Month: May 2016

Travel agents serve many useful purposes in our fast paced lives. Ideally, they will find us the best deals available to travel across the country, or the world. Do you want to find the best package for you and your family to take a fun trip to a famous theme park?  Perhaps they will have the deal you’re looking for.  If you are looking at a nice warm cruise to Mexico or the Caribbean, then give your agent a call. Yes, a travel agent can take us to many wonderful locations. They can help us plan our business trips in the most cost effective ways.  They can be great, perhaps even essential.  But there is one destination we should all want to go. The final destination. Where we want to travel when our stay on earth has concluded.   An all expense paid, one way trip to heaven.  The travel agent can’t help us with that.  In fact, no one can.  We can’t even help ourselves.  There is only one secure Carrier that can take us there.  He is the ONLY way, and all we do is trust Him to take us there.  He does all the flying, we just board the flight.

  A sad reality is too many people, even many who profess to be Christian, think that Jesus is just a choice among many to take them to heaven.  They think they can look through the best travel guide, and take their flight to heaven, by any means they want.  They seem to believe that the most important decision of their life, choosing where they will spend eternity, they have choices, like choosing which airline to take them from Dallas to Phoenix.  Many people think that Jesus is just one of many spiritual airlines that can take them to heaven, such as Buddha, Mohammed, meditation, Wicca and others. Some think that it doesn’t matter which “flight” you take, that sooner or later, we will all arrive in heaven.  Of course what the other options require in their travel guides is that you better be a perfect passenger through the entire trip.  That is among the many problems of the other “choices”.  Additionally, you must take charge of some or all of your traveling arrangements.   These people aren’t trusting Jesus to get them to heaven on His own.  But, when we do choose Jesus, He does all of the flying for us.

   With most of our travel plans, it doesn’t matter too much which ship, plane or train we take, there isn’t that much difference. But…..if you are trying to get from this life, to eternal life, you better make sure you are trusting the right Carrier to get you there.

  Jesus is not A CHOICE among many carriers to get us to heaven, He is the ONLY CHOICE.  He is THE CARRIER, the ONLY CARRIER.

It seems like it happens all too often.  I hear a song being played on the radio or at an event of some type, and though I may have heard it countless times before, if I don’t already have it in my music library on iTunes, or own the CD, I must have it.  Today was no exception. After I ran the Turkey Creek Festival 5K in Merriam KS, and waiting on the results, the DJ played an old song by The Turtles, Happy Together.  Just seemed like the right song for the moment at the right time.  So sure enough, I had to add it to my collection.   I think it will be a great song for running, sort of a warm up song as I begin a run.  I am old school when it comes to my music, (you could say I was old school today with my miserable finish time at the race). What’s happened to the classics?  I would have a hard time counting on two hands, enough secular songs written after 2,000 that I really enjoy. (There are tons of Christian songs from all eras I love)  But hey, if you like your music laced with foul, perverse, sexual language, and I don’t, there may be thousands of musical choices for you, sad indeed.

It is almost time.  Tomorrow at 8AM, while many people, assuming they are awake, will be chowing down on a stack of pancakes, or a bowl of corn flakes, I will be running in the 31st annual Turkey Creek Festival 5K run in Merriam KS.  It has been a while since I have entered a road race, and I’m hoping that this summer I will have a long list of races run.  I love running, it is a healthy habit, and something worthwhile to do on a Saturday morning.  And it is not just the running itself, though there is nothing like a runners high. For me, there are so many little extra perks in a road race.  From the initial registration, where you have paid a fee which is usually non-refundable, so you’ve committed yourself. Some may argue people who enjoy running in a race should be committed, but I digress. Then there’s the package pickup, where you get your bib number, electronic chip, your tee shirt, etc.  Then comes the big day, you are lined up near the start line, never sure where you should place yourself.  “Do I position myself near the front, only to get passed by a hundred people in less than a minute”.  “Do I start at the back of the line with the walkers?”  Usually, I try to be somewhere in the first 25% of the runners, and try to finish in that order.  It should be fun tomorrow, I don’t expect a stellar time this race, this will be my practice for more races this summer.

Well, I am back.  It has been a long time since I used my blog site, but here it is for better or worse.  It has also been a while since I ran a road race, but, that will change as I will  be running in the Merriam Turkey Creek Festival 5K in Merriam KS this Saturday.  This is one of the more difficult road races of the 5K’s I have run before, so maybe I should have chosen an easier race to get my feet wet, or blistered again.  But, nothing ventured, nothing gained, right?  Or is it, “stupid is as stupid does”?  And yes, I have heard the other Forrest Gump quote many times directed to me about my running.  “Run Donnie run”.  But when I received the flyer for this race, I noticed something interesting, if not a bit disturbing. Every racer gets a finisher medal.  I am not big on participation awards, trophies, etc., unless, as in the case of this race, there are also medals for finishing in a top tier.  Otherwise, where is the motivation?   At any level of a competition, there should be awards for winning, or placing.  If they want to give medals just for finishing or such, that is fine, but don’t let that be the only recognition.  I have run in many races over the last few years. Two races I have run in, I finished 3rd in my division, and got a medal, that meant something.   Three other of the races I have run in, I received a medal just for finishing. Two of those were four mile races, which is slightly longer than a 5K.  They mean nothing more to me than to remind me I ran in the race, cool looking as they may be.  Another of those was for a half marathon I ran, that means a lot more to me, as some people don’t finish, and countless more don’t even try.  But what if even in that race, they gave only finisher medals to everyone, regardless of where they placed?  The people who finished well ahead of me and placed,  would rightfully feel slighted. I finished in the middle of the pact, probably 5,000 in front of me and 5,000 behind me. Competition is an essential motivator in all aspects of life, otherwise, where is the fun, where is the motivation.  Otherwise, we have socialism, that doesn’t breed competition or excitement.