What mistakes are you making? (1)

Words of the wise... should be heard...

Ecclesiastes 9:17 NKJV

It's a mistake not to ask yourself, 'What mistakes am I making?' One leader writes: 'I gave little thought to what might go wrong. I assumed that the 'right way' would be mistake-free. I did not acknowledge mistakes I made to myself, or others. I was not learning from my mistakes. If I wanted to become a better leader, I would have to stop making the mistake of not asking what mistake I was making.' It's not the number of mistakes you make; it's how often you keep making the same mistake. If you want to turn your mistakes to your advantage:

1) Admit your mistakes. Why don't we? Pride: we've an image to uphold. Insecurity: our self-worth is based on our performance. Stubbornness: we'd rather flog a dead horse than bury it and get a new one. Here's a news flash: People already know about your mistakes. When you admit them they're not surprised, they're relieved. They say, 'Phew! He knows. Now we can quit pretending!'

2) Accept mistakes as the price of progress. Learn to view failure as a healthy, inevitable part of succeeding. Nothing's perfect in life - including you! So get used to it.

3) Insist on learning from your mistakes. When you try to avoid failure at all costs, you never learn, and you end up repeating the same mistakes over and over. Those who are willing to learn from their failures don't have to keep repeating them. Author William Saroyan observed, 'We get very little wisdom from success. Learn from science. In science, mistakes always precede the discovery of truth.'

How To Handle Temptation

Submit to God. Resist the devil...

James 4:7 NKJV

When it comes to temptation, remember these seven things:

1) Never say 'never.' You never become so spiritual that you're immune. 'No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it' (1 Corinthians 10:13 NKJV).

 2) Realize you can stumble on the last lap. Because you haven't blown it yet, doesn't mean you can't. Satan is a master of timing, and he's in no particular hurry.

 3) Acknowledge your basic drives. St. Augustine said, 'There is nothing more powerful in bringing down the spirit of a man than the caresses of a woman.' Your flesh is powerful; once indulged it will always want more.

 4) Understand that you are responsible. Sin is a choice. When you choose to abuse God's grace you pay the price, either now or later. 'Do not be deceived… whatever a man sows, that he will also reap' (Galatians 6:7 NKJV).

5) You're not a helpless pawn. You may not be able to change what happened yesterday, but your choice, empowered by God's grace, will determine what happens today and tomorrow.

6) If you've sinned, there's hope. God will forgive you and use you again. Jesus told Peter, 'I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren' (Luke 22:32 NKJV).

7) Stay safe by staying close to God. 'submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.' (James 4:7 NKJV)

Good Things From God

If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! - Matthew 7:11

No father will answer his hungry childs's cry for bread with a stone, or give the child a serpent if he asks for a fish. Even sinful parents have in their hearts something of the image of God's own fatherhood. The argument is from the less to the greater. If a true earthly father, with all his imperfection, will not mock a child's cry, but will respond lovingly, how much more will our Father in heaven do for us?
“How much more?” is a question none can answer. We can only say as much more as the heavenly Father is more loving, and wiser, and more able to give, than is the earthly father. Yet we must explain this promise also by other scriptures. The gate of prayer is set very wide open in this verse, yet those who would enter must come in the right way and seek “good” things.
While no one who asks for bread will receive a stone, neither will one who asks for a stone receive a stone. And many times do we come to God pleading with Him to let us have a stone. Of course we imagine it is bread, and that it will be food to us. It is some earthly thing, some gift of honor or pleasure, some achievement of ambition, some object of heart desire. It looks like bread to our deluded vision. But God knows it is only a cold stone, that it would leave us starving if we were to receive it; and He loves us too well to listen to our piteous cries for it, or to be moved by our earnestness or our tears to give it to us. When we ask for a stone He will give us bread. Thus it is that many requests for earthly things are not granted. Yet the prayers are not unanswered. Instead of the stone we wish, God gives us the bread we need. We do not always know what is bread and what is a stone, and we must leave to God the final decision in all our prayers.