Absorbing Bible Knowledge Daily

Bible knowledge is not something you can force in a few long study sessions, every once in a while. It is best accumulated day by day, and accompanied by prayers for understanding.

You will be much more successful with a defined reading plan than with randomly opening the Bible and trying to read. And unless you are a super human discipline machine, you don't have to try to read it an hour a day. You almost certainly won't be able to keep that up, which increases the chances of you quitting altogether.

Just get in the habit of reading (or listening) over and over. Start with 5 minutes (say one chapter of Luke, then move on to Acts) each day. If you do that you'll find that you often keep going. But don't feel bad if you don't - just get started every day. Create a regular place and a time and stick to it.

Get a good Bible that you can understand (I recommend the ESV) and be careful of using a paraphrase (here's an interesting article on that subject).

You can also read online at BibleGateway.com - it makes it very easy to read and compare different translations.

However you get your regular portion of the Bible, try to get it daily.

[If you would like to be more consistent in your Bible reading but just aren't sure how to start, or how much to read, or what parts to read, or whatever - just email me and I'd be happy to help you get started.]

Don't Take Offense When None is Intended

This is a pet peeve of mine. Do you ever spend time around people who are always mad? Who constantly analyze everything they hear, looking for some reason to take offense?

• “We should be too big to take offense and too noble to give it.” - Abraham Lincoln
  
  
• “Whenever anyone has offended me, I try to raise my soul so high that the offense cannot reach it” - Rene Descartes
  
  
• “Never ascribe to malice that which can adequately be explained by incompetence.” - Napoleon Bonaparte
  
  
• "Love is always patient and kind; it is never jealous, love is never boastful or conceited; it is never rude or selfish; it does not take offense, and is not resentful. Love takes no pleasure in other people’s sins but delights in the truth; it is always ready to excuse, to trust, to hope, and to endure whatever comes. Love does not come to an end." - 1 Corinthians 13:4-7, ESV
  
  

I believe the message is this: this isn't about me. The Christian isn't helping by taking offense. It is hard to love our enemies if we're mad at (or offended by) them.

I know this is easier said than done. But when you come right down to it, no one can offend you or make you feel bad without your permission. Work toward withholding that permission.

Quick Quote on Loving God

A friend emailed this today:

"God, help me to love you enough to obey."

What else can I say?

Why use a Mac?

This is a little off my normal subject material, but what the heck - when ya get religion, whether theological or technical, you want to share it! A few months ago I got a Macbook. I know several smart people who have moved to Macbooks in the past couple of years, and they have urged (OK, made great fun of) me to do the same. So I decided to see what all the fuss was about.

I started with a used Macbook from Ebay because I have a history of having a cool idea, spending a bunch of money to get started, and then not using what I bought (Gail will be happy to vouch for this). I thought doing this would allow me to cheaply find out whether the Mac would increase my productivity and if it did, I could then spring for a newer, better one. Which I plan to do soon - my only decision now is whether to get a 15" or 17" Macbook Pro.

Here are a few things I love about my Macbook, compared to the Windows desktops and laptops I've used for more than a decade:

• The hardware is better. Sure it is a lot more expensive than a Windows notebook. But it isn't throw away stuff - it is meant to be used by serious professionals (whether or not that's what you are) and it is built to last. This has been my experience, and from what I read, that of a lot of people.
  
  
• The support is better. Apple really stands behind their products. I'm sure there are always some bad experiences, but mine has been similar to this: My friend Ryan walked into the Apple store in Huntsville recently and said "I was playing with my son and dropped my iphone (that I didn't buy here) on the sidewalk and now it is having problems." Their response? "Here's a new one." If you are getting this kind of support from Dell or HP or Verizon, that's great, but that hasn't been my experience.
  
  
• No viruses. Maybe there are some out there, but they haven't bothered me, and I spend zero time buying, configuring, managing, or upgrading virus software. And no time messing with the viruses themselves. I wonder how much money that adds to your Windows PC cost and how much of your valuable time is wasted messing with that stuff?
  
