Probably my most quoted movie ever!

I absolutely love this movie. It dominated my high school vocabulary and taught me everything I know about sales. I’m no longer in sales.

Name that movie… I think I like it even more in its animated version!

conversations…

I took some time today to just sit and spend with God. In the past few weeks, I have been calling out to God about some important issues, things that I considered to be rather deep. Today was different for me. I didn’t really have anything like that today. I just sat there searching my soul for some life-altering topic to converse with God about. In this season of my life though, it’s pretty much all good. Good people, huge blessings, most of what I need He and I had been chatting about for a while now. So…what was I going to talk about with God today?

Turns out that this was the perfect question to ask God. I had just found my conversation for today. And the answer: Nothing. Just sit. Just be. Enjoy time with God. The fact that God wanted nothing more at that moment than to just spend some time with me perplexed me. 

At this point of the conversation, for the first time in a long while with God, I was speechless, peaceful, and humbled. I wish I could say that times like this happened more often than they actually do in my life. I too often try to steer my life, including my times with God, towards a specific place or direction that I deem “worthy,” feeling the weight and the responsibility to talk with God about the right things at the right times. If I could only come to grasp that no one knows where our conversations should go better than God, perhaps my prayer life would look a little different. Sure I can say or type this, but there’s a heart thing here that God may be illuminating within me. Maybe on this day, God invited me into some opportunities for growth as it applies to how He and I go at a very deep level. And He maybe He used the avenue of the very “not-so-deep” and “nothing-to-say” to do so.

So, what have you and God been talking about lately? Nothing might be a really good answer. It was today. 

Psalm 46:10-11 “Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.”11 The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.” (I added the bold type).

Summer Movies

I’m a pretty big movie fan. So, with summer traditionally being a better times to see a movie, I thought that I would begin to rank the movies that I see. Feel free to comment if you agree or disagree. I will keep this running throughout the summer. So, here goes.

1. Prince Caspian – Really good movie. Even better than the first one. I read these as a kid and again in college, so it’s fun to see them on screen. Decent for kids.

2. Iron Man – I wasn’t a comic book guy, but loved this one. Great story. Great special effects. Decent for kids to see also.

3. Indiana Jones – Well, it was the third movie I’ve seen…so it’s the third movie on my list. Wasn’t my favorite, but I’m sure that others will fall below it as the summer goes on. Not a horrible kids movie either.

Keep checking in, if you’d like. I’ll keep posting as often as I can afford it. (The cost of the movie ticket, that is. The blogging is free, of course.) 

friday…

I have found that days are what I make them. With that said, Friday was a good day.

A good portion was spent searching for all kinds of Florida wildlife. I wish I would had brought a camera. Alligators, white-tailed deer, turtles, tortoises, ospreys, ducks, lizards, geckos, buzzards, fish, grasshoppers, and I’m sure chiggers were all part of this day. I hiked through Florida’s beautiful scrub forests. A Florida afternoon thunderstorm rumbled in right on time, as God intended. Something about all of this settled my soul. Something all too familiar.

The next part of the day was spent as Disney. Not in the park…saving up for that. The latter part of Friday was spent walking around many of the hotels and Downtown Disney. I realized that Disney has dedicated it’s existence painting a picture of what life can be like; whether it can or not is a different story. But, as I walked around Disney, it hit me that they have spent billions building a land of creativity and excellence transporting its guests to a world where life is less chaotic and more surreal. They were nurturing this environment. It seems to me that this might be also in many ways what God has intended as well. Nurture what I have been given towards creativity and excellence. I went to this land and thoroughly enjoyed myself. 

In the end, I sit thinking back that both places I visited yesterday, nature and Disney, weren’t actually that different to me. Nature and nurture had worked hard on this day. That’s how I make a good day. Friday was a good day.