One Month!

OK... I know there are some of you who thought this may be just another time that I said I was going to run, but did not follow through. Well, tomorrow makes 1 month of me keeping a strict running schedule. I have not missed out running one time. I even ran in the rain, which I have found that I actually like doing and ran after an extremely long Wednesday. I am now running over a mile without stopping. In fact I am running 2 miles now, with 2 short walk breaks on the second mile.

Greg gave me a new goal. He wants me to run 3 times for 8 minutes with a 1 or 2 minute break in between. My goal is to be able to run for 30 minutes straight without stopping. Gasparilla is looking more and more like reality! 128 days, 17 hours and 2 minutes to go!

http://www.tampabayrun.com/home_page.htm

Still going

It has now been over 2 weeks and I have still been training. I am able to run 3/4 of a mile now without taking a break. This is a big improvement from 2 weeks ago. I was glad then that I did not die. I have a long way to go, however I really see that I am well on my way to be able to do my first goal which is run the 5K at Gaspirilla.

Confession of a non-blogger

OK... if any of you have tried to follow me through my blog, you will realize that I have not been a blogger. I do write weekly for my e-male. However I tend to be a pretty private person when it comes to my thoughts. This perhaps is due to living a very public life as a pastor. So what I am watching on TV, what I am eating at the moment, and the like is not something that I tend to broadcast.

So I have found a new purpose for this blog. I have decided that I am going to train to run a marathon. Now before you laugh and doubt me. I have already taken some baby steps in getting this going.

1. I have asked Greg Todd to be my personal trainer/motivator/ drill sergeant to get me going. He is a great guy from my church who is a physical therapist as well as a trainer. He himself runs and is working towards qualifying for the Boston Marathon.

2. I have ran for the first time last night. I did 15 minutes. I did not die so that is a real plus. I do realize that I am woefully out of shape. So I am going to use this blog to track my progress. My ultimate goal is to run in the Iron Man Triathlon in Hawaii. But baby steps for now. This should be an interesting journey.

3. I am going to make myself accountable to the men at my church. I am going to ask them to write me and ask me about my progress.

Self Righteous

Let me start by saying that honestly I have never heard of Gov. Spitzer until the scandal broke yesterday. If all of the reports are true, I think that it is absolutely reprehensible for someone to put their family through that. As always, when it comes to this type of situation, the sharks begin to circle. Soon as there is blood in the water, people line up to attack someone when they have fallen. It is no different in the media, or the church unfortunately.

While I believe that people need to pray for his family and for him, it appears that there is something different going on here.

Here is a portion of an article that I read about this incident on AOL news this morning:

The scandal surrounding the man who built his political reputation on rooting out corruption stunned the state. Calls for Spitzer's resignation began immediately and intensified Tuesday with the New York Daily News, New York Post and Newsday all demanding that he step down.

"Hit the road, John ... and make it quick!" read the headline of the Daily News editorial, while the Post called him "NY's naked emperor."

Spitzer retreated from public view Monday afternoon, when he appeared glassy-eyed with his shellshocked wife, Silda, at his side and apologized to his family and the public, but did not directly acknowledge any involvement with the prostitute."I have acted in a way that violates my obligations to my family and violates my — or any — sense of right and wrong," he said. "I apologize to the public, whom I promised better."

In one article I read, one of his opposition said that Spitzer is one of the most self righteous and unforgiving people that he has ever met.

It is no wonder why people have such strong opinions when something like this happens. When someone comes across as unaccepting and unloving, then when they need love and acceptance it becomes difficult to find.

In I Peter 2:11-13 it reads:

"Dear friends, I warn you as “temporary residents and foreigners” to keep away from worldly desires that wage war against your very souls. Be careful to live properly among your unbelieving neighbors. Then even if they accuse you of doing wrong, they will see your honorable behavior, and they will give honor to God when he judges the world."

