Pictures & Wisdom

 A piece of music might sound like a masterpiece when played on a high quality speaker, while sounding terrible if played on a cheap pair of headphones.  Likewise the gospel. This has two implications: 1) If you've heard the message of the Christian faith preached in a distorted way (through a bad speaker) don't discard it. It's a masterpiece when played on the right speaker. 2) If you're sharing the gospel, make sure you use the best quality speakers you can to do so. 

 Henry Ford is quoted for having said "Whether you think you can, or you think you can't — you're right" This speaks about faith - "confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see." (Hebrews 11:1 NIV)  Faith does something. Many things can only be achieved if you believe they can. I've practiced a bit of parkour in my time, and while some of it requires strength and skill, much of it depends on your mindset. If I don't believe I can make a jump, my entire body fights against me trying to do that jump because it will hurt if I fail - and therefore I am unable to do the jump. But if I know I can do it, my body performs at its best, and making the jump is not a problem. So what does it take to build such faith? To return to my parkour analogy, it's about starting small. Take a small jump that you know you can do. Then make the jump a little bigger. Then step for step increase until you are back where you started.  So what has c

 In the movie Avengers: Infinity war (spoiler alert), Dr Strange looks into the future and sees millions of possible outcomes, but only a single one where victory is theirs. God did the same. He knew every possible future for us people, and the only one where we would be saved was by Jesus coming to love the perfect life and die on our behalf. And so, as Iron Man sacrificed himself to save the many, Jesus surrendered His life to let you have life.

 Many sci-fi movies and books entertain the thought of traveling back in time to chance the future. Being able to change the future is intriguing, but we all have the power to change the future. Just not after it has happened. We cannot foresee all the different future scenarios, but by practicing wisdom and discipline, we are much more likely to create a future where we don't want to travel back in time to change what we did. 

 People living off of other people's support (such as missionaries) often have a strong sense of accountability in how they spend that money. It is given to them for them to manage and produce good fruit. But should we not all have that sense? All that we have is entrusted to us by God, to whom we will all be accountable at the end of the day. So should we not spend our money wisely and with great reverence of Him?