Grow Your Relationship with God
It’s a new year which means a natural time to reflect. To look back on what happened throughout the past year and set your sights on the future as the new year unfolds. 2020 is not only a new year but in fact a whole new decade.
It is so important to be intentional in our lives, to purposely set our gaze and move towards what God has for us in this new season. Have you taken any time to reflect and project?
Continue reading “A Time to Reflect and Dream”
What does it mean or look like in your life to BE the difference? Many of us have an embedded desire to do something great, to make a difference in the world, to know that our life matters. To be apart of something bigger than ourselves, something significant.
For myself I am realizing it starts with simple everyday choices. Intentional choices. Showing up in the small things one day at a time turns into greater things over time. I am watching this take place throughout the last six months as I choose to show up day by day at the gym, doing the prescribed workouts. No one single workout changed everything for me; it was the consistency of taking one small step each and everyday. After six months I can look back and see there have been some significant changes happening here! My body has transformed, my skills and abilities have progressed, and my mindset has been changing to realize I can do things I never thought I could.
Continue reading “Be The Difference”
Motivational speaker Jim Rohn says “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” The Bible also says it:
The righteous choose their friends carefully, but the way of the wicked leads them astray.
Proverbs 12:26 NIV
Then what are we to do?
Continue reading “The Company You Keep”
There are times in life when someone reveals a new, unique perspective about a situation and you never look at it the same again. It’s as if there was a hidden layer just below the surface that you never knew about because you didn’t see it until someone showed it to you. It reminds me of how polarized glasses allow you to see things under the surface of water more clearly.
Continue reading “Look Again”
The other day Amy and I witnessed a Christian doing their part to spread the good news. It was such an uncomfortable situation it made me want to crawl right out of my skin. With a mixture of heartache and anger, I left that situation feeling anything but love. Let me backup and set the stage for you.
An otherwise peaceful time in the dry sauna of our local rec center, we were enjoying the confines of its cedar walls and 172℉ temps. Enter our soon to be victim, let’s call him Vinay. A middle-aged man with a friendly demeanor, Vinay sat next to me, exchanged a nod, and even cracked a joke. A few others came and went in the several minutes that passed. Enter our subject; we’ll call her Bianca.
Continue reading “Assaulted by the Gospel”
Have you ever heard one of those object lessons that uses a three-legged stool as its example? Everything from team building to politics, finances to psychology has been explained using the humble three-legged stool.
The example seems so worn out. Surely a more interesting analogy can be found to describe anything with three parts. Then again, its power and simplicity in illustrating a point is what makes it so common. Like steering wheels, there’s a reason every car has one; it gets the job done better than anything else.
Continue reading “Spirit Soul Body”
This is the third post of a series I’m doing. Links for the first two posts are at the end of this article.
Let’s take a minute to recap. There is a common something or someone that seems to be drawing us in. Like the power of a black hole, nothing can escape its pull as it draws everything into itself. What is this mysterious force pulling at us? Do we want to go where it’s taking us? Is it safe to go? How do we determine if it’s even the right force to give in to? Do we even have a choice in the matter?
Continue reading “Do you know ‘the way?’”
I’m going to plant a seed in your mind; one that asks why and will forever change the way you think about professional development. Are you ready?
Over the past 15 years or so I’ve been passionate about personal development. This is ironic because I feel like I’m nowhere near as personally developed as I would expect to be given all the books, podcasts, and videos consumed over nearly two decades. Reminds me of a quote I’ve tweeted: “If more information was the answer, then we’d all be billionaires with perfect abs.” – Derek Sivers.
Continue reading “Is everyone saying the same thing?”April 2 2018, it was Easter Monday and we were driving from Creston back to Abbotsford, British Columbia. While listening to an audio book along that drive, something awakened inside of us. A dream turned reality can be traced back to a seed planted that day. We didn’t know it at the time, but in 82 days our lives would look very different.
Maybe you have heard of Chip and Joanna Gaines. Lee and I have never met them, but their book The Magnolia Story impacted our lives in a significant way. In it, the HGTV stars share their journey together, including all the ups and downs leading up to their hit TV show The Fixer Upper. The thing that really resonated with us was Chip and Joanna’s desire to work together. This has been a strong desire of mine and Lee’s for many years, but for whatever reason we talked more about that dream than actually pursuing it.
Continue reading “Pursuing Your Dream”
Three years ago today Cultivate Connection found it’s genesis. As I look back now, and if I am honest there really wasn’t any forethought to start a guided bible based meditation podcast. In fact, I stumbled my way into this. It is still a little surreal that once a week I record myself meditating on scripture and hanging out with Jesus and then post it online for people I have never met to listen to. That is normal, right? So if I didn’t dream it up how did we get from there to here?
Continue reading “What’s in a seed?”