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I read a piece in the Air Force Times this week about the Medal of Honor. If you know anything about the recent history of the Medal of Honor, you might know that only a handful of our servicemen have been awarded this medal in the Global War on Terror. You might also know that all of the recipients have recieved the medal posthumously (i.e., the action for which they won the medal also cost them their lives). So it makes more sense then that this article is entitled “Death before this honor.”
The article makes for an interesting read, and it does bring up a question that is valid. Since when does someone have to die in the midst of a heroic duty to receive America’s highest military honor? Also, if no living person will ever be awarded the Medal again, for practical purposes, does it really still exist? There is quite a list of benefits and privileges which are given to the winners of the award, and I would argue that this is a good thing; but what will happen once the 98 living recipients inevitably die?
Is the award unattainable? Should it be? Are there people who are now serving who have performed acts of heroism worthy of this award?
I have several friends who have homes for sale. Some of them have had homes on the market for quite some time. My wife works in the real estate sector, so I hear lots and lots of stories about this. Let me say up front that I’m not going to offer some tactic that will sell your house. If you’re looking for key words for your listing or a magic bullet I don’t have it for you, but I hope you’ll stick around anyway.
In times of a depressed (and perhaps depressing) housing market, people turn to all kinds of remedies to sell houses. Today I want to highlight one that I’ve recently seen again. When I was in a local Christian store recently I saw someone purchasing a statue of St Joseph, not unlike this one:
This got me thinking, is it an acceptable practice for Christians to use St Joseph statues to try to sell houses? Stick with me for a second while I briefly digress. Several years ago, as a teenager I remember an incident that happened to me. I received one of those common email forwards promising that I would be granted a certain wish if I forwarded it to enough of my friends. Sounds ridiculous, right? Well I did forward it to my friends, because there was something that I desperately wanted — perhaps you can relate. I remember clearly a Christian friend who took me to task after receiving my forward. I still remember what he said to me: “If there is something that you really want, you should pray for it.”
I was ashamed, because as a Christian I had succumbed to the allure of superstition. I was trying to get something, essentially through a form of magic. Now let’s bring it back. The principle is the same, if you want something, you ought to ask God. The Bible says that every good and perfect gift comes from God (James 1:17).
If you bury a piece of plastic in your yard, that has absolutely no power to sell a house. Why would it? How could it? If God desires for you to sell your house, He can accomplish that with or without plastic in the yard. Let me encourage you to ask God for what you want. Jesus tells his disciples in Matthew 7 that they should ask God for what they want, because God is a perfect father and wants to give good things to His children.
I know that if you’re trying to sell a house, and especially if it’s been a long time, that you can get desperate. I don’t have a good answer as to why your home hasn’t sold yet. Right now, I pray that you will seek God, and that He will give you wisdom and comfort, and also that He would lift this burden from you. I’ve got nothing against St Joseph, but when it comes to who has the real power, remember that it’s God who is in control, and He has a plan.
If you really want to sell your house, ask God for it to sell, hire the best realtor you can find, and trust God.
A friend just recently sent me a copy of a Lifeway survey entitled, “Our Ministry to Families.” It is a diagnostic tool for churches to see how well they are ministering to families. Here’s what’s on the diagnostic: On the one side are categories of plans and ministries (read programs) that churches might offer, and then there are some spaces for rating whether the church currently has this program, intends to have it, how they rate their program, and how well the congregation knows about it.
I appreciate Lifeway, and the many services that they provide us as Southern Baptists. However, it seems like the paradigm that this tool was built upon was clearly a program-based church ministry. Program-based ministry simply doesn’t work in the long run. (I imagine Dr Rainer — author of Simple Church — didn’t sign off on this one).
Program-driven ministry doesn’t work because it assumes that church activities are the same as spiritual health. The fact is that this simply is not so. While we have traditionally thought that those who were in the church “every time the doors were open,” were the most spiritually healthy, lately more and more churches are recognizing that spiritual maturity doesn’t (indeed can’t) get accomplished simply through programs at a church. Individuals must have personal growth as well, and this means far more than simply doing stuff at a church.
To learn more you can check out some of these resources:
Simple Church
Purpose Driven Church
Seven Practices of Effective Ministry
What do you think?
I just ran across this. It’s kinda scary, and eye-opening.
Click Here to see what a Trillion dollars looks like.
