Friday, May 17

Let's see, my first and last blog were quite a while ago. But in that blog I said I'd try to live by less of a schedule and not edit my writing so much (at least my blog writing)1. Clearly I've managed to not be concerned about my blogging schedule or I'd have written sooner. As for my last comment in the first blog, I have tried to reprioritize my life in such a way that I have less of a schedule. I have general patterns, but less scheduling. Of course I can't help scheduling meetings (that's just the way it has to be if anything is going to be accomplished by committees, ministries, etc), but as for the day-to-day activities of life, I've tried to be less rigid. It is freeing and opens me up to more relaxing and easy conversation.

Change of subject, but somewhat related - I went to a conference last week that was exceptional. It featured Stan Ott and his Acts 16:5 Initiative. In that conference he mentioned that churches need to not only be friendly, but need to also extend hospitality to folks. By hospitality he meant, inviting people into our lives. He spoke of a "with me" principle in which you simply invite people to join you in the activities of your life. That's hospitality. He noted that Jesus rarely did things alone and usually sent people (disciples) out 2 by 2. This pertains to the paragraph above in that it is difficult to invite people along if your schedule is so tight that you can't slow down long enough to make invitations. So, I'll try to employ these principles in my life and invite you to do so as well. We'll see where it leads.

Ok, enough blogging and on to other things (but not scheduled things).

Blessings.

Thursday, March 22

Ok, so this is a first. Never in my life have I blogged, but today I blog. I'm not even sure what that means, but I plan to take a stab at it every week or two and see what happens. As far as I can tell blogging is a free form and free forum for writing thoughts. I don't think the thoughts even have to make much sense. Aren't I lucky?! But I think I'll try to put something coherent out there. I have too many control issues to just write without trying to make any sense. On the other hand, having no real plan could be liberating for me. Maybe writing with no end in mind will move me outside my comfort zone. This is good. I think God makes good things happen when we step into unfamiliar territory. We usually discover something about ourselves. With so much of my life scheduled and planned, having no real agenda feels kind of nice. We'll see where this leads. Perhaps I'll adopt this mode of operation for other things in life beyond blogging. Talk about a leap of faith. Yikes. I'll keep you posted.

Until next time.