Tag Archives: Christian

What Matters Most?

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Think before you act

That weird thing by my ear is a pop stopper on a mic stand

In a continuation on the series about things I’m learning about maturity (as I originally posted here) I’d like to talk about what matters the most.  You see I hadn’t figure this out in application until recently.  What matters most hasn’t changed, but the application of that has become much, much more important to me.  What matters most to me is my relationship with my Lord and Savior and that relationship being reflected in my day-to-day life.  My friend Craig told me recently in a conversation that he could tell a difference between Randy 2 years ago and present day Randy.

I used to run my mouth a lot (OK, I probably still do).  Maybe it was pride, maybe it was because I’m an extroverted influencer, but I’ve started listening more.  That only took 30+ years to figure out.  Listen more.  It isn’t as if James hadn’t told us in his letter to the diaspora of the church at Jerusalem that they should listen more.  It isn’t that I hadn’t read that letter tens of times.  It is that I didn’t realize I wasn’t listening.  Do you ever think that you are listening but you’re not?  I am learning to listen more.  The problem is that it takes discipline to listen.  It takes discipline to shut your jaw muscles down and just listen.  I’ve met good listeners and when they listen to me I feel loved.  I need to love by listening more.  Craig told me that during a series of tasks with him that I wasn’t talking as much.  I was working more, but I was also listening more.

A week or so before that I had another friend, Jim, suggest I listen (there’s that word again!) to some lessons by a mutual friend, Jeremy Thomas, who is the pastor at Fredericksburg Bible Church.  As I listened a yearning for a deeper understanding of God’s word just dominated my thoughts.  I have been insatiable in my appetite for what matters most: knowing my God more.  Jim also suggested I re-listen (and finish listening to) the Bible Framework series by Charlie Clough.  There is so much good material in that series.  The series is about thinking.  I know, that’s goofy, but its over 200 lessons on thinking as a Christian rather than just being a thoughtless Christian (that’s kinda blunt, but I don’t know how else to put it).  Craig is a good thinker and when he mentions that he thinks I’m changing it means a great deal to me.

What matters most (my relationship with the Godhead) impacts my work, my family, my friends, and my church.  At work I want to do an amazing job, but this change in my focus means that I actually pay more attention to details (which probably thrills some of my co-workers to no end).  My family has been getting a lot more of me praying and looking for teaching opportunities [and hopefully more listening].  My friends will hopefully find me a better listener – I’m sure praying a lot more for them (even if they’re agnostic or atheist).   At church I’ve been trying harder to pour myself into preparation for my lessons (not that I spent only a few minutes before).  I want my brothers and sisters there to hunger more despite being fed more, to listen more, and to grow more.  I want them to know I love them.  Not to be a creeper, but I want you to know I love you.  When Craig tells me he’s seeing changes he’s telling me he loves me and he’s been listening and watching.  I’d hate for that message (of love) to stop with me.  Listen to someone else today; love them through listening.  It is amazing what you’ll hear.  It is amazing what you’ll learn.  It is amazing how you will grow.

Hoosier Rabbi?

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I’m writing this post ahead of time.  Go figure.  I’m writing this while having been studying for a Bible study lesson I will have taught by the time you read this.  The thing I’m covering, as the title of this post suggests, involves rabbis.  Without going into the hefty religious connotations of Christ being a rabbi, I want to give you some quick summary information and then ask you a question or three.  Even if you’re not a Christian, this post has some relevance, so stick with me.

What’s a rabbi?  Here is a short bit of text I wrote for my handout (it is by no means thorough):

Rabbis would have been teachers of the Old Testament, but primarily the Law or Pentateuch. Typically a student would approach a rabbi and ask if he may follow the rabbi, if the rabbi rejected him, he would then go off to a trade. The student of the rabbi was called a talmidim. If you’ve ever heard of the talmud, it is the a Judaic book that outlines traditional rabbinical teachings. Christ operated contrary to this and sought out His disciples and told them to follow Him. Furthermore the disciples were at least in part already involved in trades – so they would have to walk away from their careers and lives as they had expected them to be and instead joined themselves to Christ.

A rabbi was expected to have a physically following disciple or disciples, and Elijah and Elisha were an important example of this concept in the Old Testament [I Kings 19:19-21]. Time was to be spent together and a lifestyle that represented the teacher was to be lived in front of the following disciple. Discipleship meant being seen with the rabbi so that others would begin to see what the rabbi taught as see the fruit of the teachings worked out in the lives of the disciples.

What I have been thinking about is this question: Who are today’s rabbis?  Who do people follow and identify themselves with?  Historically it was a life devoted to a teacher and their teachings.  In modern first world America, do we have time for this rabbi/disciple concept?  Today we follow people on twitter, television, the Internet, and of course in our cars to the store, but do we really follow teachers and devote ourselves to their teachings?

Are rabbis Richard Dawkins, Rush Limbaugh, or Barry Obama?  Of those three one is anti-religion but religious about his anti-religion, one is a right-wing-loud mouth, and one is a president with big words and many promises but single handedly incapable of delivering on what he wants to promise.  Do we follow them?  I personally wouldn’t follow them.  I wouldn’t follow Oral Roberts, Bill Gates, or Joel Osteen.

Who is your rabbi?