Update on Seizing Nostalgia

Coincidentally, I was at the Farragut Chamber of Commerce Christmas Party. It was coincidental because I ran into an acquaintance who spoke some truth and light into my previous post about the Good Old Days. For the record, his name is John Haney. John was talking about his daughters. He told me that one day …

you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s over.

I heard it said once that you should attend at least one funeral and one wedding each year to keep life in perspective. I’ve had more than my fair share of weddings since then but it wasn’t until this evening that I went to a funeral for the first time in over a decade. There …

exposing the lie of careers

Amer­ica is the land of oppor­tu­nity. If you work hard enough, you can be any­thing you want to be. There’s a lot of truth to that. When we boil it down, our soci­ety has 3 gen­eral cat­e­gories of suc­cess­ful careers. You have lawyers, doc­tors, and busi­ness exec­u­tives. I hap­pen to per­son­ally know one such person…it’s my dad. Ya, he …

the power of a touch

Touch is a pow­er­ful thing. As an Ital­ian, touch is woven into my DNA. Not every­one is so inclined. Here’s a few exam­ples of the power of a sim­ple touch, and how it can change the very essence of who you are and how peo­ple per­ceive you. Encour­ages — A sim­ple hi-​​five or pat on the back. You know’ve got­ten one …

What would you enjoy doing if money were no object?

I watched a video tonight that cut deep. The ques­tion was asked, “How would you enjoy spend­ing your life if money were no object?” Watch the video for yourself. Peo­ple have dreams but get jobs to make money to live those dreams. Young peo­ple get a good career and get wrapped up in it, then buy a house, …

the benefit of athletics in christianity

I just fin­ished run­ning an Olympic Triathlon. “Olympic” clas­si­fies the dis­tance of the triathlon. It involves swim­ming 1500m (.93mi), bik­ing 40k (24mi), and run­ning 10k (6.2mi). It’s pretty intense and takes a fair amount of ath­letic abil­ity (which I never knew I had in me til this summer). One of my friends who I train and run triathlons with …

how to live life and be a christian too

You can’t! There’s no dichotomy. There is no room for liv­ing life and try­ing to fit Chris­tian­ity into it. Chris­tian­ity demands every­thing and is the whole of your life. It was never promised to be fun or easy. It is a road of many sac­ri­fices. There is a cost, but the eter­nal rewards far out­weigh the tem­po­ral ful­fill­ment …

a psychology of modern prayer

Let it be known from the start that this is not a the­ol­ogy of prayer, nor is it even an objec­tive stance on the sub­ject. These are merely obser­va­tions and con­sid­er­a­tions that I’d like to leave with you on the tra­di­tional and some­what mod­ern approaches to prayer. Prayer preach­ing. This goes out to those pas­tors who went …

church fellowships are as bad as facebook

Most churches have “fel­low­ships”. No, it has noth­ing to do with Lord of the Rings. It’s the Chris­t­ian term for “hang­ing out”. Some churches have fel­low­ships weekly, monthly, quar­terly. Every­one gets together, brings some food, and they sit around and talk while the kids play hide and go seek in the church building. As time …

5 reasons why commitment and responsibility trump the independent life

Most young peo­ple (and even older adults) run from things that might tie them down. A full time job, buy­ing a house, mar­riage, etc. They want to live a life that’s free. A life where if their desires change, there’s noth­ing hold­ing them back from fol­low­ing through on them. At a quick glance, peo­ple might say that inde­pen­dence is the …