While I believe that this passage deals primarily about someone's actions, the passage definately speaks about our attitudes, our disposition, and our ability to love and live properly among your unbelieving neighbors. It is not a surprise to me when we get attacked and made an example of when we fall into sin by the world. It is not simply because we messed up. It has more to do with our self righteous attitudes.

I have tried to maintain holiness in my walk with God. Most times I have succeeded, although there have been many times that I have fallen short of God's best. Don't worry, I am not about to call a press conference and admit my "secret sin". It is nothing like that. While I may not have stumbled in the big sins list that seems to be news worthy, I have blown it nonetheless. Truly I am a sinner, saved by grace. Not only have I sinned, but I continue to sin. I am not proud of it, but it is true. I am sure that if someone self righteous is reading this, there first thought may be, "AHA!!! I knew it!" That just goes to show how blind being self righteous can be.

I believe that in the body of Christ many people are convinced that God has called them to be umpires calling balls and strikes, rather than being life guards trying to rescue people. I want to be known as a life guard. I want to rescue people from Hell, not direct people to Hell. As a pastor I call people to live holy lives. I am strong against sin. I hate sin more and more every year that I live. At the same time, it is more effective to love people into the kingdom than judge them into it!

That is the way I see it...

My Personality Results

After reading my lovely bride's post, I took the quiz and here are my results...

You Are An ENTP

The Visionary You are charming, outgoing, friendly. You make a good first impression. You possess good negotiating skills and can convince anyone of anything. Happy to be the center of attention, you love to tell stories and show off. You're very clever, but not disciplined enough to do well in structured environments. In love, you see everything as a grand adventure. You enjoy taking risks for love. And if things don't work out, you're usually not too much worse for the wear! You would make a great entrepreneur, marketing executive, or actor. At work, you need a lot of freedom to pursue your own path and vision. How you see yourself: Analytical, creative, and peaceful When other people don't get you, they see you as: Detached, wishy-washy, and superficial

What's Your Personality Type?

Pride and Prejudice

We find ourselves in a very interesting time in the life of our country. I can honestly say at this moment, I have not decided who I will give my vote to in the upcoming election. I certainly have some leanings, however I am undecided. The three front runners to sit in the highest office in our land our Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and John McCain. There are some people who will not vote for Hillary simply because she is a woman. There are some that will not vote for Barak because he is Black. There are some who will not vote for John McCain because he is considered too old. Each decision unfortunately is based on prejudice, rather than on character or the skill set needed to be the commander in chief.

You can be prejudiced against anyone you feel superior to.

I believe that prejudice happens primarily because of two things. Ignorance and Pride. People who allow ignorance to dictate their life often have many prejudices. The reality is that their prejudice is based on false information. Yes, I am sure many people cite bad experiences that they have had with people in their life. However, it has nothing to do with race as much as it does the character of the person they had issue with.

The second reason for prejudice is Pride. You know what the Bible says about Pride! That God opposes the proud. When you believe that you are better than someone just because of your race or gender or age… your life is filled with Pride. I want to make a statement that is going to come across as very harsh. However, I don’t believe that there is any other way to say it. From my study of scripture and my experience in life, I have a hard time believing that someone who is prejudiced is a true follower of Jesus Christ.

Now, I may give a little wiggle room for those who are ignorant. Ignorant simply means not knowing. But the hate filled bigotry that accompanies many people’s lives is simply inexcusable. Ignorance gives room for someone to change, pride says that you don’t want to, because you some how feel that you are better.

As a local pastor I want to make all people feel welcome – regardless of culture, color or age. We want to be colorblind just as Jesus was. He looked at the hearts of people. I am blessed that at Northside, we don’t simply tolerate being multi-cultural… We CELEBRATE IT!

After all, we are all just dirt. The Bible says that we were made out of the dust of the earth. Pretty humble beginnings for all of us. You didn’t come from the wrong side of the tracks… you came from under them. Now to me it really doesn’t matter if you are grey dirt, or brown dirt, or red dirt, or yellow dirt, or tan dirt, or black dirt. Dirt is dirt! To me it is nothing to feel superior over!

