How Are You Self-Medicating?

I was talking with a man the other day and he was explaining to me how many projects he had, and that were vying for his attention. They all were equally important, each with the people in charge wanting their project to be first on his list. Needless to say this man was slightly stressed out. As I usually do when I run into people that are being pulled like this, I tried to encourage him and said, "Be sure and go have a cup of coffee and just sit down for a while." His response to me was, "I'll have a cup of coffee, but I want something a little stronger in it too!"

As I left the conversation, I began to think about what he had said and the thought occurred to me that he meant that he needed a little stronger help in order to alleviate the stress in his life. How many of us do that too? I mean look for something to help us get past the grief, stress and troubles that face each and every one of us daily? Now maybe you don't reach for a bottle of alcohol to drown your sorrows, but what is it that you go to when things are tough in your life?

In the world that we live in, especially in the last ten to fifteen years, we have been inundated with commercials about the latest and greatest drugs on the market, each with about a thousand side effects. The one that makes me laugh out loud about is the drug to help with depression, which one of the side effects is that you may have suicidal thoughts. Really? A drug to make you happy, but just might cause you to kill yourself? Isn't that just a little bit ironic don't you think? Along with this, and the myriad of medical websites found on the internet is it any wonder that we as a society is a mess in this area?

Now before you say to me that you are not like this, what do you do when the daily grind begins to get to you? I know for me, it has always been to pop in a DVD or blue-ray disc and "veg out". Years ago, before being delivered as an alcoholic by Jesus, I would purchase a couple of cases of high point beer and spend the weekend in my apartment just drinking my troubles away. The thing is, that everyone does this to some degree. Some people shop, others gossip or spend endless hours on Facebook (guilty as charged) or they have endless hobbies or put their children in every sporting event known to man to keep busy. Which causes all manner of endless stress, it's a vicious circle.

I remember reading a great book by John Eldredge called "Walking with God", which can be purchased on his website at this link: and I would highly recommend it. In the book he related a story about how he would come home from a hard day of work and pour himself a stiff drink to help him unwind. This became a habit for him, and one day the Lord asked him about it. It seems that for John the drink was what he was going to for relief instead of going to the Lord. And with this realization, he sat down the drinking and begin spending time with the Father after work instead.

And this is the real crux of the matter here. What is it that we go to in order to relieve whatever stressful situations that we find ourselves going through in this life? I know that for me, going to the Father seems to be the last thing I think of, and why is that exactly? Could it be that this is opposed because it is something that our enemy, the devil knows will help us and bring the peace that we are searching for? I think so.

Jesus told us in Scripture that we would be opposed by the world, and have tribulations, trials and tests. We should not be surprised when it happens, yet we so often seem to be caught off guard by it, and then we begin trying to find things to bring relief. Instead we should run to the Father when life gets tough, take our troubles to Him and lay them at His feet and find what we need. Remember Jesus said to take His yoke upon us because it is easy. I'm going to start doing this today, and stop self-medicating in my life. How about you?

Fatherhood As Told By Parking Spaces

I have been a father now for a little more than nineteen years, and in that time I have seen a lot of change in my life. One of those I came to realize only this evening as I strolled across my lawn towards my Dodge pickup to add oil to it. This is something of another story which I may tell at a later date. Tonight however I want to talk about the passage of time and my life as a father.

When my bride and I moved into the house we currently live in, she had just given birth to our first child, Micah. At that time, we parked both of our vehicles inside the comfort of a closed in garage, something of a first for both of us. This was very good given that neither of us had been parents before, and we did anything and everything to protect little Micah from the elements.

Years passed, and we added two more children; April followed a short time later by Noah. It was during these years that we started to accumulate various toys, bicycles and a sundry other things that come with children. Of course these things needed to be stored somewhere, so I began to park my truck outside of the garage, leaving a space for my bride and children to be comfy and cozy getting into our minivan, and again staying clear of the elements.

Understand me; I never minded scraping my windshield or facing the cold and rain to allow my family the comfort of just getting in the vehicle without having to face those things. It is what a husband/father is supposed to do, and chivalry is not dead, not as long as I breathe that is. But it wasn’t too long until we needed to do something about the sleeping arrangements in our house, mainly to keep two boys from hurting each other. So as Micah entered the teenage years, my bride (ever industrious as she is) built another bedroom in our garage. This is when no one parked in the garage. It was full of stuff gathered from almost twenty years of marriage and all the blessings our children had received from friends and family. So my bride joined me in parking outside of the garage.

This went on for many, many years until one day Micah turned sixteen. It wasn’t too long until I would come home from work to find his car parked in my space outside of the garage. More than once I would instruct him to park on the circle drive, and being the obedient son that he is, he would do so. But it wasn’t until my baby girl began to drive that I realized that for the next several years I would no longer be parking up close to the house, but it was my turn to move to the circle drive.

It was on that trek towards my truck tonight that I realized what it means to be a father, and that is to give of yourself so that your family can have it a little bit better. To be the one to take one for the team, to show your family that you do in fact love them. I’ve heard it said that people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. I think it can safely be said also that your family doesn’t care how much you know, until they know how much you love, and love after all is the key isn’t it?

It’s an amazing thing to be a father, and with all this passage of time, I realize that it won’t be long until I reach another father stage, that of grandfather. (Although that one can wait a bit longer as neither of my kids is anywhere near ready to marry yet). Who knows where I’ll be parking by that time? But I do know this one thing, I will continue to give of myself to my family because they deserve that from me, and truthfully I’m glad to do it.

I Witnessed A Transformation Yesterday

I have a very dear friend who is a worship leader at my church. She has a beautiful voice, and when she first came to us from her home town I would try and encourage her to hold the microphone up closer to her mouth so we could hear her voice better. She was timid and shy about using her gift, and probably thought I was being mean to her each time I said something about it.

Mallory is also a good friend of my oldest son Micah, and when the two of them would sing together, there was something in my heart that would leap. I loved hearing the two of them harmonize and worship the Lord. Micah left this past January to go to Australia and attend college for a year at Hillsong. One thing I've noticed, is that when the two of them would sing together she would take cues from Micah so I wondered how this would affect Mallory.

Yesterday as we entered into worship, I was particularly drawn to watching her for some reason. As I sang praises to God, there was something in Mallory that I hadn't seen until then, and it was amazing. It was like a transformation of sorts. What I witnessed yesterday was the worshiper that God has placed inside of Mallory finally breaking forth. It was truly like she became a different person on the stage, different than that timid little girl I remember from so many years ago, into this amazing woman of God with a voice to match.

I know that she may in fact hate that I have written about her in my blog, but I witnessed a transformation yesterday that truthfully left me speechless and I had to write about it. I am so proud of the woman that you are becoming Mallory and if you didn't know how I felt then I hope that my blog has help you to see how truly amazed and proud of you I am.