Let Your – Smile – So Shine!

Let Your – Smile – So Shine!

by | Oct 26, 2014 | Positive Living, Relationships

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“When I smiled at them, they scarcely believed it; the light of my face was precious to them” (Job 29:24).

You probably know that studies have found that smiling is good for you. Carefully controlled psychological experiments have proven that we are happy because we smile just as much as we smile because we are happy. Smiling – even forced smiling –  has been found to relieve stress, and a 2010 study published in Psychological Science even showed that smile intensity in photographs predicted longevity.

But did you know that at least one study has found that the single most effective thing a person can usually do to enhance his or her relationships with other people is … to smile more often?  So in the title to this post I do not mean to be flippant in paraphrasing the biblical injunction “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16, KJV).  Letting our “light” shine is clearly more than just smiling, it involves our “good works” – the whole range of our behavior and interactions with others – yet if smiling is such an important component of our relationships with others, shouldn’t we indeed smile more often?

We may not be able to find biblical verses saying “Jesus smiled,” but in his classic work The Humor of Christ, Elton Trueblood lists thirty passages showing the humor of Jesus in the Synoptic Gospels. There are many other examples in the Bible of things being said with evident humor that suggest smiles were often present on the faces of God’s servants (for example, 1 Kings 18:27); and verses like “Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy” (Psalm 126:2) had to involve smiling.

The point is, walking in God’s ways should produce smiles at least a portion of the time. This is particularly true because feelings of care and affection are frequently accompanied by smiles – if we are concerned and caring for others we will naturally smile even, sometimes, despite our own circumstances.  In fact, just as experiments have found we can make ourselves happy by smiling, we can also make others happy by smiling at them.  So there are at least two good reasons to be smiling, but it is something many Christians don’t do as often as we might expect.  A surprising number of sincere believers live under  a cloud of seriousness – at its worst it can be an expression of focusing on spiritual problems rather than the answers, though more often it’s just that we forget what an impact a smile can have.

So  keep this in mind when you greet the world. As they say, if you see someone without a smile, give them one of yours. It’s not meant as pop-psychology advice to make you feel better, it’s meant as a small reminder that smiling is a part of letting our light shine. It certainly isn’t the most important part, but it may be the first thing that people notice about us and – as Job mentions in the scripture quoted above –  it may be one of the things they firmly remember.

Do You Need Rapid Responses?

Do You Need Rapid Responses?

by | Oct 22, 2014 | Knowledge & Wisdom

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Emergency services personnel are judged by how quickly they respond to emergencies, Presidents are judged on how quickly they respond to crises, companies are judged on how quickly they respond to customer service requests, and kids are often judged by their peers on how quickly they respond to computer game prompts. In the age of now, speed is king in many areas of life, and rapid responses are desired everywhere.

Unfortunately, fast reflexes and rapid responses are not always  good things. They may look cool in action movies, but when it comes to character and personality traits in everyday life, rapid responses are often counterproductive and harmful.  That’s something that is stressed time and again in the Book of Proverbs – the Bible’s book of distilled wisdom for everyday living. Notice these few examples from some different areas of life:

Proverbs 18:13  To answer before listening – that is folly and shame.
Proverbs 19:2b  … one who acts hastily sins. (HCSB)
Proverbs 21:5  The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty.
Proverbs 25:8  Don’t take a matter to court hastily. (HCSB)
Proverbs 29:20 Do you see someone who speaks in haste? There is more hope for a fool…

It can be a valuable study to look through the verses mentioning “haste” and “hurry” in Proverbs, but it’s not just that biblical book that decries hasty thoughts, words and deeds. Notice what the apostle James says in the New Testament: “Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath” (James 1:19-20 ).

Why is this – why does the Bible so often condemn rapid response behavior? The answer is simply because our first reactions are almost always our most human ones – the ones based in our own human nature; and as a result, our rapid responses can sometimes be rabid responses (Jeremiah 17:9, Matthew 15:19).

The right response often needs time for us to get over our primary emotional reaction – time to get our brain in gear and to remember the principles we have learned of God’s way of life.  It’s only then, after we have taken the seconds, minutes or even hours we may need to arrive at an appropriate response, that we can be confident that our reaction is the right one – and in most of our interactions with others, a right response is better than a rapid response every time.

So take heart – even if you don’t have the super-fast response times of an action hero or a game console warrior – you may be better off with slower responses! In fact, it can often be a good decision to leave rapid responses to the professionals who need them in their work. In our own personal lives we need right responses so much more!

Me, My Selfie and I

Me, My Selfie and I

by | Oct 19, 2014 | Popular Culture

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No matter what the news headlines and what is happening in the world at any given time, the most frequently uploaded type of content on the world’s social media is the “selfie” photo  and information about the person and what he or she is doing at the present moment.  

Now, the fact  that most of us might want to record special occasions or stay in contact with loved ones might well account for a good number of selfie postings, but that’s only a part of it. Selfie production has become an obsession for many. We have become the “Me, my Selfie and I” generation –  a selfie-absorbed generation.  

