The Two Commandments

1. Love God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your soul, and with all your strength.
2. Love your neighbor as you love yourself.
These are the rules to live by, given by God.

Now, on the first: My heart, mind, soul, and strength are pretty much the sum total of what I am. My heart is at the core of my body's operations, pumping life throughout me. Love for God needs to be in every function of my body: breathing, walking, standing, sleeping, resting, playing, anything.
My mind is at the core of my thinking, where I put ideas together and make decisions. Love for God needs to be part of every decision, every thought process. I must honor Him with my thoughts.
My soul is my identity. It's the "me" behind it all. Love for God must be central to who I am. To the question, "Who are you?", at least part of the answer should be, "I am one who loves God."
My strength is my work. It's all I do. Any action: from walking to a place to doing a job to giving a direction to just pushing a button must demonstrate a love for God.

On the second: Who is my neighbor? Jesus answered in the Good Samaritan parable. It's anyone who decides to connect with me. Anyone who wants to avoid or reject or hurt me is not my neighbor. Anyone who helps me or needs me or wants to relate to me in any way is my neighbor. These are the folks I need to concern myself with. Specifically, I must treat these as myself. If I'm hungry, I feed myself. If I have a need, I try to satisfy it. I want myself to be happy and comfortable and at ease. I must treat my neighbor in this same way.

Profanity

"Words mean things." - Rush Limbaugh.

Say what you mean. If the words you select mean exactly the thought you want to communicate, then profanity will very rarely come out of you. It is pretty rare that, in polite conversation, you will want to refer to bodily waste, fornication, or a curse to Hell. And if those are the concepts you want to speak about, then there are better words to use. Like "bodily waste", "fornication", or "curse to Hell".

It is certainly possible one might use a metaphor, but I can think of better comparisons than calling someone a body's orifice from which waste is produced. That's just foul to think about. If you mean someone seems very stupid, a "fool" would be a reasonable comparison. Or an "idiot".

These words have become some kind of bizarre punctuation in our conversation. As if we're trying to shock people into listening to us. I ascribe this to poor upbringing, leaving children open to peer pressure. We have so little confidence in the strength of our ideas, we throw these shocking words in to lend greater emotional power. In truth, all this does is pollute the idea.

Love

Last Sunday, Pastor Scott shared a quote from his mentor and brother-in-law, Dr. Jack Sharpe: "Love is my personal response to what I consider to be fundamentally precious." This was one of those insights that just smacked me right between the eyes.

I think a lot about what I love and why. Why do I love my wife? She frustrates the heck out of me sometimes! Why do I love Tahoe? It's a place. Why does it hold a place in my heart that other places don't? Why do I love music?

So, now I had a new lens to look at these questions. "Fundamentally precious" to me. Do I consider these things fundamentally precious? Fundamental refers to something as a foundation, a basis on which the greater structure rests. Precious refers to something highly valuable; something in which I place great value. Are these things of such value to me, they compose my foundations?

• My wife: absolutely. I promised myself to her before God. Maybe I didn't fully comprehend everything I was promising at the time, being young and stupid. But I do now. And I fully accept that commitment as the primary defining characteristic of my life.
• Tahoe: what is it about this place? It's the air, the sky, the mountains rising up out of the basin, the sunsets, of course that amazing blue water. The pines, the snow. So many of us who have lived there know it. Others may love other places. This is my place.
• Music: there's something there I don't fully understand yet. In the rhythms; in the relationship of intervals that make up melodies and harmonies; even in the frequencies of the sounds. Something there relates to my soul and I want to know it better.

I've always been a little sensitive about saying that I "love" this or that. Now, I have a clear context to assign this label. Thanks, Dr. Sharpe. Good one.

Be a man.

A few years ago, I prayed for God to show me my mission in life. He clearly told me, "Be a man." So, I set out to be the best man for God I could be.

First, I needed to figure out what that meant. As a kid, I had some different ideas:

• When I turn 18? No, that just makes me a legal adult in the United States. It means I am responsible for my own actions in society.
• When I have sex? No, that just means that I'm physically intimate with a woman. Pleasant, scary, but ultimately meaningless.
• Getting my own place? Driving? Paying bills? Not really.

So, since God was the one giving me this mission, I figured I'd better ask him. I had already accepted my roles in life as a husband and father, so that was my focus.

About being a husband, God says, "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her" (Ephesians 5:25). Jesus' love for the church is a sacrificial love. He gave everything for His people. About being a dad, God says, "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord." (Ephesians 6:4). A dad needs to be an effective leader for his kids. Teach them right. Bring them up to be the best they can be.

So here I am: A man, a husband, a father. I give myself to my family to lead, care for, and protect the best I can.

Inspiration!

I was inspired today by Pastor Scott's message. Text was Ephesians 4:17-24. Contrast pre-Christian thinking and living from Christian. Futility of thought and life apart from God. Denial of God by willful ignorance due to desire to maintain self-centered life, self-gratification. Purpose found through new life in Christ. Pursue holiness. Learn Jesus and love Jesus. Be constantly renewed.

Run from the old life. Build fences around your new life to keep the old, Pagan life away. Say no.

Live in the Spirit. Be renewed. Keep focused on holiness, righteousness.

I've wanted for a while to re-focus. Give more of my attention to the Lord and His Word. I've been wanting to journal and meditate on my walk in the Spirit more. This is how I'm going to do it.

I finally have something worth taking the time to think and write on. Happy days!

The point

I made this blog just to have a place to put info. Stuff I'm doing, stuff I'm thinking, etc.

The name comes from a quote I got from Donald Rumsfeld's Rules: "Persuasion is a two-edged sword -- reason and emotion -- plunge it deep." Attributed to Professor Lewis Sarett, Sr.