  
• No (OK, very little) rebooting. I have always had to reboot my Windows PCs all the time. Things hang up, quit working, or just get slow. I rarely have to reboot my Macbook.
  
  
• It is Unix. I first started using and writing software for Unix around 1986 or 1987 at Intergraph when they came out with CLIX. While there are some pretty technical Windows fans for who I have a great deal of respect (my old Intergraph buddies John Allen and Tony Dye come to mind), my personal experience is that Mac OS X and Linux are a lot more stable, easier to use, and cheaper to administer than Windows. And with Apple continuing to make inroads with their Mac sales, the days of having to use Windows because that's where all the software is are coming to a close.
  
  

Like most religious wars, this one won't be solved in my lifetime. I'm not trying to convert anyone to the Mac. And this guy says it better than I can anyway. All I'm saying is that I'm much, much happier and more productive with a Macbook - maybe you would be too...

Do you know when to quit?

I recently wrote an article on persistance. Today I want to look at the other side of that.

A friend sent me an interesting article (Knowing When to Quit) that was particularly meaningful to him because of his own experiences in the coffee business.

As I think about this I realize that in past businesses I've very much NOT known when to quit. I've spent literally hundreds of thousands of dollars and seriously endangered my family's financial position because I couldn't see past the emotion.

Readers of this blog know that I try to be a positive, can do kind of person. I think the "whether you believe you can or believe you can't, you are right" line of thinking is true.

But here's the thing - sometimes you just don't have the resources or ability to do this thing. You need to know the difference between blind optimism and justified optimism.

In On Writing, (the best book on the subject I've ever read) Stephen King said that there are 4 kinds of writers: bad, OK, good, and genius (I don't remember his exact labels but for the record he considers himself in the "good" category). He said that with a lot of work you can make an OK writer good but that you can never make a bad writer good. You either have it or you don't.

No matter how hard I try, or how much I practice, or how many lessons I take, I won't be playing in the NBA. Some businesses aren't going to work - they just can't - the math isn't there. Some careers or jobs just aren't ever going to pan out. The trick is to be wise enough (or look hard enough) to know the difference. I recently read a short little book called The Dip that might give you some insight into how to do that.

Paul's Eyes

We can only know what we can know, and we have to be satisfied that we can't know more than that. My particular engineering-type personality doesn't like that. I want to know everything; I want to be certain of everything. But I can't be. I've come to accept that for the most part, and that sometimes makes it hard not to be annoyed by people who haven't.

You see, some things are clearly spelled out in the Bible, and we can safely decide that they are true. Some things are less clear, and while they may be true, the Bible doesn't give us enough information to know for sure. Take the following passage:

Brothers, I entreat you, become as I am, for I also have become as you are. You did me no wrong. You know it was because of a bodily ailment that I preached the gospel to you at first, and though my condition was a trial to you, you did not scorn or despise me, but received me as an angel of God, as Christ Jesus. What then has become of the blessing you felt? For I testify to you that, if possible, you would have gouged out your eyes and given them to me. - Galatians 4:12-15, ESV

Paul seemed to have some sort of physical ailment ("...a thorn was given me in the flesh..." - 2 Cor 12:7) and people have theorized that he had a problem with his eyes based on the verse above and a few other phrases in the epistles such as "See with what large letters I am writing to you..." - Galatians 6:12).

Now that may very well be what those verses mean. My point is that we can't be sure.

And left alone, that's well and good. Does it really matter whether Paul had poor eyesight or gout or heartburn? I don't think so. What I think we want to avoid is this:

We pick something like this, decide it is a fact, then base further assumptions on that, often not stopping until we've "proven" something to be true. Unfortunately that "proof" is based on a series of assumptions, none of which are certain. My wife's grandmother (Jane Hale) used to warn that you could prove anything by the Bible, and I think by this reasoning she was right.

So be careful to distinguish between what is true and what may be true. What's our best defense against this? In my opinion it is reading and studying the whole Bible over and over, in many different ways (and it doesn't hurt to use different translations from time to time). Look for the overall message and for how the pieces fit together. If you believe Matthew 7:7 is true, we'll understand in the end.

