As me and my sister walked around our neighborhood and solved the problems of the world, I thought about some of the dysfunction in the Christian body.
The area I have been struggling with/thinking about is the double standards that Christians have. Sometimes it is easier to hang around non-Christians then Christians because you know where the non believers stand but Christians shift around. Why this is the case?
Well I am still thinking about it but this is an issue I have been really thinking about over the past couple of days. Why we as believers give people so many rules but us so often forget to tell them why we have the rules or what is their purpose.
Also this occurred to me this morning. There is a generational gap between the older generation of Christians giving us the rules and between the young people who want to know why. This generation has grown up in a virtual world: friends, entertainment, shopping, everything. There is so little that is concrete for this generation. For our parents it was cut and dry you do or don't, you have or have not. This generation, our generation is tired (this might be just me) of all the religions B.S. (also a large topic in the book "Faith of the American Soldier" by Steven Mansfield).
(I will look at this for me) I am so tired of all the religious jargon I have been fed for so many years. I can walk the walk and talk the talk but living the life is a different thing and one does not always lead to the other.
The image of perfection (or so we think) is something that the church has worked on for years and sometimes it is just that. Just an image. There is no substance in it. I am tired of looking like someone who follows all the rules and is an example of a Christian man and I want to be that person. By the grace of God I am discovering this in my life. He is helping me to discover that the man I want to be is there, I have just been holding him captive, not letting him out.
Well I got off topic but as a friend of mine said about their blog "for me it is sort of like word barfing my thoughts." I started on a topic but my thoughts started to go in a different direction. That is how it is.
You all have a great night.
Always yours,
Joey
27 December 2009
25 December 2009
LIFE....what a twisted tale we weave
Side Note:
My friends are so encouraging. I love them. It is so nice to see all of them again. One of my friends especially encourages me more than any of my other friends they do not know how much they mean to me but their words mean a lot to me. The realness and openness touches my heart and really help me to push on.
Since I have been home I have been going a lot of soul searching and looking at my past and my future. I have found out that even though I have not really noticed it or intended to be I am a very performance driven person. I have always tried to be a person who just does my best and that is all it is not about the results or the outcome. But I am a performance driven person and as a result of this trait I have carried a burden that I do not need to carry. A burden that has weighted me down, causing me to not live the life that God intended me to live. This is deep, but what I have been thinking about over the past couple of days.
It is surprising how draining it is to step back and look at one’s life from a distance. When you step back and look at our life it can be a scary thing because all of the stuff that you thought you know about who you are can be proven wrong by one real look. I have had the opportunity to look at lot of who I am through unclouded eyes and frankly I am not really all that happy with what I have seen.
All this really means is that I have a lot of repair work to do. A lot of unresolved....things to figure out in my life to allow me to live the life that I have always wanted.
Well that is all I have for tonight,
All ways your
Joey
My friends are so encouraging. I love them. It is so nice to see all of them again. One of my friends especially encourages me more than any of my other friends they do not know how much they mean to me but their words mean a lot to me. The realness and openness touches my heart and really help me to push on.
Since I have been home I have been going a lot of soul searching and looking at my past and my future. I have found out that even though I have not really noticed it or intended to be I am a very performance driven person. I have always tried to be a person who just does my best and that is all it is not about the results or the outcome. But I am a performance driven person and as a result of this trait I have carried a burden that I do not need to carry. A burden that has weighted me down, causing me to not live the life that God intended me to live. This is deep, but what I have been thinking about over the past couple of days.
It is surprising how draining it is to step back and look at one’s life from a distance. When you step back and look at our life it can be a scary thing because all of the stuff that you thought you know about who you are can be proven wrong by one real look. I have had the opportunity to look at lot of who I am through unclouded eyes and frankly I am not really all that happy with what I have seen.
All this really means is that I have a lot of repair work to do. A lot of unresolved....things to figure out in my life to allow me to live the life that I have always wanted.
Well that is all I have for tonight,
All ways your
Joey
Christmas 09
Today is Christmas 09. This morning was so much fun. I woke up at 0615 and went up stairs to see if my sisters were up and.....they were not!! They were still asleep so I waited until 0720 until I could not wait any longer and woke them up. They were not happy at first especially Grace but she got over it. We had a lot of fun up in their room waiting to wake up our parents and for our grandparents to come over from their hotel.
So finally when we opened presents at like 0930 (after breakfast) it was still as much fun as it was years ago. You would think that after 22 Christmases it would lose some of its thrill and excitement. But it does not!! I LOVE IT!!!
