Ten Golden Rules

One of my subscribers shared this with me and I thought you would enjoy them too!

1. You should not worry, for worry is the most unproductive of all human activities.

2. You should not be fearful, for most of the things we fear never come to pass.

3. You should not cross bridges before one comes to them, for no one yet has succeeded in accomplishing this.

4. You should face each problem as it comes. One can only handle one at a time anyway.

5. You should not take problems to bed with you, for they make very poor bedfellows.

6. You should not borrow other people's problems. They can better care for them than you can.

7. You should not try to relive yesterday for good or ill, it is forever gone. Concentrate on what is happening in your life and be happy now!

8. You should be a good listener, for only when you listen do you hear ideas different from your own. It is hard to learn something new when you are talking, and some people do know more than you do.

9. You should not become "bogged down" by frustration, for 90% of it is rooted in self-pity and will only interfere with positive action.

10. You should count thy blessings, never overlooking the small ones, for a lot of small blessings add up to a big one.

Finally, give thanks to the Lord, from whom all blessings come.

Author unknown

God-Centered Worship

Doug Wilson shared this with us at our worship service this morning. I hope it is encouraging to you.
Kerry

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Reformed Christians have sometimes reacted away from the man-centered worship of much of the contemporary church, and they have lurched to another extreme, one just as dangerous. If you react away from a style of worship that seems to be saying nothing more than "gimme, gimme, gimme," the temptation is to think that "God-centered worship" means therefore coming before the Lord in order to receive nothing at all. "We come to give glory to God, to focus on Him. We do not come in selfishness, like those others."

But this is extremely wrong-headed. How did we get to the point where we came to believe that implicit declarations of our self-sufficiency, of our lack of a need to receive anything from God in worship, were anything but arrogant posturing.

But of course, Christian worship is a covenantal conversation with God, a matter of giving and receiving. In the act of giving, we receive. And we not only receive, but we receive our life—that which, if we did not have, we would all perish. We know we need it, and we should seek it.

The issue is not whether we receive in worship. Of course we do. We are creatures, after all. The question is whether we are to receive on our own terms, or whether we are to receive from God on God’s terms, in accordance with His promises.

It is not "selfless" to pretend that you need nothing from God, and that you come here only to overflow out of your bounty. It is not "God-centered" to be so theological checked-out that your worship is a mere recitation of all the stuff you already know. It is not really Reformed to thank God that you are not as other men, that you tithe everything, that you fast twice a week, and that you are not like that poor publican in the corner who obviously came to the Temple in order to get something. Those who react that way discover that the poor publican does get something—justification.

from www.dougwils.com