You're so vain, you probably think this blog is about you!

I have often considered writing a book entitled, "Things I have heard at the back door." Many things I have encountered have been unbelievably hysterical. There have been the usual pleasantries of "I really enjoyed that Pastor"; "Good word Pastor"; "that really ministered to me". On many occasions I have heard the "That was just for me" comment. Now while I have never written a message specifically for one person, nor written an article or blog for an audience of one, I am glad when people are able to get a personal message out of it.

However there have been times when people have times when people have misconstrued something that I have said, or even believe I said something that I never even did. For instance, I have had people on several occasions indicate that something I said in a message confirmed something for them. At times this has been innocent. While there have been instances where what they believed they heard actually was not Biblical nor something that I shared. Why do these type of occurrences happen so regularly? Well, I believe that we have not been trained to be better listeners. I know that I have been guilty of this.

Various studies stress the importance of listening as a communication skill. A typical study points out that many of us spend 70 to 80 percent of our waking hours in some form of communication. Of that time, we spend about 9 percent writing, 16 percent reading, 30 percent speaking, and 45 percent listening. Studies also confirm that most of us are poor and inefficient listeners.

Why?

Several reasons are likely.

Even though listening is the communication skill we use most frequently, it is also the skill in which we've had the least training. From personal experience, we know we've had much more formal training in other major communication skills -- writing, reading, speaking. In fact, very few persons have had any extended formal training in listening.

The same is true of informal training. It's not difficult to find workshops and conferences that provide opportunities to improve our writing and speaking skills. But it is difficult to find similar training programs to sharpen listening skills.

Another reason for poor listening skills is that you and I can think faster than someone else can speak. Most of us speak at the rate of about 125 words per minute. However, we have the mental capacity to understand someone speaking at 400 words per minute (if that were possible). I believe that the 275 unspoken words cause most people to daydream or have their thoughts wander just a bit. I even believe that it is possible for the Lord to speak to us in those extra words if you will.

If you are at all like me, I hear an excellent point that causes me to ponder upon it. That one point may lead to several. Many times the Lord really ministers to me in those thoughts. And if I am not careful, I can attribute what I was thinking to the person that was delivering the message. Like I said earlier, most of the time, it is innocent. Other times though, may be inaccurate assessments of a message.
This difference between speaking speed and thought speed means that when we listen to the average speaker, we're using only 25 percent of our mental capacity. We still have 75 percent to do something else with. So, our minds will wander.

This means we need to make a real effort to listen carefully and concentrate more of our mental capacity on the listening act. If we don't concentrate, we soon find that our minds have turned to other ideas. Another good habit is to be a note taker. Try to stay focused upon what the speaker is trying to convey to their audience.

Numerous tests confirm that we are inefficient listeners. Studies have shown that immediately after listening to a 10-minute oral presentation, the average listener has heard, understood and retained 50 percent of what was said.

Within 48 hours, that drops off another 50 percent to a final level of 25 percent efficiency.

In other words, we often comprehend and retain only one fourth of what we hear. We all want to be more than 25 percent efficient. It's not difficult to see the many problems inefficient listeners can create for themselves and others. Poor listening causes us many personal and professional problems.

Ralph G. Nichols, long-time professor of rhetoric at the University of Minnesota shares in his book Are You Listening? the Ten worst listening habits of American people." He says that listening training is primarily eliminating bad habits and replacing them with good listening habits and skills.

Here are the 10 bad listening habits. You'll recognize some that you have and that you can make an effort to correct.

1. Call the subject matter uninteresting

You go to a meeting, the chairman announces the topic or you see it on a program, and say to yourself, "Gee, how dull can it get anyhow? You'd think they could get a decent speaker on a decent subject."

So you've convinced yourself the topic is uninteresting and you turn to the many other thoughts and concerns you've stored up in your mind for just such an occasion -- you start using that unoccupied 75 percent of your mental capacity.

