Excel Still More

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Christians seek first spiritual goals and the kingdom of God.  But let's not have our head in the sand:  money still matters. We need it to provide for our family.  And honestly, we need it to do a whole lot of extra great things for God and His people and the world. In centuries past, there were few opportunities to hav...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Taking initiative, doing things your way, showing personal strength - these all can be great qualities!  However, you and I have to admit something important:  we don't know everything.  In fact, we may not have the knowledge, experience or strength to solve our OWN problems! This doesn't have to be bad news.  It ju...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! So far in this season we have made some big decisions on who we want to become.  We have selected some lofty goals that will take all year to reach.  We have even figured out how to break that progress down into months, weeks and days.  But it is worth noting: unless those goals align with your core values, they aren't w...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! We kicked off season two with an episode on January 6th - Building Your Ladders.  You were encouraged to think BIG! To come up with awesome ideas of who you would like to become, and then identify big year long goals that would certainly prove that progress.  We talked about how you break that down into ladder rungs, monthly...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Welcome to Season 2!  Last year we collected 82 episodes designed to help you grow in faith, deepen relationships and get the most out of the life God has given you.  Now, we head into this New Year ready to use all of that experience to reach new heights!  Firstly, you have to decide who you want to become.  What does a bett...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! This is the last episode of season 1.  We started on January 24th and today is October 31st.  I hope you've grown and feel stronger and more hopeful.  We will return, Lord willing, on Monday, January 6th, for season 2!  But there are two important months in between now and then.  There will be lots of obstacles to growth...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! We are all learning all the time.  Spiritually, we learn when we study, when we worship, when we have discussions, or when we listen to podcasts.  Does it ever feel like information overload?  Maybe we think we should be learning less, since implementing it all seems so daunting. Well, there's a much better strategy than...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Are you the kind of person who takes too many things personally?  Maybe someone gives you a look or says something and you just assume:  they are mad at me.  Well, there is a much better and more peaceable way to live you life.  In fact, with just a few adjustments in your thinking you can see all of your relationships improv...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Imagine if, right now, there words appeared in the sky in fiery letters:  Seven Days Left!  And imagine that for the next 24 hours everyone on the earth saw it and investigated it and couldn't explain it.  Then, it changed to Six Days Left.  What would you do?  Well, when the impending urgency of some heavenly event fell...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! It is great to celebrate achievements.  Reaching goals feels great.  But beware, present position is only that:  a fleeting moment of stature and accomplishment.  While position can indicate good behavior, it is not a behavior of itself.  But direction, now that's all together different.  Direction isn't focused on...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! "The purpose of education is to know God and make Him known."  Do you believe that?  I think when it comes to spiritual education, like Bible reading and sermons, we would say so.  And there are important applications of this phrase upon how you and I are using the things we learn in study and at a church.  But woul...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! When we live our lives with behavior aligned with beliefs:  peace happens.  We get to have this tremendous peace in Jesus Christ, when we believe in His word and live like it.  But when our behavior departs from our beliefs, the peace is taken away.  In its place are things like anxiety, stress, worry, discouragement, hopeles...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! The island of Icaria is an amazing place!  Not just because of its beauty, but because people there "forget to die"!  Yep, that's a quote from a resident there.  This small island in the Aegean sea has the highest percentage of residents living on into their 90's and beyond!  A full 1/3 of them do so.  And...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! I love great conversations!  It feels awesome to listen and be heard.  I love walking away feeling like I learned something and contributed.  We are better friends now because of that interaction.  HOWEVER, not all conversations go that way.  In fact, many times they aren't rewarding at all!  Why is that?  Well, it turns...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! I heard a powerful story recently.  A woman was rich and influential.  She had great success in her life.  However, there were a few things that she hadn't done.  These were things she'd put off and things of great value.  As the story was told to me, there were 3 things "she was gonna" do, and soon.  Her...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Uncle Ben told Peter Parker: "With great power comes great responsibility."  It took Spiderman a while to figure out what that meant.  How about you? Do you understand what it means to have power?  Have you figured out one of life's most unfair and critical lessons?  That the strong does most of the heavy lifti...

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Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Is anybody else sporting a terrible memory?  Oh man, I'm probably the worst I've ever met, but I can't remember.  Seriously, forgetting names, ideas, points, tasks, the names of my children... it's a big deal.  But, the work still needs to be done, you know?  Names still need to be recalled.  Duties still...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! We all have things in life we'd like to do, experiences we want to have, places to see, skills to learn, and horizons to behold.  But there comes a time in life when it hits you: "I'm not going to be able to do all of that."   How does it feel to realize that there are experiences and accomplishments beyon...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Okay, you may not agree with me on this one, but hear me out.  We traditionally view comparing ourselves in a negative light.  And, to be fair, comparing yourself with people you view as "better than you" can cause some serious deeds of the flesh outcomes, like jealousy and strife.  Also, comparing your self to peop...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Are you a 90 or a 52?  The difference is huge!  The difference is not 38.  The difference is more like 32,800!  The difference is generational lethargy (vs) changing your life in less than two months.  What's it gonna be?  Let's examine the story of Nehemiah.  What the people of God had failed to do for generations,...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Please and Thank You are the magic words!  We all learned that as kids, but do you know it still stands? Maybe we will look at Please in a future episode.  Today our focus is on that second term.  The truth is, in nearly EVERY situation, there is room for a Thank You.  It is often a much better choice than what might awkwardl...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Where is Jesus?  With reference to where you are right now, where is He?  Is He in heaven?  Is He far away? Is He right there with you?  How we see Jesus and where we see Jesus will have a huge impact on His imprint on our everyday lives. The Bible helps us see His presence, and asks us to acknowledge that He is always in the...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! Solomon writes a lot about how unfair things are in the book of Ecclesiastes.  Things don't always work out and there are always a million things we don't know and/or cannot control.  However, he ultimately prescribes daily optimism and a willingness to cast your bread on the waters, even if you don't know what...

Reach Out: Please include your email and I will get back to you. Thanks! This is our Back to School special episode!  Even if school is not a part of your life, consider this a Back to Reality message for all of us transitioning from Summer into the Fall.  We have travelled, enjoyed the season, loosened up on bed time and morning alarm time.  In some ways it may mean a bit of a fall off in the exc...