You Must Choose, but Choose Wisely

It is a blustery day out. The lake is a shade of grey that matches the sky except for the chaotic ripples from the wind on its surface.

Despite what some would call a nasty day (I rather like it; its cozy), I am in a happy and positive mood. I am ever discovering the power of our ability to choose our own thoughts; the ability to choose our own attitude. It is something I have learned being under Terry and David's ministry, but the reality of this is starting to really impact every part of my life.

Now, I have heard it my whole life from parents and individuals, yet somehow all but one or two of those individuals actually utilize their ability to choose. I feel that choice is the greatest gift that God gave man that makes him godly. Our creative ability (‘man was created in the image of his creator’, which makes him creative) is the ability to choose; to choose our thoughts, to choose our attitudes. And what we choose manifests in us, and then around us.

This is our godliness, but it seems like so many people scratch the surface it this Law of Choice (often known as the Law of Attraction; you attract to you your thoughts, feeling and emotions.) It seems as if most people choose their attitude, but from the perspective of victims or losers.

They say things like, “I am choosing to be happy in spite of everything going on around me,” instead of, “I am happy and everything is going well for me.” It is as if they focus on the negativity in their life as being ‘real’ and are ‘trying to stay positive.’ Prayer and faith are much the same for most people.

I believe that we create our reality through prayer and faith. I believe that many of the principles that one can understand under the terminology Law of Choice are the missing ingredients to prayer and faith.

I believe that there is a depth where our creative ability goes much father than that. I believe that prayer, faith, and what I am terming the Law of Choice are all the same thing. People’s minds can grasp a Law and principles. They have difficulty grasping what we now know as faith and prayer.

The Law of Gravity is readily understood, and I think that the Law of Choice is just as predictable and regular gravity. We just have to receive it and walk out under its pull.

The ability to choose our own path, our own world, starts with us overcoming our current frame of mind. That is a simple thought, however to practice it is hugely difficult. To overcome our paradigm and take on a new concept of ourselves, a new identity, may be the most difficult part of the Law of Choice.

That is why so many teachers of success like Terry Kruse, Bob Proctor, Norman Vincent Peale and Napoleon Hill all say “Start with your Why!” You must start with your real, big huge dream. The reasoning behind this is that it is a shortcut to a new paradigm.

It is difficult to explain how to change your paradigm to someone who never has. It is easy to take them to a new paradigm by focusing on their dream. When an individual sees themselves in their dream home, driving their dream car, and living their dream life, they are taking the very first steps to having a new paradigm. They are seeing themselves in a new light.

That IS the Law of Choice! You are choosing to align your thoughts (which, on a long enough time line, will ultimately translate into action that will take you there) with your dream self!

So, today, write down your top 100 things you want to do, be, see, travel to or have. Don’t stop until you have 100. Then, write down the Number 1 top goal on a note card or piece of paper.

Focus on it all day. Every chance you get. When something negative happens, glance at it. Allow yourself to sense how that thought can take you from a negative state of mind to a positive state of mind.

Do this all day long, and before bed, just dream about that thing again to get your brain working on it all night. Then, when you wake up tomorrow, tell me how you feel!

The Name

"Now I know that the Lord saveth His anointed;
he will hear him from His holy heaven with the saving strength of his right hand.
"Some trust in chariots, some in horses,
but we will remember the name of the Lord our God."
Psalms 20:6-7

I was stopped when I read this again (for the 100th time!) I like it a ton, but it finally hit me: the psalmist is not comparing the strength and might of the Lord God with the strength and might of the tools of this world. He is comparing the NAME of the Lord with the tools of this world.

“We will remember the NAME of the Lord,..”

Just the mere mention of God’s name should stop chariots and horses. Trust, confidence and that overwhelming sense of victory should arise at the slightest reference to that name. For the author of this psalm anyway, he had a reckless confidence in just the name of God.

I imagine him on a battlefield with the enemy bearing down with all of their war machines; arrows in hand with the bows stretching taunt, horses frothing and breathing in step with their pounding hooves. Trumpets blasting the sound of the charge barely drown out the din of war elephants sounding the alarm. Chanting from the foot soldiers adds to the calamity.

Then, this one guy, a poet-warrior leaning on a rock watching all of this effort straightens himself and says “Jehova.”

The animals all stop instantly. The war elephants settle and the charging horses slow to a trot and stop. The archers look back and forth at each other and loosen their bows. Generals look at the animals in total confusion, then their eyes drift across the field to this lone warrior-poet-king.

The pagan priest, knife in hand over a lamb, stops cold to see what the newly awkward silence is. He looks over his shoulder away from his false altar. All that can be heard is the bleating of the lamb.

That is the name of the Lord.

Technological Overload

What are we going to do?

Information is flowing so fast, communication makes us accessible at any time, leaving one no way to focus for more than 15 minutes. Our forefathers could focus on a goal for days and weeks on end usually without interruption. No cell phones to interrupt the walk in the forest. No e-mails that “Urgently” caused them to reply instantly. Business was done at the pace of the mail.

Now, we have 2 or 3 conversations with one person at one time. An e-mail comes to us. We reply quickly. Then we think of something else to say. We send a second reply. But, at the same moment, the receiver’s e-mail arrives in our inbox. We reply to that, and they reply to your second e-mail. Now, instead of taking a day or so to think about how to word an intelligent response, you have two conversations going with someone. Instead of being patient to hear back from your correspondent, you “throw the ball in their court” to respond as quickly as possible. If you can’t reach them instantly, you can Skype them, chat with them, and, to make sure they know that something is pressing, you text it.

