54 things I’ve learned on planet earth

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! Thank you for the words.

1. Birthdays continue to come quickly.
   Quicker and quicker
2. Life is like the morning fog—here for a little while, then gone.
   Capture it…magnify it…help it to be better for someone else before it’s gone.
3. Suffering is meant to scour your heart.
   And so much more.
4. Doing something uncomfortable on purpose will inspire you.
   Step beyond the measure of faith he has given you. Take the assurance of hope and prove that you have it. Demonstrate your faith by expecting to see the magnificent fruits of the Holy Spirit everywhere.
5. If we always travel the easy path, we will get shallow.
   Remain shallow. Become shallower?
6. True life is lived in the place where risk is involved.
   Big risks. Continually going beyond your limits…but not of your doing. As a result of God’s overflowing. We cannot take on the world. We cannot busy ourselves into living big.
7. Over-sanitizing is not fertile.
   Life is gritty. Savor the grit.
8. If we give away the feeling we want, we will get the feeling we desire.
   Very St. John of the Cross. But it’s not about giving to get. It’s about coming to the eternal fount of God for filling and overflowing. If we give it to God, he will fill us with the feelings we desire. Those feelings need to result in actions around us. As an overflowing demonstration of the fruits of the Holy Spirit.
9. Overflow is a mindset.
   A mindset we set, or a measured blessing of God, dependent on what we do with that overflow.
10. Scarcity is a mindset.
    The barren wilderness of ignorance or repelling of God.
11. I love the breeze through the trees.
    Infinitely complex… incomprehensible…bringing an indescribable peace and refreshment.
12. Chickens are funny to watch—they remind me of people fighting for items on Black Friday!
    God’s sense of humor. An example of joyfully living in the now and fully experiencing His joyful blessings.
13. Inspiration will come like the wind in your sails—when you feel it, you must capture it or it will evaporate.
    Almost all of it evaporates. That this shred of what we capture is the truly miraculous.
14. Voice text is a wonderful invention to capture those inspirational thoughts.
    Capturing, re-reflecting on it. Sharing. If not shared, it’s that fleeting, uncaptured wind. Untapped fruit.
15. We are all dying daily.
    Dying a 1,000 deaths. Sacrificing EVERYTHING. Losing everything…forcing a continual rebuild by Him, in Him, for Him, recrafted and improved as only He can do.
16. Say significant things to people you love before it’s too late.
    Live and say only what’s significant. Continually.
17. Being a counselor is the most humbling, challenging, and rewarding thing I’ve ever done.
    A Christian counselor.
18. I love football season.
    Like chickens. What a tremendous outlet of happiness He’s blessed us with. Through the mysterious workings of people.
19. Having something to look forward to is one of the most rewarding parts of being alive.
    As I look back in wonder. I wonder how I got through that life. Wonder at the beauty I experienced. Wonder in the now, in this moment.
20. Reconnecting with friends from high school has been one of the highlights of this past year.
    A scary thought…doubting who I was. Sinfully caring about what others think.
21. Great friends are able to pick up where they left off.
    Like they were never apart.
22. Humility is easily the most healthy and attractive quality a human being can have.
    And one of the toughest attributes to develop. Honestly and fully.
23. Sandpaper comes to craft you into a masterpiece.
    Is the masterpiece already there, and needing to be revealed by removing our varnish…or do we need to widdle it into something better?
24. We think living a life of faith is one where we arrive at death safely… nothing could be further from the truth.
    A life of faith is dying a thousand deaths. Crashing in our humanity and Lucifarian intellect. Humbly allowing the God reset.
25. A life of faith is setting your eye on eternal things, gritting your teeth, and doing tiny little things daily to stack days one at a time until a life is formed.
    Disciplined incremental grinding is the only way.
26. Endurance is necessary in marriage; not every day will be fun and games… someone has to take out the trash and do the dishes.
    Purposeful reflection, planning, executing, and enduring. Finding the tremendous joy in doing the mundane. The beauty of God in the stillness of the mundane. The beauty in proving your devotion and the joy of marriage.
27. Relationships are like a garden—if you want flowers, you have to plant, water, weed, and prune.
    You also have to stop and smell the roses. Showing that you love it.
28. If you don’t tend the garden of relationships, you will experience an overgrowth of weeds that choke the life out of flowers.
    Tending, seeking, reaching, looking out for. Expecting nothing in return.
29. Knowing why you are on earth is the fuel that allows us to endure hard times.
