Month: March 2023

Imagine you are standing in front of a blank canvas, with a palette full of colors and a brush in your hand. You have the freedom to paint whatever you want on this canvas – you are the architect of your own creation. In the same way, you are the architect of your own life and happiness.

If we doubt this, reflect on the words of Jesus, “Ask and it shall be given unto you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened to you.” (Matthew 7:7-8)

With God’s help, you do create your own picture. Even if you are 40 or 80, you still have a blank canvas called the future. What will you paint? What will you do? What will you ask of God?

The choice is yours. 

God has conspired with you to make it so. I love the haunting words from “Life’s Scars” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox. 

“I bargained with life for a penny,
And life would pay no more,
However, I begged at evening
When I counted my scanty store;

For life is just an employer,
He gives you what you ask,
But once you have set the wages,
Why, you must bear the task.

I worked for a menial’s hire,
Only to learn, dismayed,
That any wage I had asked of life,
Life would have willingly paid.”

Lonnie Davis

I call them “Wise-Words.”

You know, those words that are so wise that you feel like they must be in the Bible somewhere. 

Here is one of my favorite: “A luxury once tried becomes a necessity.” In my family, I can start that quote and any of them can finish it. I thought about this truth a lot during the 2008 Olympics. I enjoy watching it on my plasma television in high definition. I cannot imagine watching it on an old black-and-white television or even a 32-inch color TV.

It was long ago, but I remember once when a friend used the phone in our house and was talking to his wife. I heard him say, “They even have a color TV.” Now that which seemed to wonderful to him has become a common possession. We can’t go back to how things used to be. So here is that Wise-word, “A luxury once tried becomes a necessity.” We get so used to luxury that it becomes ordinary to us.

I read about one young bride who was showing her great-grandmother all of the modern conveniences in her kitchen. She showed her a garbage disposal, dishwasher, ice maker, and trash compactor. When she got through she asked her great-grandmother which modern convenience she liked best. Her great-grandmother replied, “I think I like running water the best.”

Not only does a luxury once tried become a necessity, but it also becomes an expectation and an entitlement. We must remember to be appreciative or else our possessions will possess us.

Lonnie Davis

Some of you remember the famous “Cookies Monster.”

In one of his scenes, he is set up to decide between three doors. He can have door #1, which is a beautiful mansion, door #2, which is a million dollars, or finally, door #3, which is a cookie. True to his name, you know what he chose. He chose the cookie!

Life gives us many such choices. We get to choose between the good and the bad, or even the good and the best. We choose between the easy thing and the right thing. We chose between healthy food and fast food. Honestly, this list could be expanded to every time we have to choose to read, exercise, rest, play, study, or whatever. Life is filled with the choices we get to make.

Wisdom is the ability to make the right choice. Where you are in life and where you will be tomorrow is all about your willingness to make the right choices. Unfortunately, too often I have chosen the cookie.  

The brother of Jesus, James said, “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.” (James 1:5).

For more than 50 years I have told people that I wanted to grow to be a wise old man. I wish I had been a wiser young man, but as long as I have life, I can still hope for that final goal. Maybe today’s thought will remind us of the need to be wise and not to choose the cookie.

Lonnie Davis

Faith is not just belief. Faith is a belief that allows one to keep on keeping on, even in the face of failure. Before he was the leader of a nation, Moses was a 40-year-old failure running from the Pharaoh. Before he was a preacher on Pentecost, Peter lied and denied that he even knew Jesus. Before he penned the Gospel of Mark, he offended the Apostle Paul so deeply that Paul would not even take Mark on a missionary trip with him.

It is not your failures that define you. It is how many times you are willing to fail and then try again. Everyone remembers Will Rogers for his great wit and sense of humor. He did not start out as a humorist. He started out as an act that entertained audiences with rope tricks. One day, in the middle of his act, Will failed. He got tangled up in his ropes. Facing people who had paid money to see him do rope tricks, he said, “A rope ain’t so bad to get tangled up in if it ain’t around your neck.” The audience roared. He loved their response to his humor. His failure changed his life.

Failure is not a sin. As the Bible says, “The godly may trip seven times, but they will get up again. But one disaster is enough to overthrow the wicked” (Proverbs 24:16). You have only failed when you quit trying. There is a difference between saying, ““I have failed” and “I am a failure.” Everyone fails, but not everyone is a failure.

~Lonnie Davis

Do you remember the “Easy Button?” Serval years ago, a business promoted its ability to fill your needs by talking about how using them is having an easy button.

I love the “Easy Button.” I wish that every time I had a job to do or faced a difficult task I could just hit an easy button and everything would magically get better. Unfortunately life does not work that way. 

In 425 B.C. any businessman could have sold many such “Easy Buttons” to the Jews living in Jerusalem. In those days Cyrus of Persia allowed Nehemiah to return to Israel to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. As the Jewish people began to rebuild the walls, the nations around them began to threaten them. Fearing attack, they could have made the threat go away by simply quitting the great work. Instead they chose something else. They chose to fight through the threats. The Bible tells us, “Those who carried materials did their work with one hand.” (Nehemiah 4:17a) Why would they work with only one hand? The Bible gives us the answer. They worked with one hand and “held a weapon in the other.” (4:17b)

They did what they had to do to get done what had to be done.

Anytime you start to do something great you will always find people who will try to stop you. The reasons vary from jealousy to who knows what. Great workers know they have to overcome great obstacles. It was true in 425 BC and it is still true today.

If you are not struggling in your work, then you are not challenging yourself. For true greatness there is no “easy button.”

~Lonnie Davis

In 2009 Ms. Thompson was arrested for burglary of a children’s medical center in Torrance, California.

Hers is an unusual case for several reasons: First, because the burglar was a woman. By far the great majority of burglars are men. Second, because she was given three years for her crime. Too many people walk from such nonviolent crimes. Third, because she is eighty!

In explaining her crime, she told the court that if the she had more money coming from the government she would not have to steal. Wow! Her crime is the governments fault.

Unfortunately, she is not the only guilty person to blame their sins on someone else. Here is the problem with her excuse: she was also arrested for theft in 1965, 1977, and for burglary in 1980, and 2008. Her criminal record started 55 years ago, yet this one was the fault of the government for not giving her more money.

She is not so different from most folks. When caught in sin we seek someone else to blame. It is the fault of our mother, our father, our husband, our wife, or whoever else we can find. Until we are willing to accept responsibility for our own actions we are certain to keep messing up.

Many years ago, a teenage girl in our congregation ran away from home. After about a week she came to see me. She told me how hard things had been. She told me that the only thing she did wrong was that because she was hungry and had nothing to eat she stole some food. In reality her excuse for stealing was a snow job. She did not fool me; she fooled herself. She did not steal because she was hungry and desperate for food. She stole because her pride was too great to call her family or even me.

We love to make excuses, but what we need to do is confess our sins and behave righteously.

After the 80-year-old woman was sentenced to three years she said to the judge, “I feel guilty for asking this, but is this a solid three years or is it just half time?” When caught she blamed. When sentenced for her crime she tried to escape the pain.

Don’t do that!

~Lonnie Davis