Is anything so important to disturb one’s quiet time? Children are unfocused, people don’t know why they do things because we don’t allow them time for them to develop their own thoughts.

We have to insist,..No. We have to fight, rather, for quiet time. Business is so much better now that it is global. Other people are working while you are sleeping and vice versa, yet when we awake, instead of morning meditation or a quiet cup of coffee in the brisk morning air to gather our thoughts, we reply to e-mails that are “urgent”.

As a boy, I used to rise early in the morning and go surf before school. Then, I would return, grab some breakfast, and head to school to sit through class. I had a week for each assignment. Now, it seems our class assignments are due by lunch in the professors’ inbox. More information must be consumed.

When I surf after I have done e-mails, it is like little electron parasites are in my blood and taint my thoughts for the rest of the day.

More money can be made, but more information must be handled. We know that the average person needs more than one job to keep up with the speed of information, the speed of economy, today. So, now, instead of that technology giving us more freedom, we have to become a contractor, just so we can juggle 6 clients.

And the sad part is, we only do the base minimal things that client is asking for because of the need of "now".
Client 01: “Change this period.” Period changed. Just ignore the crappy coding.
Client 02: “Could you replace this picture?” Picture changed. Ignore the fact that the layout would be better if you brought out the blues and made it off-center.
Client 03: “did you send me your resume?” Resume sent. Skip updating the current address. They will just e-mail me and when they have to pay me, they will simply ask me via e-mail. It is quicker than thinking to look at the resume.
Client 04: “Did you come up with a layout for the new site?” It has been uploaded. Thank God I just bought a template to work with. It is free and easy, though artistically a 5th grader could do better.
Client 05: “Did you book my tickets to Nairobi?” Booked. Confirmation code. I don’t know if they have customer service, but they must be good because it was the top of the Google list.
Client 06: “What was that website?”

Client 01: “Hey, you forgot to change that period.” Oh crap, I raced on to the picture change, and sending my resume, I forgot that.
Client 04: “You didn’t answer your phone. I need..”
Client 03: “I forgot…”

Balls are getting dropped. Where did finesse go? Where did taking our time to do a good job go? I know the older generation would say ‘well, you have too much on your plate?’ I would say, no, I am working with so many clients because I can’t afford to put anything on my plate!

I know that there is a lot on the plates of this Information Generation, but that is only because we are expected to not only move at the speed of information and adapt, but we are expected to do as good of a job as they did when they had at least a day, if not a week to do the same task. ‘You have computers now,’ they reply. ‘You should be able to do it.’ NEWS FLASH: Not even my techno-savvy generation cannot adapt fast enough to keep up with technology today!!! Hey, down here, in the trenches! I am telling you point-blank that what was good enough even last week isn’t good enough today!!!

A new program is invented every 10 minutes that is better, faster, and more efficient. It took you how long to learn punch-card inputs for your room sized computers? That is 6 new programs an hour, 144 new programs a day (globalization, remember?), 1008 per week (nope, no days off; you will fall behind because others are working on Sundays now too; Saturdays are the new Fridays, right?), 4,032 new programs a month, and 12,094 per quarter. Why did I stop at 3 months? Information will be traveling faster by then, and the rate will have grown exponentially. (Read more about the speed of information.)

I MISS taking my time to put TLC into my HTML! I miss taking time to read a chapter to improve my skills. Or, bless the Lord, a fictional NOVEL! I get my education from an RSS feed!

Now, the managers ask for a good, quality job, but they don’t want to give you the time,..forget the fact that they are still paying $8 an hour!

All I am trying to get at is information overload. People, good, stable, balanced people who are truly cut out for greatness are swamped in information overload. They need space to think. Technology is supposed to allow for MORE flexibility, not constrain us.

I don’t need an electron-induced virus stealing the pleasure of dropping into a wave. I don’t want my mind at the felt cubicle when the cool breeze is blowing my hair, the warm water is rising and falling, and the sea gulls. It is a battle for the mind right now.

We need to use technology to be able to free ourselves, free our minds.

Do People Go to Hell for Eternity? N-O

So, do they? Do people go to hell for eternity?
NO!!! A big FAT whopping N-O!
I declare to you that no one will spend eternity in hell.

Grant, how can you know anything like this? What revelation do you have, Grant, that would dispel hell from a possibility for our future?

Good question.
If one will look in Revelation 20:14, they will find (in the King James Version):
"and death and hell (hades) were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death."

Now, one will then reply, 'Grant, well, even though no one will spend eternity in hell, they will spend it in the lake of fire. So what's the difference?'

I only point this out to A) rile some religious devils and B) to bring to light that if we as believers have false beliefs in something like this, we need to assess what else we have false beliefs in.

How much doctrine is based on"Hell"? Does anyone every think of the play Heaven's Gates and Hell's Flames? That play is as scary as H-E-double hockey sticks. Many will say they were saved having seen it, or have seen many come to the Lord by it. Ok. Whatever. No argument here.

But, why not say Heaven's Gates and the Lake of Fire's Flames? (Well, that's not really catchy, huh?) Well, other than for marketing purposes, why do we use the false doctrinal fear of spending eternity in Hell?

I will leave that question to fall rhetorically on the pharisees of our day, and let the point marinade in you.

If you are currently teaching a doctrine that is based on a fear of eternity of Hell, what other parts of your doctrine need to be checked?