Lessons from Home Depot (Part 1)

I took my daughter with me on a quick run to the Home Depot this week to pick up some paint and a few other odds and ends for a project.

As I was waiting at the paint counter, she lost interest and began wandering over to the checkout counter.

She is a candy freak. She could sniff out a Skittle in the center of a 10' thick block of concrete, so finding candy on an end cap at her eye level was a given. She also managed to grab a 20oz. Sunkist from the refrigerator right next to it.

She took them over to the checkout all by herself and she handed the items to the young lady behind the counter. The lady looks at me as if to ask, "Do you want her to have these?"

I nodded to the lady that it was alright and gave her the finger........you know, the I'll be there in 1 minute finger.

Once the paint was ready I went over and paid for everything, including the pop and candy.

I'm a sucker.....and she knows it.

My daughter is only 3.

She has no source of income. She is flat broke. No matter what she did or how hard she tried, there is no way she could pay for the pop and candy.

But none of that matters. She got the pop and candy anyhow.

How is that possible?

Because my daughter has an ace in the hole.....her daddy.

I paid the cost for something she couldn't.

Because I love her.

We live in a fallen world. When Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, sin entered the framework, and it has driven a wedge between us and God ever since.

So how do sinners like ourselves get into the presence of a Holy God?

We can't do it by ourselves. We don't have the resources.

Someone else has to pay for our pop and candy.

Jesus paid for our sin the day he was pinned to the cross.

Jesus paid for our pop and candy.

And just like my daughter, all we have to do is accept the gift.

My daughter took the pop and candy, smiled at me and said, "Thank you daddy".

That was good enough for me.

It is good enough for God too.

Holy Ship

Christian-

We have all seen them before.

The ship in the bottle. Some of them are pretty amazing.

Do you know what I noticed after looking at them over the years though?

The bottle is insignificant in the big picture. Sure it holds the ship, but nobody is looking at the bottle.

The sailboat inside of the bottle is what’s so amazing.

The detail of the ship and the awe of how it got into the bottle is what lures people in.

Now, I want you to pretend for a moment the the bottle was opaque.

Close your eyes for a second and imagine that all you can see is the bottle and not the contents.

The bottle sucks doesn't it.

It’s boring.

Nobody gives a rip about the bottle.

It’s just a freakin’ bottle!!!! There is nothing special about it.

Christian-

When we made the decision to allow Jesus to be the leader of our life and the forgiver of our sins, our boring opaque bottle was filled with something magnificent.

Something alluring and attractive and full of awe resides in us.....in our bottle.

Did you know that we have control over the opacity of our bottle?

We do.

We can either choose to let the opaque color give way to clarity and reveal Jesus dwelling inside of us, or we can pretend the boring opaque bottle is what people want to see.

Thank God, I am no longer the person I once was. People that knew me a while ago are still trying to figure how something so awesome got inside of my bottle.

But they wonder it because they can see the ship.

Christian-

There is a ship in our bottle

Can people see it?

Does the way we live our life allow people to see the ship?

Reveal the ship and your neighborhood will change!

Reveal the ship and your city will change!

Reveal the ship and your country will change!

Reveal the ship and your world will change!

Reveal the Holy ship!

Inviting the other ones

So my middle child (Caiden) was working on a list of people he wanted to make sure he invited to his birthday.

My wife handed it to me when I walked in the door from work.
"Look at your son's birthday invite list", she said.

In order, it went like this:

God
Jesus
Angels
(And a boy from his class that I will call Joe)

I was blown away by his desire to invite the God to his birthday. I was so proud of his little heart that I got choked up. I don't think I ever invited God to anything.

Perhaps that is why I have made so many mistakes in my life.

So I ask my wife, "Who is Joe"?
She answered, "Joe is the special needs boy from Caiden's class".

Even as I type this I fight back the tears.

"I thought Caiden said that Joe spits on him all the time (an issue that comes with Joe's disability that my son interprets as dislike for him.)", I said.

"He does", was my wife's response.

So I went to my son before bedtime and I asked him, "Caiden, why did you invite Joe? I thought you felt like he didn't like you because he spits on you from time to time, and he is the only kid you have on your list".

Caiden: "It's easy to invite people you like and people that like you. We are supposed to invite the other ones too though".

Yeah.....we are.

You might not like your neighbor.
They might dislike you.
Either way, they are a child of the King just as you and I are.

This world changes only when you and I invite the other ones.

Tonight, my son the student became the teacher.
And I am thrilled to be in his class.