Our Newsletter
Our newsletter, "Cross Current" is published each Sunday. Along with an up-to-date rundown of congregational activities, each edition features an interesting and challenging cover story that connects faith to real life.
Written by Rick Gamble, these articles are published the following week in the Brantford Expositor where Rick is the Religion and Ethics columnist.
PLEASE NOTE: This page will not be updated during the month of April. See you in May!
A Life Sentence
She challenged the President, on purpose. His purpose.
According to the bestselling book Drive by Dank Pink, it was 1962 when Congresswoman Claire Booth Luce asked John F. Kennedy to consider “his sentence”. Worried the president was unfocussed with too many competing goals, she pointed to history.
“'A great man,” she told him, 'is one sentence.' Abraham Lincoln's sentence was: 'He preserved the union and freed the slaves.' Franklin Roosevelt's was: 'He lifted us out of a great depression and helped us win a world war.' Luce feared Kennedy's attention was so splintered ...his sentence risked becoming a muddled paragraph.”
As Pink points out, each of us should have a single sentence that embodies us, even if our contributions in life aren't exactly Lincolnesque. Your sentence may say something about you your character or accomplishments, capture your essence, and and help you stay focussed and motivated. The author offers some simple examples: “He raised four kids who became happy and healthy adults.”; “She invented a device that made people's lives easier.”; or “He cared about every person who walked into his office.”
Pink says he best way to have and hone a purpose in life is to consider your sentence. Taking that further, writer and educator Naphtali Hoff suggests we build our sentence around four things I call vision, values, verification, and eventuality.
First, recognize prupose is easier to find and live when you have a philosophy of life that guides your choices and actions. So it's important to identify and refine your core values until they're clear and something you're willing to commit to as a moral compass. For Christians, the character of Jesus and the guidance of scripture are the essential place to start.
We exist to honour God. That's your pupose, every day. And that's fundamentally founded on the recognition that you're a small but treasured speck in the universe and beyond. “Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge!” Paul writes in Romans 11. “Who knows enough to give him advice?And who has given him so much that He needs to pay it back? For everything comes from him and exists by his power and is intended for his glory.” That includes us, and the lives we lead.
But to do that, we must also be people of vision with challenging goals and a willingness to work hard to reach them, whether they relate to the shaping of our character, or serving those around us. That means living in submission to the Spirit's power with faith, hope, and intentionality, instead of just waiting for things to happen or fobbing off our responsibility on God. It also means developing patience and perseverance, because few important things come quickly or easily. As Proverbs says, “Where there's no vision [guidance from God], people cast off restraint; but blessed are those who heed instruction.” (29:18)
By verification, I mean that each time we go through a major experience — good or bad — we should take stock of how it affected us. Hoff encourages us to look at how we might've approached things differently, or gotten better results, and to reflect on how that experience relates to our vision and values, to see if we're on target. That's precisely why it's so important for us to pray, reflect, and be accountable to God and spiritual people we trust.
As for eventuality, we should focus on the end of life and work backwards. This concept reminds us we're all going to die and be remembered for something. We get to choose that something. But chances of it being something positive will be much higher is we live each day with our purpose and eternityin mind.
“Remember, we'll stand before the judgment seat of God. For the Scriptures say, 'As surely as I live,’ says the Lord, ‘every knee will bend to me, and every tongue will declare allegiance to God.' Yes, each of us will give a personal account to God.” (Rom. 14:10-12)
So, what's your sentence? A friend of mine has an unofficial one: “Be like Jesus, and don't be stupid.” In my own life, I've adopted two scriptures as my sentence, and failed miserably at both, for the most part. The first relates to resentful followers of John the Baptist who see Jesus drawing people from their mentor. “I'm not the Messiah,” John tells them. “I'm only here to prepare the way for Him.” Then had adds the most powerful part. “He must become greater and greater, and I must become less and less.” (John 3:30)
So it is in my life, too. And I try to combine that purpose with 2 Timothy 1:7, which reminds me that I have backup. “For God hasn't given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.” I guess that's my sentence. “Jesus must become greater and greater, and I must become less and less. For God hasn't give me a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.”
Like everybody else, I'm still a prisoner of sin. We all deserve the equivalent of spiritual capital punishment. Instead, Jesus makes possible a life sentence.
