Living Hazzardously

Little pieces of our journey with Jesus

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Fixing that leaking tire in your life. 

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I was out mowing the other day and I remembered just how therapeutic it can be to mow the trails. I was stressed about not having the time to mow the yard for three or four weeks. But, Today I finally mowed the trails for the first time this year… actually, I never even mowed them last year either. WHY? Well, my mower broke down two years ago and I finally gave in and asked the neighbor to fix it, “I just don’t have the time to fix the mower”.

How ridiculous is that statement? I don’t have time to fix the mower but magically I would have time to mow? If I had just missed one mowing cycle, I could dedicate that time to fixing the mower, but instead I just missed mowing the entire season. 

How often do we do this in life? How often do I put off doing something until everything is right to do that thing? I paid someone to fix my mower because I just don’t have the energy to take on one more “MR. fix it” problem, but mowing takes longer, mowing takes many hours to accomplish, but mowing is therapeutic, and sometimes I just don’t have enough “problem solving” energy to resolve the broken boat motor or the lawn mower. But if they were working, I would easily find time to mow or fish… fishing… that sounds nice. I just need time to fix that boat motor. 

How many times do we say the same thing about our relationships with friends? With our spouse? With our pastor? With our-self? Our lives get so cluttered with daily living that sometimes we just don’t have time to fix the things we tolerate. Like the man that fills the tire of his truck every day, he knows it’s leaking and rather than taking 3 minutes to put a plug into the tire to stop the leak, he takes one minute everyday for months to just fill it with more air until he has time to fix the tire… 

I had a tire in my life that had a leak, it drove me insane, but over the last 450 days (fixing Sam’s Place) I have had to prioritize my time more than any other time in my life, I never missed an opportunity to restructure my time, to prioritize projects and fix leaking tires. Now I am to the point that I can start to breath a bit, but I feel guilty for taking a day off to work at home, or an evening to relax, or a date night with my gal… we have both been burning the candle at both ends… it’s now time to catch up on a bit of maintenance at home. Our relationships need some attention, and we are now able to start inserting that relationship time back into our lives. I thank God for his direction and for sustaining us this past year. 

This summer we are taking a few trips to see our kids and grand babies. It’s hard to allow myself to enjoy some well deserved time off after not even having a free weekend for so long, but I seem to settle in quickly enough to enjoy the few days we are able to squeeze out so far. 

One of our biggest obstacles in Bigfork is lack of transportation, public transportation. Our clients have needs that can only be filled by trips to Grand Rapids, so now we are using our little four seater car to transport folks to rapids and back. It’s a mess when we get back home and some days it’s smelly, but we have no choice! 

We have had multiple meetings, attended forums and made countless phone calls with public transportation operators, private transport options, D.O.T. … NOTHING! We can get some limited Medical rides if we plan it for two weeks… Recently We had one client miss a Dr. appointment in Duluth because our car was already in use that day with another client’s needs. So, we just need to get a van asap, do you have a van you are willing to donate? We have had offers from some folks to buy their van.  The truth is, we can’t afford to buy a van, so we just need to “keep filling the leaking tire” until we can somehow resolve the issue. We honestly loved the offer from one person who offered a van for really cheap…

I just can’t afford to buy a van at a really good price and then spend countless hours fixing the van. We just need that van that works, asap. 

So I appeal to you today. If you are reading this Blog: please go to our website and donate to get a van, or… maybe you have a van you would like to donate? Or maybe you would like to match some of the other matching funds to our grants? There will be more information about this in the future.. We need matching funds to fulfill our grant requirements for the following projects: ADA accessible (ramp, elevator)? Painting, exterior upgrades? Fencing, garden and pavilion? Updating the kitchen? Air Conditioning and ventilation (it’s horrible hot in there after that storm we had and even the day before.)?

Where ever you want to help, we have a need! 

Visit our website or join us on Facebook

https://www.samsplacenorth.com/general-5

https://www.facebook.com/p/Sams-Place-61559249289857

Asalways, God Bless

C.

DAD’S day

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When is a good dad great?

On fathers day, I wanted to look at and understand the complexities of a good father vs a great father. 

A good father loves

A great father loves

A good father says “I love you”

A great father says “I love you”

A good father provides

A great father provides

A good father supports

A great father supports

A good father is present

A great father is present

A good father is a positive role model

A great father is a positive role model

A good father is a friend to his kids

A great father is a great friend to his kids

All in all, there are many principles to be followed in these statements, and none of them are bad, they are all levels of good fathering…

Dr Google says :

The key difference [between a good and great father] lies in the level of active engagement and the depth of the relationship with their children. 

The world is measured by the world, and basically the difference is found in the “degree of goodness” a father has for his kids. 

