Just Continue That Thought...

A thought by Jon Tyson from his book, The Burden Is Light: Liberating Your Life from the Tyranny of Performance and Success (p. 118). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) But is that all that is important? Jon says, “We want to realize an immediate return from whatever we invest in. I am prone to this way of thinking in so many areas of my life. ‘I paid a lot for that meal, yet the portions were not that big.’ ‘I invested two hours in that movie, and it was just okay.’   ‘I went to church, but the sermon wasn’t that profound.’ We believe it’s important to derive value from everything in our lives. But beauty doesn’t fit within that framework. When Mary anointed Jesus with oil, there was an immediate outcry against her extravagant generosity. ‘It could have been sold for more than a year’s wages and the money given to the poor.’ (Mark 14:5) One gospel depicts the disciples crying, ‘Why this waste?’ (Matthe

A thought by Jon Tyson from his book, The Burden Is Light: Liberating Your Life from the Tyranny of Performance and Success (p. 98). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) So many around us feel as if they are living under a curse but are seeking a blessing. Jon says, “John Ortberg again gets at the heart of this: ‘Blessing and cursing are not compartmentalized Bible words at all. They are simply the two ways that we treat people. They are as inseparable as breathing in and breathing out.’ (Ortberg, Soul Keeping , 154–55.)   What would it look like for you to begin to be a source of blessing to those around you? Jon goes on, “We often underestimate the power of the words we speak into the lives of others. Words create worlds. God said, ‘Let there be…’ and there was. We can shape hearts and minds and identities by the things we speak into others. That’s why James is mortified by the thought of someone wo

A thought by Jon Tyson from his book, The Burden Is Light: Liberating Your Life from the Tyranny of Performance and Success (p. 60). The Crown Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) That is the truth.   Jon says, “It is one of our primary coping mechanisms to fend off heartache and pain. And control is not a bad thing in itself. We should take control over abusive, coercive, and harmful things. But when we become obsessed with managing our existence to the point that we stop trusting God or depending on him, we enter the dangerous territory of seeking to become God ourselves. Our culture is riddled with control mechanisms that facilitate this idolatry.” He goes on, “Seeking to control God and thus narrate the details of our own story cuts at the heart of our faith. Christianity is not primarily a plan of protection against the brokenness of the world but a relationship with Christ in the midst of it. When we conf