By Rick Gamble. Reprint at will in not-for-profit publications. Originally published in Cross Current, the weekly newsletter of Followers of Christ, an independent, nondenominational church in Brantford, Ontario, Canada. To get these free weekly articles by email, with no strings attached, send a note to Rick at info@followers.ca
According to the bestselling book Drive by Dank Pink, it was 1962 when Congresswoman Claire Booth Luce asked John F. Kennedy to consider “his sentence”. Worried the president was unfocussed with too many competing goals, she pointed to history.
“'A great man,” she told him, 'is one sentence.' Abraham Lincoln's sentence was: 'He preserved the union and freed the slaves.' Franklin Roosevelt's was: 'He lifted us out of a great depression and helped us win a world war.' Luce feared Kennedy's attention was so splintered ...his sentence risked becoming a muddled paragraph.”
As Pink points out, each of us should have a single sentence that embodies us, even if our contributions in life aren't exactly Lincolnesque. Your sentence may say something about you your character or accomplishments, capture your essence, and and help you stay focussed and motivated. The author offers some simple examples: “He raised four kids who became happy and healthy adults.”; “She invented a device that made people's lives easier.”; or “He cared about every person who walked into his office.”
Pink says he best way to have and hone a purpose in life is to consider your sentence. Taking that further, writer and educator Naphtali Hoff suggests we build our sentence around four things I call vision, values, verification, and eventuality.
First, recognize prupose is easier to find and live when you have a philosophy of life that guides your choices and actions. So it's important to identify and refine your core values until they're clear and something you're willing to commit to as a moral compass. For Christians, the character of Jesus and the guidance of scripture are the essential place to start.
We exist to honour God. That's your pupose, every day. And that's fundamentally founded on the recognition that you're a small but treasured speck in the universe and beyond. “Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge!” Paul writes in Romans 11. “Who knows enough to give him advice?And who has given him so much that He needs to pay it back? For everything comes from him and exists by his power and is intended for his glory.” That includes us, and the lives we lead.
But to do that, we must also be people of vision with challenging goals and a willingness to work hard to reach them, whether they relate to the shaping of our character, or serving those around us. That means living in submission to the Spirit's power with faith, hope, and intentionality, instead of just waiting for things to happen or fobbing off our responsibility on God. It also means developing patience and perseverance, because few important things come quickly or easily. As Proverbs says, “Where there's no vision [guidance from God], people cast off restraint; but blessed are those who heed instruction.” (29:18)
By verification, I mean that each time we go through a major experience — good or bad — we should take stock of how it affected us. Hoff encourages us to look at how we might've approached things differently, or gotten better results, and to reflect on how that experience relates to our vision and values, to see if we're on target. That's precisely why it's so important for us to pray, reflect, and be accountable to God and spiritual people we trust.
As for eventuality, we should focus on the end of life and work backwards. This concept reminds us we're all going to die and be remembered for something. We get to choose that something. But chances of it being something positive will be much higher is we live each day with our purpose and eternityin mind.
“Remember, we'll stand before the judgment seat of God. For the Scriptures say, 'As surely as I live,’ says the Lord, ‘every knee will bend to me, and every tongue will declare allegiance to God.' Yes, each of us will give a personal account to God.” (Rom. 14:10-12)
So, what's your sentence? A friend of mine has an unofficial one: “Be like Jesus, and don't be stupid.” In my own life, I've adopted two scriptures as my sentence, and failed miserably at both, for the most part. The first relates to resentful followers of John the Baptist who see Jesus drawing people from their mentor. “I'm not the Messiah,” John tells them. “I'm only here to prepare the way for Him.” Then had adds the most powerful part. “He must become greater and greater, and I must become less and less.” (John 3:30)
So it is in my life, too. And I try to combine that purpose with 2 Timothy 1:7, which reminds me that I have backup. “For God hasn't given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.” I guess that's my sentence. “Jesus must become greater and greater, and I must become less and less. For God hasn't give me a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.”
Like everybody else, I'm still a prisoner of sin. We all deserve the equivalent of spiritual capital punishment. Instead, Jesus makes possible a life sentence.
By Rick Gamble. Reprint at will in not-for-profit publications. Originally published in Cross Current, the weekly newsletter of Followers of Christ, an independent, nondenominational church in Brantford, Ontario, Canada. To get these free weekly articles by email, with no strings attached, send a note to Rick at info@followers.ca