“A good father is good to his kids and a great father is gooder to his kids”

But the bible sees it very differently… The bible says “fathers” with no distinction between “good” and “great”. So what does it mean to be a father in the bible? Here are a few key illustrations from scripture:

raising them in the Lord’s instruction

 guiding children towards a right path

 righteous and wise, highlighting the impact of a father’s example

 leading with reverence for God

You can clearly see the Bible has turned the relationship of

“father / child”

to

“father/God, child/God, father/child”

and does not talk about the child and father without God, a great father is a three way relationship putting God at the center and father/child on each side.

“father/GOD/child”

If you want to be a good father, be good to your kids, if you want to be a great father, be gooder to your kids but if you want to be the father you are called to be… put God in that relationship first and always point back to God. 

“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake?

If you think you are a good father, God says you are actually evil (by comparison or actually evil by human standards, it matters not). “evil” and you still make good choices for your kids…

A godly father should be our goal, not a good father and not a great father. We should be friendly, not friends. We should be models, not peers. We should be God focused, not person focused. Take back the role of father today and serve your children well, teach them in the ways of the Lord first. 

May God richly bless your sacrificial service to your family today as you discover God’s sacrificial service to you. 

Special side note: There are a group of men that give extra, not all are “GOOD” but remember the “step fathers” who make a decision every day to be a father to a child that usually rejects that man daily, remember those men that “step in” as a father…

C

The authority to destroy a boy

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My entire life has been marked by authority! Do I have authority? Do you have authority? Do they have authority? All great questions, different connotations, but all around authority… but what is authority? How do we get it? Maintain it? Give it? 

The definition of authority is :

The power or right to give orders, make decisions, enforce obedience. A person or organization having power or control in a particular, typically political or administrative, sphere.

The power of yielding to authority or the power of wielding true authority is the only thing that gives authority any value. This is a difficult balance for the person with authority, because with authority comes power, with greater authority comes greater power… power corrupts and greater power corrupts greater… So does authority mean corruption? This is where I want to park today… authority that is used improperly. 

When I was a child in school, I got my grades on a card every semester. I would need to bring that card home, have a parent sign off that they saw it and bring it back. But whose authority was it if I refused? May father? He would have beaten me first and then asked questions… my mother? She was hooked on pain killers this year and she wasn’t really in touch with the world… myself? Yes, there it was, I somehow needed to take charge and figure out a way to get a signature without getting a beating…. I was too young for that authority… so I lost that report card, I made the school redo that report card and things went much better…

You see, the words on that report card from one music teacher would have driven my father into a rage and I would have once again been beaten with a wire coat hanger, I knew if he saw what she wrote about me, my underwear would surely have been stuck to my backside with the bloody stripes of a wire coat hanger, and the next step would be going into the laundry tub to soak the underwear off those bloody stripes in order to use the toilet. So what were those fateful words from a seventh grade music teacher? 

Let’s back up a year, the year was my 6th grade, a summer that changed me forever, my neighbor molested me, my grandfather died, my mother was hooked on pills and I entered JR High. My first 6 grades were in a private school, Immanuel Lutheran Grade School. I was a custodian’s assistant and played basketball. Everything was going fine! I started 7th grade, got picked on, got in typical Jr High fights and was awarded a 2 year all expense paid scholarship at the UofM… tuition, fees, books and housing (I never went to college, that scholarship was wasted) so back to my music teacher. What could be so bad on a report card? Well, I kept that report card, I never actually lost it and I still have it today as a reminder that words can cause more damage than a knife.

 “Charlie is not much use to us!”… 

Those words set me on a path of self destruction and eventually led me to be the man I am today, no regerts! (intentionally misspelled). I remember those words almost as clearly as the words my father spoke with colorful expletives… He exclaimed “you (meaning me) are the worst thing that ever happened to me (meaning me)” of course that’s not the actual quote, it contained many words that should never see the light of day in my blog, but the intent is fully understood when I clasp that phrase in quotes for you.

Back to authority, today God has given me authority in many areas of life: My family. My business. Sam’s Place. Operating our farm… and so much more. But with authority comes responsibility, and with great authority comes great responsibility… that responsibility should never be taken lightly, for we will all be judged by God on what we have done with what has been given to us, as stewards, because in reality, it’s not our authority, it’s Gods!

So this day, remember this, if you are given authority over twenty dollars, and you use it to cause harm to yourself or others… you will not escape the responsibility of that authority. One day I will answer for my actions and I have a shield to protect me from what I have done and what I deserve… That comes with the responsibility of surrendering not just my failures, but also my success… because I can do nothing good apart from HIM who saved me! So give praise where it is due, and not to men, for nothing good has ever been done aside from the father ordaining that good to happen. Nothing good has ever been done in Charlie’s name, except that God has done it though me.

What are you going to do today that is honorable, good and delightful in Gods eyes?

C.