Love to hear from and know who is listening
When I was a young man I had my eye on many different people that I thought were just so cool!!! As a teen boy I thought these people had achieved the pinnacle of life. I used to think that “Evil Knievel was just so awesome!!! My favorite stunt of his took place in 1974, I was just 9 years old. I watched him strap himself into the a homemade rocket he called the “Sky-Cycle X-2” as he attempted to jump the Snake River canyon. Another person that I idolized was my neighbor, Dale Ruff. Dale was a semi professional drag racer. He lived just a block from my home and every Friday night I listened to the sound of his race car, and so did everyone else on the south side of town, as he tuned it up and got ready for the Saturday night drag races. Dale influenced my life with his actions so much, that when I grew up I built and drag raced for several years. Later in life our relationship grew closer and helped Dale work on his race car and I even got to drive it myself a few times.
You never know how your actions may influence the lives of those around you, your neighbors, friends and especially your children. I have a couple great personal examples of how your life influences those around you. The first example happened several years ago when my daughter, Sophia, was a freshman in college, she called me to tell me that to her dismay she had turned into me!!! When I was raising my children I had many sayings that I repeated frequently one of those was, “Were you born in a barn? Shut the door and turn out the light!” My daughter was living with a roommate that was let's say, maybe not the tidiest person. Sophia told me that she caught herself telling her roommate, “Were you born in a barn? Shut the door and turn out the light!” She immediately realized that to her disgust she had became her father.
The second example happened just recently. That same daughter called me to tell me that her daughter had become her mini-me. She went on to say that her husband on several occasions had told her that her daughter Sydnee was a carbon copy of her. Sophia told me that she always denied that and said they were nothing alike, however on this occasion she was proven wrong. My daughter said she was in the kitchen and her daughter Sydnee was nearby. Little brother Thatcher came into the kitchen and told mom, I took the clothes from the washer and put them in the dryer like you asked me to mom. She looked at him and said “I didn't ask you to do that?” Then noticed out of the corner of her eye that Sydnee was smiling from ear to ear. Sophia asked her, “What are you smiling about?” Sydnee replied “I stood at the stairway and used my nice mom voice and told my brother to take the clothes out of the washer and move them to the dryer so I wouldn't have to.” “He thought I was you mom.”
As people of the Christian faith, we need to make a difference to our families, to our friends and neighbors, and to our community. You are the only Bible some people will read and, you are the only Jesus some people will see.
Galatians 5:13 NIV You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love.
How are your actions influencing your family? How are your actions influencing your friends, neighbors, even strangers? You never know who is watching you!!! Are the things that you say and do bringing others into a closer relationship with Jesus Christ or are your actions driving them away. Here is a great statement to live by: “May someone that does not know Jesus, come to know Jesus, because they know you!”