A good listener, on the other hand, might start at the same point but arrives at a different conclusion. The good listener says, "Gee, that sounds like a dull subject and I don't see how it could help me in my work. But I'm here, so I guess I'll pay attention and see what the speaker has to say. Maybe there will be something I can use."

2. Criticize the delivery or appearance of the speaker

Many of us do this on a regular basis. We tend to mentally criticize the speaker for not speaking distinctly, for talking too softly, for reading, for not looking the audience in the eye. We often do the same thing with the speaker's appearance. If speakers aren't dressed as we think they should be, we probably tend not to listen closely or we may immediately classify the speaker as a liberal or conservative, a hippie or a square.

But if we concentrate on what the speaker is saying, we may begin to get the message and we may even get interested. Remember, the message is more important than the form in which it is delivered.

3. Become too stimulated

We may hear a speaker say something with which we disagree. Then we can get so concerned that our train of thought causes us to spend more time developing counter arguments so that we no longer listen to the speaker's additional comments. We are busy formulating questions in our mind to ask the speaker, or we may be thinking of arguments that can be used to rebut the speaker. In cases like this, our listening efficiency drops to nearly zero because of over-stimulation. So, hear the speaker out before you judge him or her.

4. Listen only for facts

Too many of us listen for facts and, while we may recall some isolated facts, we miss the primary thrust or idea the speaker is trying to make. Be sure that your concern for facts doesn't prevent you from hearing the speaker's primary points.

5. Try to outline everything that is being said

Many speakers are so unorganized that their comments really can't be outlined in any logical manner. It's better to listen, in such a case, for the main point. A good listener has many systems of taking notes and selects the best one to fit a speaker.

6. Fake attention

This is probably one of the more common bad listening habits. If you're speaking to a group and suddenly you become aware that most of your audience is sitting with chin in hand staring at you, that is a good signal that attention is being faked. Their eyes are on you but their minds are miles away. We probably have developed our own faking skills to a high point. Let's recognize what we're doing and eliminate faking as a poor listening habit.

7. Tolerate or create distractions

People who whisper in an audience of listeners fall into this category. Some distractions can be corrected (closing a door, turning a radio off) to improve the listening atmosphere.

8. Evade the difficult

We tend to listen to things that are easy to comprehend and avoid things that are more difficult. The principle of least effort will operate in listening if we allow it to do so.

9. Submit to emotional words

We're all aware of the emotional impact of some words. Democrat and Republican are emotional words for some people. So are northern and southern for others. There are hundreds of examples. Don't let emotional words get in the way of hearing what a speaker is really saying.

10. Waste thought power

Nichol's 10th bad listening habit is the one he feels is most important. It is wasting the differential between thought speed and the speed at which most people speak.

Nichols says there are three things that you can do to help yourself stop wasting thought power and become a better listener.

One is to anticipate the speaker's next point
If you anticipate correctly, learning has been reinforced. If you anticipate incorrectly, you wonder why and this too helps to increase attention.

Another is to identify the supporting elements a speaker uses in building points. By and large, we use only three ways to build points: We explain the point, we get emotional and harangue the point, or we illustrate the point with a factual illustration. A sophisticated listener knows this. He or she spends a little of the differential between thought speed and speaking speed to identify what is being used as point-supporting material. This becomes highly profitable in terms of listening efficiency.

A third way to improve yourself as a listener is to periodically make mental summaries as you listen. A good listener takes advantage of short pauses to summarize mentally what has been said. These periodic summaries reinforce learning tremendously.

In summary, most of us are poor listeners for a variety of reasons. We have had little training and few training opportunities exist. We think faster than others speak. Listening is hard work.

We've listed some ways to improve skills
to concentrate, to summarize, to avoid faking, and others. Just as important are your attitudes -- be positive, concerned, sincere.

It's a challenge to be a good listener. But good listeners get big rewards.