming leaner. I’m calling myself into accountability for my latter years, so I’m looking at how I invested.

I invested time into Living Well so that my example would encourage others
I invested in Perseverance to make it this far
I invested in Discipline to show I can follow directions
I invested in Character to exhibit rightness no matter who’s looking
I invested in Integrity to honor God’s name and who I represent
I invested in Truth to maintain honesty and integrity
I invested in Study to be knowledgeable and ever learning
I invested in Relationships to show love and care for people and my family
I invested in Teaching for there were many who wanted to be taught
I invested in Music so that my heart would always have a song to sing
I invested in Family so that I would always have a home to come to
I invested in Self so that I would be mindful of how I affect others
I invested in Others who didn’t know they were worthy of my time
I invested in Righteousness to show God I’d follow His Word
I invested in Love to be loved and to show love as well as receive the same



I invested in God’s Word so that when I forget all of these investments and the blessings they have brought into my life, God’s Word reminds me that had not God first invested in me, I would not have invested at all.

Men Marry for No Change, Women Marry for Change

As a young man gazes upon his future wife, she becomes the most beautiful woman in the world. No other woman compares with his soon to be wife. He does all he can do to wine and dine her and convince her that she has finally found her “Prince Charming.”

The woman on the other hand hopes she has found the “Knight in Shining Armor.” He has done many things that she has checked off her spousal list. She has placed her best foot forward and was successful at presenting her self a chosen vessel that was worthy of her man’s proposal. She even showed herself to be and adequate housekeeper, a smart dresser and a pretty good cook.

This is the perspective that each one saw in one another. The two shall become one was their ultimate goal for their lives. They wanted to duplicate each other by having children and having a happy family. A boy for him a girl for her and any extras will be just fine. Loving each other meant until death do us part. The two of you were committed to stay the course.

Several years on the marriage path, things begin to change. She had the girl for her and the boy for him, plus a couple more. Her body began to change with more than a “love handle” in various places on her body. Her time was no longer her own and her days were filled with meeting everyone’s needs but her own.

She was no longer the slim healthy person she was when she started out on this marital journey. He had lost his lustful pursuit of earlier times in their relationship. His eyes no longer gazed upon her with youthful lust. His sight had become cloudy which caused his eyes to roam for better looking bodies. He failed to adjust to the changes in life.

I need him to change some things. When we got married I thought he would take out the trash, help me clean up, watch the children sometimes and give me a break, do a little laundry, put gas in my car every now and then, and be the husband I dreamed of. But, over the years she put in a lot of time trying to make him into the man you thought you wanted. She failed to adjust to the changes of life.

Change comes from within. You cannot change anyone. As you see a need for change within yourself, then the change will come. What and who you were before you
Marry is the same one you said “I do” to. As you mature you will make changes by assessing your life’s path and how you are walking down it. You will learn to accept people for who they are. Your change of attitude will allow you and them to become an agent of effective change within themselves.

Allow your expectations to be realistic. Life is full of changes and we all will encounter these changes at one time or another. Communicate your wants and needs to each other. Make room for changes expected and unexpected. Love each other through these changes by being the first positive example. Changes will come. It’s just a part of life.

Sometimes What You See Ain’t What You Saw

The headlines read ”Wealthy Woman Dies in the Slums.” A wealthy woman was found dead in the lower slums of Blind. She was seen on a daily basis pushing her old rusting cot up and down the trash laden streets of downtown. No one spoke to her after a while as she became a permanent fixture in her tattered clothing showing signs of her poverty status as it blended into the landscape of Blind.

She never seemed to be all there when they passed her by on the streets for she always looked down as they went to and fro to their various destinations. Her head was always bowed down and her back never was straight. When you saw her , you would have thought that she was always looking for something on the ground. She was just another old lady that had no one to care for her in her latter years. Did she have family, children, sisters, brothers, grandchildren, cousins, anybody? No one ever stopped to inquire.