Single Handling Tasks

The other day I received an email from someone at work with a problem for me to address. I opened it and saw what it was and decided it was too complex for me to easily solve right now, so I replied that I'd take a look at it soon and started to move on. Then I remembered something I've heard Brian Tracy mention many times: practice single-handling tasks.

You see, it wasn't that I couldn't do anything on this task right now, it was that I didn't want to! It wasn't going to be straightforward, and was going to require some thought, and some coordination with other people, and who has the energy for all that right now?

But here's the problem: every time you open that email or pick up that paper you have to spend time coming up to speed on what it says. You have to switch everything out of your mind and put this task back into it. If you do like I've often done and open it 3 or 4 or 10 times before you eventually do something with it you can sometimes spend as much time trying to get started as actually doing it!

So what did I do with that email? I opened it right back up and handled it. I spent the time to think about what was required, and emailed the people from whom I needed input, and made some notes, and basically took it as far as I could at that point. Then I was able to archive that email - it wasn't sitting there in my inbox waiting for me to open it over and over, causing me never-ending stress.

Persistence

I'm a big fan of persistence. I think it is the ultimate power tool. With it you can conquer the world! Before its wrath, obstacles are blown away, problems fall by the wayside, setbacks are scoffed at. Whatever you are trying to accomplish, persistence wins.

So many people give up just before they turn the corner. If they could just see through the clouds, they'd see success.

Here are some of my favorite quotes on persistence:

• Ambition is the path to success. Persistence is the vehicle you arrive in. - Bill Bradley
  
  
• Patience, persistence and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success. – Napoleon Hill
  
  
• Energy and persistence conquer all things. - Ben Franklin
  
  
• Persistence is what makes the impossible possible, the possible likely, and the likely definite. - Robert Half
  
  
• Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance. - Samual Johnson
  
  
• Fall seven times, stand up eight. - Japanese proverb
  
  
• When nothing seems to help, I go and look at a stone-cutter hammering away at his rock perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow it would split in two, and I know it was not that blow that did it, but all that had gone before together. - Jacob A. Riis, journalist and social reformer (1849-1914)
  
  
• Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan "press on" has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race. - Calvin Coolidge
  
  
• It is the `follow through' that makes the great difference between ultimate success and failure, because it is so easy to stop. - Charles F. Kettering
  

Being in Awe of God

I listened to a sermon recently about how to have a better prayer life and one thing I heard that really stayed with me was how we often fail to appreciate the magnitude of God and the reverence that appreciation should generate. He compared praying and attending church to visiting the President - would we wear old clothes, take cell phone calls during dinner, or otherwise be disrespectful? Of course not, a visit like that would be a once-in-a-lifetime honor for most of us.

If that's how we'd feel about a meeting with the President, how should we feel about a meeting (prayer, church) with the creator of the universe?

I hadn't thought about it that way, but that really stuck in my mind, and I've decided that I need to show more awe toward God.

Don't Worry, Be Happy

"If you have fear of some pain or suffering, you should examine whether there is anything you can do about it. If you can, there is no need to worry about it; if you cannot do anything, then also there is no need to worry." - Dalai Lama

I've had this posted on the wall of my office for a long time. I think about it often, and if you know me very well I've probably told you about it at one point or another.

I think this is one of the most valuable pieces of advice anyone could ever get, and I try to live by it. Is it hard to implement? Oh yeah, definitely. But is it possible?

I believe so. And the upside is tremendous!

Like anything else, the first step in implementing it is to think about it. When you find yourself stressing about something, examine it and ask yourself which of the two of the Dalai Lama's categories it fits into, and then decide whether you need to worry!

I'm only being partly facetious - the more you try to do this, the better your results will be. Practice makes perfect (well, if not perfect, at least mostly worry free).

One final thing: I've had friends point out that they know there is something they can do about their situation, but they don't, and so they just worry (or worry about why they aren't doing it). All I can say is that if your problem is that you know what you need to do, but can't get yourself to do it...well, that's a topic for another day...