I am enjoying being at home right now so much. It is really nice to hang out with my family and not have anything that I have to do. No due dates no formations no uniforms no.....nothing!!!!
there has been a lot going on in my life over the past couple of days I will share some of with you later but for now just know that God has been doing some real work in my life. I have started to actual see some of the barriers that are in my life and how I am going to overcome them and live my life to the fullest. Live the life Jesus wants me to live.
I will remain yours always,
Joey
So finally when we opened presents at like 0930 (after breakfast) it was still as much fun as it was years ago. You would think that after 22 Christmases it would lose some of its thrill and excitement. But it does not!! I LOVE IT!!!
I am enjoying being at home right now so much. It is really nice to hang out with my family and not have anything that I have to do. No due dates no formations no uniforms no.....nothing!!!!
there has been a lot going on in my life over the past couple of days I will share some of with you later but for now just know that God has been doing some real work in my life. I have started to actual see some of the barriers that are in my life and how I am going to overcome them and live my life to the fullest. Live the life Jesus wants me to live.
I will remain yours always,
Joey
13 December 2009
Army Navy & OCF
So this weekend was Army Navy. We lost to navy but were not defeated. There is a difference...if we keep our spirits high and eyes focused on our goals we will never be defeated.
After the game we went to an OCF dinner with a speaker, Steven Mansfield. He was amazing. He talked about heroes and religion in the military.
He redefined heroes using a biblical definition.
HERO: is someone who does what no one else has to show that it can be done.
He talked about Roger Bannister. He was the first man to break the 4 min barrier for the 1 mile run. But once he did it within 3 months someone else broke it and within a year 3 other people had broke it. Now you can see it broken on a good day at a high school track practice. But none of them could have done it without someone showing them that it could be accomplished. They needed someone to forge a trail.
I will talk about the other stuff some other time.
Your always
Joey
After the game we went to an OCF dinner with a speaker, Steven Mansfield. He was amazing. He talked about heroes and religion in the military.
He redefined heroes using a biblical definition.
HERO: is someone who does what no one else has to show that it can be done.
He talked about Roger Bannister. He was the first man to break the 4 min barrier for the 1 mile run. But once he did it within 3 months someone else broke it and within a year 3 other people had broke it. Now you can see it broken on a good day at a high school track practice. But none of them could have done it without someone showing them that it could be accomplished. They needed someone to forge a trail.
I will talk about the other stuff some other time.
Your always
Joey
05 December 2009
Leadership part 1
Over the past couple of day I have been asked about my leadership and shared my ideas about leadership with some people so I wanted to put it into words and see how it looks. Because when you put ideas on paper it helps you visualize them and workout the rough edges. This could be really long or several posts. If there is one thing I love to talk about it is leadership.
What is leadership? Well looking at leaders of the past they are people who helped people get places and accomplish things that they could not have done on their own.
A leader is someone who motivates, inspires, organizes, coordinates and drives. The men and women under him/her to do what they have always wanted to accomplish. Sometimes this means that the leader has to make his people do things that they do not like in the present to reach their goal in the future. But the leader has a view of the end goal and the entire road to that goal knowing that steps that need to be taken.
The question I have been pondering is how does a leader do all of that. It is easy to say a leader inspires others but how does he do that.
Since I started writing this post (about two days ago) I have been thinking about leadership and how many different facets it has. So I am going to have to break it up or this will end up being a book and I will never finish this one post.
Always,
Joey
03 December 2009
Where has the FIRE gone??
Do you remember Christmas morning when you were little the anticipation and excitement you had to see the tree full of presents. (my parents would put all the presents under the tree Christmas eve after we were all asleep) so waking up and seeing the tree from the top of our stairs was something me and my three little sisters could not wait for. It was crazy.
Why don't we have that fire to talk to God? He has given us so much more than our parents could even more Jesus gave us our parents! So why do we not have that fire for him to get to know him?
I high school I could feel that I wanted to know Jesus and I wanted to spend time in his word. Heck I even liked it, I knew I would learn something and it would encourage me for the day and anything I had to do that day. But over the last couple of years when I have needed him most where has that fire gone?? I really wish I knew.
Over the past two years what could have put out this fire?
-It is college?
oAcademics demands
oPhysical demands
oMilitary demands
-New friends
oNot all Christian
-Movies (bad influences)
-Music (not beneficial)
There are a multitude of reasons I could blame for dumping water on that fire.
But no matter what put it out…I WANT IT BACK!!!!
