Excel Still More

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Let's continue our discussion on "Anxious For Nothing." Jesus comes right out and says it three times in Matthew chapter 6:  "Do Not Worry."  That's a big ask. But He goes on to explain exactly how we can get there from here. There are a series of points in this podcast, so I'll list them he...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! So many people have simply excepted that being stressed out is just a part of this life. We will be worried and bothered and pulled in 100 directions, and that's just life on this earth. This is a lie.  This is a lie the devil tells to help people justify being pulled away from God. But Christians know better.  We unders...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Every family is different, so it can be tough to do episodes on helping families grow. However, we all love our families. We share special connections with them. And, families are important, no matter how different they may be. As goes the families, go the churches, community, nation and world!  The power to change our collec...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Christians try to live lives filled with blessings. And doing what God says is a great way to build a great life. You will avoid a lot of damage that people in the world incur. However, problems are still a part of this life. Even believers see damage in their lives. Maybe it is relationship trouble, maybe economic woes, or h...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! I really wanted to do an episode titled "Don't Get Involved." It was almost recorded. It just seems like, in our time of political, medical, and social divide, just about everyone who jumps in only makes it worse. Have you noticed that? We are Christians and speak the name of Jesus, but do we really have to jum...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! The first church presentation I ever gave was back when I was 10 years old. The topic was optimism or pessimism. I actually remember it quite well.  We talked about glasses of water, roses and thorns. To be honest, my whole life I've tried to be positive and have had a very hard time being around negative people. But, ho...

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Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Darius Fornoux recently published an article titled, "The Science of Developing Self-Control in Life." It is a great read into the parts and pieces that make up a disciplined life. Today's podcast digs into that article and addresses three questions: 1) What is self-control? 2) What will self-control help me do...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Why can't everyone be saved? Do you have to have family members who are lost? Is it written somewhere that most of your friends won't be saved? NO!  The message of Christ is for all men. God wants to save all men. The Gospel has the power to save everyone! Our attitude towards evangelism ought to be optimistic and h...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Most of us make commitments. It is a part of living this life. You decide to do something and then you go about getting it one.  Jesus said that disciples will do this carefully. And they will keep their word.  Some of us take marriage vows.  Some bind themselves under oaths.  But it is all the same:  an agreement to do a thi...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! I'm sure you've heard our title phrase a thousand times. We usually are talking about daily habits that can help us achieve our goals. And while we will look at some of that today, I primarily want you to think of our phrase in a spiritual way. When it comes to our spiritual activities:  both good and bad, how does...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! For centuries, mankind believed we were in the center of the universe. The sun, moon and stars all revolved around us. Of course, this isn't true. And it wasn't true, even when we believed it to be. We learned that, in terms of the universe, we aren't very special on our own. We also learned that the sun was wa...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Every single person can become a better Bible student. The Word is divine and grand and we are not. So it will always have something to show us, some message to place into our lives.  In fact, the whole Bible, page upon page, shares beautiful insight into our King, and every single student of the Bible has more to find if the...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! The human experience is filled with both ups and downs.  More specifically, downs followed by recovery.  Most of us move along quite well in life most of the time. But then just like that, something happens.  And you become broken.  Maybe it is a crack. Other times it feels like life is falling apart. But that is not the whol...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! The Emerson family took on The Storage Shed this past week! The process was long overdue and represented an all day affair for us. But the results... well, we feel like superheroes!  More importantly, every one of us has a storage building. It is a place where everything we are obligated to, everything we schedule, and everyt...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Hope is the desire for better things and the expectation it will happen. Springs are seasons of new beginning, and the act of sudden change. Eternal is a guarantee of consistency and even beyond this world. If we want to excel in our walk, we must be optimistic, hopeful people in Christ.  Good news: God has done a TON of thin...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! With the world facing a pandemic unlike anything we've ever seen, people are looking too God for answers. But what questions are they asking? Here's a common one: Is God Angry? Is God angry with the sinfulness of this world.  We will answer that question today absolutely and confidently. But then comes other questio...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! I need to tell you about Patrick.  He had a rough upbringing, a tragic loss, and a dark addiction. But two years ago he decided to get help.  And as he sat across from me, in my office, he was on step 12 of the Alcoholics Anonymous program!  And even as he was about to put on Christ in baptism, and celebrate victory over Sata...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Don't panic.  We got this.  In fact, Christians were born for this.  At least, we were born again for this. When the world is turned upside down, Christians see Jesus standing upright.  We are the people who use times of fear to show courage. We use times of uncertainly to stand on solid ground. Today we will read a port...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Let's explore how to get other people moving. I know, the purpose of these episodes is for you to work on yourself. And sometimes just doing that has the power to influence others. But every once in a while you actually need to get another person moving. How do you empower the individual to get going in their work?  Mayb...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! No one enjoys trials.  If you are struggling with something in your life right now, you have no doubt prayed for relief. But as Christians, we have also signed on to be molded and trained by God. We wanted to be prepared to be a sanctuary, tried and true, and to do His work. After all, we have been saved to do His good works,...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! The term "kick the bucket" has been around for well over 200 years.  But just in the last 15 years, we have started talking about "bucket lists." This represents things we would like to accomplish before the end of life. For the most part, people list places they would like to see or accomplishments they a...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! When it comes to free time, discretionary time, we all wish we had more.  Life is busy. And obligations of our time exist in every single day of life.  From work to school to family to worship to rest, the calendar is full. But we all have moments around those events where we get to choose what to do!  Some say they do not, b...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! "Be the change you wish to see in the world." Do you know who said that? Most attribute it to Mahatma Gandhi.  Well, he didn't actually say that, but what he did say is amazing, and is summed up well in this popular phrase.  He created incredible change in the world by focusing on growing individually and letti...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Quitting can be a great idea.  If there are things in your life that do not resonate with who you want to become: quit them. If there are things that don't matter to God or your family, stop doing them.  If there are things that you know you will not ever return to, say goodby. This is actually a great way to create more...