To the naked eye she was a nobody a pathetic old person that had nothing to offer anybody. She looked as though she had nothing, nothing at all. As people read her story in the newspaper and saw her life flash across the T.V. many began to recognize the lone media character. As recognition dawned among those who took special note, the stories of her gifting began to surface. Stories like that of a young man who ran into the deceased one day and how she gave him a hand full of money. He had just lost his minimum wage job but his children needed food just the same. A young woman was sitting out on the curb with her children and furniture as the deceased lady was pushing her cot pass the destitute family. Her heart reached out to the crying mother as she fumbled down in her cot and pulled out a crumbled bag. With an incredulous look on her face the young mother almost didn’t look inside. When she did look inside, it was full of money; enough money to get her and her children off the street and a safe place to stay.

E-mails, letters, and phone calls came form the most unlikely sources. No one knew her name, but there were a number of people who were blessed buy her gifting. She did not live in a big house, or drive a fancy car. Her clothes would offend those who she came in contact with. Her presentation was that of a poor person without any means. It’s what other eyes saw when they came in contact with her, but it’s not what they really saw.

At the funeral, the church was full. Those who had been touched in a personal way came to pay their respect. The congregation was varied from young to old, and from rich to poor. They all came forth for one purpose. The story does not end here. Three weeks later the final headline read “ Wealthy Slum Woman Leaves A Million Dollars to the Children’s Home.”

Was this a true story? Only your heart will know if what you see is what you truly saw.

Everywhere You Go

As each day begins, we often have an agenda as to what we hope to accomplish for that day. Our itinerary can often be varied as we have many task and duties that have to be implemented and completed on any given day. No matter what we have to do we need help to get the agenda done for it generally involves interaction with other people.

In looking for help we need those who can function well within their gifting. Those who could do all that are humanly possible in bringing the task to completion. In order to accomplish this we must be cooperative with those who have been placed in our spheres of working on the tasks. It’s called bringing your “A” game to the table.

Your “A” game should be manifested in all that you do from the smallest to the largest task you undertake everywhere you go. What should your “A” game look like? Should it show what you are made of and what you stand for? Everywhere you go you may want to exhibit:

• The spirit of cooperation


• The spirit of teamwork


• Showing integrity


• That which is right


• Treating others the way you wish to be treated


• Kindness and compassion to others


• Words of healing and affirmation


• Forgiveness to be forgiven


• Character- I am the same no matter where I go or who’s looking


• Love to the wounded in heart


• Mercy and grace


• Courtesy


• Goodness to your fellow man
  

The list could go on and on, but what’s important is that we take all these attributes with us Every Where We Go. There are many people we encounter from day to day who need special touches from us, just as we needed the same touch from Jesus to make us into the people who are capable about bringing a wonderful change into other lives. As you set out today take these words and game plans with you. Go make a difference today

You Can’t Tell Me What To Do!

I am grown and nobody tells me what to do. I am my own person. I have a job, I provide for myself and really don’t have to bow down and do others biddings. I’m very independent and make my own way in life all by myself. I do things my way like the song “I Did It My Way.” I’m sure you’ve heard those and many other phrases from those who think they don’t have to do what others say.

These are the people who have chips on their shoulders and look at life and others through jaded concepts. All is not right with them on most days and they tend to live in the negative from day to day. I’m not sure if they recognize or even consider the following things people have told them to do without speaking out loud to them.

If you have a job you will work for a certain number of contracted hours and you will be told what time to take a break and to have lunch.
If you shop whether for groceries or clothes you will shop in stores according to their hours.
If you go to the doctor, dentist, or optometrist, there are hours set that you can go into their offices and after that you are told to go to the emergency room.

If you drive a car you must buy gas at the offered price if you want to get to your destination.
If you want to eat out, you pay the cost of the meal.
If you fly from one destination to the other, you fly according to their schedule and not always your own. If you go anywhere in this world, you will go when they tell you to go.

In the United States you have more options concerning when, where and what time you can do those things you want to do. If you were in another country you would be severely limited as to when and how you handle your business. Other places on foreign soil are thankful for the privileges of being able to take care of their business with the choices they have even if the are few.

They don’t use the previous phrases to govern their discontentedness. They use the choices without many complaints. They live within the structure of being told what to do. Living within the guidelines of the structure is not to deny you rights and privileges but to allow you to live without constant confusion.

The structure is in place to give order to your days; to help you navigate through life with the fewest of interruptions along the way. In order to have fewer interruptions you have to do what others tell you to do because they have paved the way through experience in what not to do. Whether they speak to you directly or indirectly all of your life you will do what someone has told you to do. The next time you say don’t tell me what to do, remember someone already has.