    Enduring hard times will bring you closer to understanding why you are on earth. Maybe crashing as a result of the hard times will bring more awareness.
30. Loneliness is arrogance.
    Selfish, easy, non-value.
31. Arrogant people only think about themselves.
    And destroy others.
32. Humble people think of others with no real thought of themselves.
    Going to God…to let him fill us with humility…to have that pour out to others through the self. Choosing to let our humility be fully materialized and demonstrated as the Fruits of the Spirit. If we’re appropriately filled with the Spirit, there is no try in humility. We become a natural reflection of the Spirit
33. Self-care can get ugly if all we do is focus inward with no overflow.
    Eliminate the inward focus. God focus is all we need. The flow will come through.
34. Intelligence, credentials, ministry, and Bible knowledge can all be plastic masks we wear to overcompensate for our lack of self-worth.
    Meaningless, when not used to draw unto and bring glory to God. A snare of pride and arrogance.
35. Job had friends who thought they were helping but they served as obstacles.
    All things are measured against the Bible, our relationship with Him, and better friends.
36. The fastest way to get to know someone is to struggle next to them.
    The greatest friend builder.
37. We have an eternal appetite woven deep in our souls that can only be filled by the timeless truths of God and His Word.
    And the interwoven relationship between our growth in friendship with God and people.
38. To feed our eternal appetite with entertainment, influencers, or even slick teaching only serves to make us hungrier.
    The more we feast on God’s Word and our relationship with Him through Jesus, strengthened by the Holy Spirit, the hungrier we get.
39. Want to change your life? Spend 10 minutes in complete silence, uninterrupted, for 30 days. Don’t do anything except empty your thoughts—and watch what happens.
    Then try 90 minutes. 10 minutes might get your attention. 90 minutes gives you a chance to dwell in Him. 10 minutes for 30 days…or 90 minutes for 5 days. What’s better? Try it.
40. Anyone who tells you it’s easy to trust God hasn’t trusted God.
    Only if it’s easy for you to crash and burn daily. Smashing your face on the sidewalk, forcing you to become wholly dependent on Him.
41. Trusting God requires a heroic trust—one that demands ruthless relinquishing of the controls of your life and a willingness to let Him have it all.
    Giving it all is so much bigger than we can imagine.
42. Have doubts? Need reassurance? Confused? Go visit a cemetery—it will clarify things for you… Just don’t go at night.
    What a place of centering.
43. Giving things to kids never makes them happy. They just want you.
    Powerfully purposeful.
44. A happy marriage leads to happy children.
    Achieving a consistently happy marriage is one of life’s mysteries. Solved only through our relationship with God. Together.
45. An unhappy marriage damages the children in ways that can change generations.
    Causing one of those thousand deaths. Maybe bringing a generation back around to God in a bigger way because there’s nowhere else to go.
46. Divorce doesn’t happen because people disagree about money. Divorce happens because people stop knowing one another in the little ways they did when they first met.
    The millions of special little ways. Undying selfless devotion, especially.
47. If your parents were toxic, it can take a lifetime to undo what was done. Once undone, you may see it as the greatest catalyst behind your character and growth.
    Burying us under a blanket, keeping us from seeing Him.
48. Addiction is slow suicide.
    Oh, how to stop. How to fall into His arms before having to let him rebuild everything. Letting that death be a short fall. Hiding the addiction.
49. Self-hate is the cancer of the soul.
    A cancer only eradicated by your spirit, directed by the Holy Spirit. Your spirit re-directing your soul (smashing that Luciferian intellect).
50. Stop waiting for someone to love you—take the initiative and go love someone else, even if it’s anonymous.
    Altruistic love expressed…especially when not reciprocated, is the greatest love. We will never be able to reciprocate the love Jesus showed on the cross.
51. You are either an actor or a reactor.
    Reaction: the scourge of this life.
52. Take a deep, deep, deep breath and let it out… you’re welcome.
    Spiritual, emotional, psychological, theological, physiological. Too complicated for anyone to fully understand. But indeed…how well it works.
53. Humming is the quickest way to make your whole body feel good.
    And I started singing with my playlists. A terrible voice indeed, but not so bad with my headphones on. What a release, in no longer caring what I sound like. Sorry dear.
54. In case I haven’t told you lately, I love you very much and am so glad you are in my life. If I don’t know you, I’m still glad you are in my life as my family of readers.
    Loving God and others is all there is. As Jesus has loved us.

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