I want it but I do not like it. Every day it is hard to read by bible (I do not want to do it). I want to pray (but I do not know what to say or have a desire to ask for help). But there is something that I know to be true, that is that God has great plans for me. Amazing plans that I cannot even begin to imagine and I know that if I am not close to him. I will not be ready to be used by him when the time comes. I want to be ready. I spend so much time preparing myself to be an officer, learning discipline in my studies (which I do a lot of), physical discipline (building my body to meet the challenges of my profession) and developing a mind ready to handle the demands of a leader who one day will make life and death decisions.
I have to feed on the word of God, to stay alive. But I do not to do. It is like in this song “the good I want to do I don’t do and the bad I don’t want to do I do” Jesus is fighting for all of us though. He talks about how is hems in our hearts so that we have no choice but to turn but to him. We are forces to see that we are not strong enough and that no one can save us but him.
Therefore I will block her path with thorn bushes;
I will wall her in so she cannot find her way.
She will chase after her lovers but not catch them;
She will look for them but not find them.
Hosea 2:6-7
God is talking about a woman trapped and seeking relief in other lovers but she cannot fill the hole in her heart. I have that hole you have that hole and there is only one person who can fill it and not matter if we want to or not we have to seek after him. Because it is a matter of survival.
The speaker at FCA talked about this this morning. Getting in the word, and how he cannot live his day without it.
Starting the day without God is like not eating today, you may be able to get by for one day or two or three it will hurt excruciatingly but you may live but that life without the help and assistance of God is not sustainable. He does not want us to be in that pain he want to help us and grow us into the people he created us to be.
That is all I have for now, this was weighing on my heart this morning and I had to share
Yours always,
Joey
Why don't we have that fire to talk to God? He has given us so much more than our parents could even more Jesus gave us our parents! So why do we not have that fire for him to get to know him?
I high school I could feel that I wanted to know Jesus and I wanted to spend time in his word. Heck I even liked it, I knew I would learn something and it would encourage me for the day and anything I had to do that day. But over the last couple of years when I have needed him most where has that fire gone?? I really wish I knew.
Over the past two years what could have put out this fire?
-It is college?
oAcademics demands
oPhysical demands
oMilitary demands
-New friends
oNot all Christian
-Movies (bad influences)
-Music (not beneficial)
There are a multitude of reasons I could blame for dumping water on that fire.
But no matter what put it out…I WANT IT BACK!!!!
I want it but I do not like it. Every day it is hard to read by bible (I do not want to do it). I want to pray (but I do not know what to say or have a desire to ask for help). But there is something that I know to be true, that is that God has great plans for me. Amazing plans that I cannot even begin to imagine and I know that if I am not close to him. I will not be ready to be used by him when the time comes. I want to be ready. I spend so much time preparing myself to be an officer, learning discipline in my studies (which I do a lot of), physical discipline (building my body to meet the challenges of my profession) and developing a mind ready to handle the demands of a leader who one day will make life and death decisions.
I have to feed on the word of God, to stay alive. But I do not to do. It is like in this song “the good I want to do I don’t do and the bad I don’t want to do I do” Jesus is fighting for all of us though. He talks about how is hems in our hearts so that we have no choice but to turn but to him. We are forces to see that we are not strong enough and that no one can save us but him.
Therefore I will block her path with thorn bushes;
I will wall her in so she cannot find her way.
She will chase after her lovers but not catch them;
She will look for them but not find them.
Hosea 2:6-7
God is talking about a woman trapped and seeking relief in other lovers but she cannot fill the hole in her heart. I have that hole you have that hole and there is only one person who can fill it and not matter if we want to or not we have to seek after him. Because it is a matter of survival.
The speaker at FCA talked about this this morning. Getting in the word, and how he cannot live his day without it.
Starting the day without God is like not eating today, you may be able to get by for one day or two or three it will hurt excruciatingly but you may live but that life without the help and assistance of God is not sustainable. He does not want us to be in that pain he want to help us and grow us into the people he created us to be.
That is all I have for now, this was weighing on my heart this morning and I had to share
Yours always,
Joey
02 December 2009
sleep....I know you not
Why is it that when we are tired the world looks so much bigger and every problem is so insurmountable???
It is now 0100 in the morning. This is the second day in a row that I have seen this time before going to bed.
Right now I feel like I understand all my problems but at the same time I know that I am so lost right now and my mind it to tired to hold a clear thought.
Just wanted to put this in about how important sleep is.
Yours
Joey
It is now 0100 in the morning. This is the second day in a row that I have seen this time before going to bed.
Right now I feel like I understand all my problems but at the same time I know that I am so lost right now and my mind it to tired to hold a clear thought.
Just wanted to put this in about how important sleep is.
Yours
Joey
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