The Lesson Of The Hula Hoop

[Bro. Bill]

READ: Mark 6:34-44

Let us not grow weary while doing good. —Galatians 6:9

One of my favorite childhood toys is making a comeback—the hula hoop. My friend Suzi and I spent hours on the front lawn perfecting our technique and competing to see which of us could keep a hoop circling our waist longer. This year I relived that part of my childhood. While sitting in a park, I watched as children of all ages and sizes tried their hardest to keep hula hoops from falling to the ground. They twisted and turned with all their strength, but despite their exertion the hoops landed on the ground. Then a young woman picked up a hoop. With hardly any motion, she moved it smoothly and rhythmically up and down from her waist to her shoulders and back to her waist. Her success depended on strategic movement, not vigorous motion.

In our spiritual lives, we can expend all kinds of energy trying to keep up with others in service to God. But working to exhaustion is not a virtue (Gal. 6:9). Before feeding thousands of people with only five loaves and two fish (Mark 6:38-44), Jesus called His disciples away to rest, proving that He doesn’t need our frantic exertion to accomplish His work. The truth Jesus taught His disciples, He wants to teach us: Quiet obedience accomplishes more than wild activity. —Julie Ackerman Link

Help me, Lord, not to compare myself and
what I do with others. May I serve where You
want me to serve and do it in Your strength.
I love You and give myself to You.

Jesus wants willingness, not weariness.
Our daily Bread

[bowenarra]

Thank you, Bill!

[Bone Thug]

Thanks, Bro.Bill.

[Ron]

Thank you Bill.

[TimH]

Thanks Bill. This is probably one of the hardest things for Christians to realize. This reminds me of one of the Christian teachers that has impacted my life as a Christian probably more than any other.

Major W. Ian Thomas.
"Christ did not die simply that you might be saved from a bad conscience, or even to remove the stain of past failure, but to "clear the decks" for divine action.

There is something, which makes Christianity more than a religion, more than an ethic, and more than the idle dream of the sentimental idealist. It is this something, which makes it relevant to each one of us right now as a contemporary experience.

Christian living is not a method or technique; it is an entirely different, revolutionary principle of life.

There are few things quite so boring as being religious, but there is nothing quite so exciting as being a Christian!

Eternal life is not a peculiar feeling inside! It is not your ultimate destination, to which you will go when you are dead. If you are born again, eternal life is that quality of life that you possess right now.

The One who calls you to go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature, is the One who by your consent, goes into all the world and preaches the Gospel to every creature through you!

True godliness leaves the world convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the only explanation for you, is Jesus Christ to whose eternally unchanging and altogether adequate "I AM!" your heart has learned to say with unshatterable faith, "Thou art!"

There are those who have a life they never live. They have come to Christ and thanked Him only for what He did, but do not live in the power of who He is.

The moment you come to realize that only God can make a man godly, you are left with no option but to find God, and to know God, and to let God be God in and through you.

The One who calls you to a life of righteousness is the One who by our consent lives that life of righteousness through you!

To live "to and for yourself" is to "walk after the flesh"! To live "to and for Christ" is to "walk after the Spirit"!

Man was so engineered by God that the presence of the Creator within the creature is indispensable to His humanity."

[Cazador]

Thanks for the message!

[Bro. Bill]

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