But the problem with so much of the social media content we are producing – the artfully posed selfies, the tweets of facts such as “I just had my third cup of coffee today”– is not the delusion that other people really care or find this so interesting,  but the fact that we are placing so much importance on what happens to us.  It can be selfie-centered  to a sad degree. You don’t need a degree in psychology to figure out that the more we feed the self, the less likely it is that the self will engage in unselfie-sh  behavior.

Selfie-fixation  is certainly the opposite of an outgoing and other-oriented attitude.  As Christians we know that even Jesus himself said: “I can of mine own self do nothing … I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me” (John 5:30 KJV), and we know that the will of God is that we focus our lives not on ourselves, but on God and others (Matthew 22:37-39).  Focusing on others is hard to do when so much of our time is spent focusing our cameras and our thoughts on ourselves.

So am I saying we should never take selfies and try to selfie-righteously discourage others from doing so? No, of course not.  But I am saying that we can at least use the selfie-fixation in the world around us as a reminder of what  our lives should be about.  If every time we see someone taking a selfie, or we see a selfie on our computer screen, we take a second to think “what can I do today for someone other than myself?” we may keep ourselves very busy, but we may move a little closer to perfecting the increasingly rare, and increasingly important, art of the “unselfie.”

What Pleases God?

What Pleases God?

by | Oct 15, 2014 | God, Tactical Articles

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In Ephesians 5:10 Paul wrote “… try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord,” and it is a clear indicator that we are making progress in the Christian life if we feel the desire to do exactly this.

But what is pleasing to God? Is it just becoming saved, or are we given more specific instructions? If the answer were obvious, Paul would not say “try to discern what is pleasing to God.”  So we must search to find the answer.

The Bible actually lists a good number of things that God finds pleasing, and this is an extremely worthwhile topic for a careful study by searching “pleasing” in a Bible concordance or, more easily and effectively, by searching “please + God” on the BibleGateway.com site – which covers many translations and allows much more flexible searching.  Doing such a study turns up many results, and in a new article “What Pleases God” uploaded today, we  look at just some of the more important answers to the question of what is pleasing in God’s sight.  You can read the article here.

It’s How We End Up that Counts: Manasseh

It’s How We End Up that Counts: Manasseh

by | Oct 12, 2014 | History & the Bible

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              Third in the “Lessons from the Kings” Series

According to the biblical record, many of the rulers of ancient Judah and Israel were exceedingly bad. If we ask “How bad did they get?” the answer might well be “Manasseh.” Manasseh was certainly one of Judah’s worst rulers, yet the end of his story is a surprising and inspiring one.

Manasseh was the son of the good king Hezekiah with whom he seems to have co-ruled in the last years of his father’s life.  He became sole king around 687 BC and reigned for a total of 55 years (2 Kings 21:1; 2 Chronicles 33:1).  His reign was soon after the conquering of the northern tribes by Assyria in 720 BC, and during his time Judah itself was constantly under the shadow of possible Assyrian invasion.

Despite the good influence of his father, Manasseh annulled the religious reforms made by Hezekiah and re-instituted the worship of pagan gods and idols.  2 Kings 21 outlines the extent of his apostasy, telling us that “He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, following the detestable practices of the nations the Lord had driven out before the Israelites.  He rebuilt the high places his father Hezekiah had destroyed; he also erected altars to Baal … He bowed down to all the starry hosts and worshiped them … In the two courts of the temple of the Lord, he built altars to all the starry hosts” (2 Kings 21:2-5).

As if introducing pagan idols and altars into the temple of God were not bad enough, we are told: “He sacrificed his own son in the fire, practiced divination, sought omens, and consulted mediums and spiritists” (2 Kings 20:6).  The Book of Kings also suggests he may have executed prophets of God and supporters of his father’s reforms, for much “innocent blood” was shed by him in Jerusalem (2 Kings 21:16 and see Jeremiah 15:4).

Yet we are given some fascinating further information in the Book of Chronicles which tells us, not surprisingly, that the anger of God was roused against Manasseh and that God caused the king to be led away in chains by the King of Assyria.  Only then did Manasseh apparently realize his folly: “In his distress he sought the favor of the Lord his God and humbled himself greatly before the God of his ancestors.  And when he prayed to him, the Lord was moved by his entreaty and listened to his plea; so he brought him back to Jerusalem and to his kingdom. Then Manasseh knew that the Lord is God” (2 Chronicles 33:11-13).   After his return to Jerusalem, Manasseh cleansed the temple, did away with idols, and re-instituted the worship of God (2 Chronicles 33:14-16).  Despite his earlier evil, Manasseh turned his life around, and his story gives us a flesh and blood example of what the prophet Ezekiel tells us:

“… if a wicked man turns from all his sins which he has committed, keeps all My statutes, and does what is lawful and right … None of the transgressions which he has committed shall be remembered against him…” (Ezekiel 18:21-23).

In these words Ezekiel paints a clear picture of how, if we turn our lives around, what matters is how we end up – a fact by which the repentant Manasseh, formerly one of Judah’s most reprehensible kings, was greatly blessed.