#32- How Can I Secure My Future?

by Cory MacNeil

If you're like most people right now, you're beginning to wonder if Spring will ever come again.  This winter in the Northeast has been one for the books and it's taken it's toll on many.  If you're not careful, you can get to the point where you think nothing's ever going to change.  But that's not the voice of God talking to you.  Left unchecked, your hopelessness can infect not just your immediate future but your destiny.  What if one realization could change all of that?

In the bible, we learn that our futures are anything but bleak!  The book of Genesis begins in a garden and in the book of Revelation we find out there is a city beyond our wildest dreams.  Not the kind of city we're familiar with- a place of poverty, ruin and despair- but a place where there is order and beauty and great joy!  Not only that, but Jesus is there and will wipe away every tear.  Yes, there is ruin in this lifetime, but there is also redemption and restoration.  The world is a mess, but Sunday is coming!

If you're not careful, you can long for this kind of world to the point that you become inactive in this one.  When you do, you miss out on the opportunity to be a light to the people who are in darkness here.  The people who especially pay the price for our lack of presence are the ones we care for the most.

So what is the key?

The key is to reexamine your beliefs.  Do you believe there is someone larger than you who has your best interests in mind and they are drawing you to themselves?  Or do you believe it's all in your control?  Jesus frequently used the image of fishermen who used nets.  Peter, James and John were this type of fisherman.  When Jesus first encountered them, they were mending their nets.  Jesus told them if they followed him, he would make them fishers of men.

Today if you've been captured in the net of God's love, I want to remind you that you have a brighter future than you could ever imagine or believe.  What if your only requirement was to trust.  Stop flopping around in the net and let a power bigger than you haul you to shore.  

Common thinking tells us to resist power outside of ourselves.  We'd rather fight or flee than rest and see.  

So what impact is your future having on you today?  Is it strong and powerful?  Are you confident it has the strength and ability to reel you in or are you hopeless and just floating around in the flotsam and jetsam?  

What if you started viewing the brightness of your future in such a way that you ran towards it?  To know God is to love God.  So do you know Him?  If so, how well.  Maybe part of the reason you're not to excited about what lays in store is because you don't know Him all that well and the plan He has for you.

Paul said to the believers in Thessalonica: "It is clear to us, friends, that God not only loves you very much but also has put his hand on you for something special."

Maybe it's time you traded in your version of your story and started believing God's version of your story.  Your story is a jewel embedded in His story.  Just imagine, in His story you are a trophy beyond compare....so much so that He brags about you!  Catch a glimpse of that kind of future and you'll run for it!  

#31- What’s in Your Pot?

Noah Rondeau, the renowned Mayor of Cold Brook- population of 1- was a hermit known for his everlasting stews.  Those who visited him at anytime of the year were sure to be served a meal from his pot.  The only problem was you never knew what you were eating and how long it had been cooking!  Noah, you see, would simply cook whatever he could get his hands on, be it a rabbit, deer, bird or....well you get the idea.  Thus the creation of his Everlasting Stews.  Rule number one was he never started a fresh stew, he always added to the old one!  As eccentric as Noah was, he may have been onto something.  The question today is what’s in your pot?

Maybe in your quest to launch new projects and ideas, you’ve forgotten the long lost art of having a ‘work in progress’.  Some people have mastered this concept.  I know a guy who never finishes anything.  His whole life is one big ball of loose ends.  We’re not promoting that path.  Others on the other hand, never start anything, let alone finish it.  As author Dave Kraft says, “They are so afraid of making mistakes that they never make much of anything.”  Then there is a third type, someone who always has something in the pot.

Here’s a question to better help you understand this concept.  What do you do when you are bored?  If you have no work to fall back on, when you are bored, you’ll constantly attempt to be creative at a time when your creative energies are at their lowest!  We’re not talking about using work to muffle the emptiness or loneliness in your life.  We’re talking about working from your sense of fulfillment.  You realize life has meaning and you can contribute in a meaningful way.  Are you someone who works to live or someone who lives to work?

Author F.B Meyer was someone who did both.  He enjoyed his life’s work to the fullest, but it was not an escape from a life half lived, but a joy he embraced whenever time allowed.  Most of his books were written during brief intervals while waiting for trains, in a dentist’s office, during lunch, using snippets of time that would otherwise be wasted.  C.K Chesterton, a literary giant in his own right, possessed the same habit as well.  These men were masters of the Everlasting Stew.

So what’s in your pot?  Is there a meaningful project you can work on while you are waiting for fresh cascades of inspiration, or are you passing the time unproductively?  It’s your time, and you can do what you want with it.  But if your looking to pass the time in a productive manner maybe this is just the recipe you’ve been looking for.

With the advent of technology in the form of laptops (even smartphones) you can carry your work with you at all times.  Never before have we had such amazing tools at our fingertips at all times.  Imagine!  We can singlehandedly carry the libraries of the world in one hand!

For you, maybe it’s not a book or an entrepreneurial pursuit, maybe it’s redecorating the Dining Room or building a boat with your son or daughter.  Perhaps it’s your marriage or a relationship with someone you are trying to reach with the Gospel.    Use the otherwise wasted time in your schedules to follow these pursuits and you may be surprised.  

In the meantime, pass me some Everlasting Stew!