Motivation

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Motivation

This is about motivation.

Lately, there have been some days where it has been harder to get up than others.

It reminds me of a time when I was completely without motivation, when I had little desire to do anything and it felt like I had to lift the weight of the world just to get out of bed each day.

Then a switch flipped for me.

The turning point was anger.

One day I lost a lunch break just trying to decide what to eat. I wasted an entire hour brooding over what I had a taste for. There was this unhealthy obsession about what meal would please me the most. I would later realize that what I was really doing was looking for how food could provide enough good to makeup for how bad I was feeling elsewhere in my life, the sadness about my failures, about not measuring up, about not getting ahead, about my marriage…

In the beginning food was a salve. It could make me feel better for a little while. But it’s effect was diminishing to a point where the grief was too great for any amount of titillating tastes, perfect textures, soothing chewing or sheer volume of food to overcome.

On that lunch break I came to terms with the reality that food could not fill the hole in my heart.

Food could not make my life good.

And the Sisyphean task of getting up each morning was my subconscious realization that I was trapped in a cycle of futility. I was being compelled to spend great amounts of time and effort to do things that did not profit me.

I was enslaved.

That infuriated me.

This was my motivation.

I hated the idea of something having that kind of power over me.

The next day, I started eating the same kind of Subway sandwich every day to take thinking about what I was going to eat out of the equation.

The next month, I started and completed the P90X program that my wife bought me, twice.

Six months after that, I started going to the gym and have maintained that routine since then – for 15 years now at the time this was written.

But, it wasn’t a straight line. There were periods of relapse because there was flaws in my motivation. And, I have since realized that it’s easy to trade one tyrant for another.

There was a period that I became religious about what I ate and going to the gym. I still struggle with that to some extent, but I have embraced this truth:

Going to the gym and eating healthy cannot fill the hole in my heart.

Going to the gym and eating healthy cannot make my life good.

“All things are lawful for me, but all things are not profitable.

All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.”
—1 Corinthians 6:12

There’s a near infinite number of things you can insert in that sentence, “X cannot fill the hole in my heart. X cannot make my life good.” Sex, food, alcohol, money, success, friends, children, church…

But, I have found the One who can fill the hole in my heart. I have found the One who can make my life good.

My experience is that whatever is truly good, is always so -it’s good all the time and for everyone everywhere it is experienced (it’s good even for those who are not the primary participants but are affected by it’s secondhand downstream effects).

Good is alive, life giving, growing, unable to be contained, overflowing the deep expanses of my heart.

“Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.”
—James 1:16-17

I have also found that anger is not a sufficient or sustainable source of motivation. Whatever is burning at the heart of that fire, whatever is fueling that anger will be eventually spent.

This is true for a lot of sources of motivation. I once got a full scholarship because I was motivated (pride, stubbornness) by someone telling me I couldn’t. It was sufficient motivation to get me to school but was not enough to get me through school or through the challenges life presented me at the time.

But, “love never fails…”
—1 Corinthians 13:8

My encounter with the love of God expressed in the person of Jesus Christ changed everything. It is changing everything.

I was utterly enslaved, hurting others and being hurt, ignorant of my bondage and without strength to do anything about it.

But since I met Jesus and the Holy Spirit has revealed Him as Lord, I am being set free.

Bit by bit, He’s marching through every corner of my heart, winning territory and tearing down strongholds, the lies, that block the life-giving love of God from shining on and through me.

It’s so good.

My appreciation of His love for me and consequently my love for Him, and you grows every day.

Now my motivation is to make Jesus King.

I am angry about the devastation that I see sin causes and I want people set free from the tyranny of the evil one and the lies of this world.

But above all, I am loved by God, I love Him and I want others to share this wonderful love that I’ve found. Or said more accurately, this wonderful Love that found me.

I want a world where Jesus reigns and He does what He’s doing for me as King.

He alone is worthy to rule.

I am His soldier to this end.

As a soldier, sometimes, when you’re in the trenches and you’ve been there for so long, your motivation can wane, you can forget the mission and lose sight of what you’re there for. I’m peeling potatoes, but I’m not actually peeling potatoes. Whatever job I’m doing is in support of the war effort -a war that ends with Jesus crowned King of Kings and Lord of Lords, where there is no rule that rivals His and He returns all things to God that He may be all in all.

This is why I get up every morning. This is what I use everything at my disposal to achieve: my money, my home, my job, my relationships, my marriage, my life.

This is my motivation: to make Jesus King because I love Him. He is excellent and He rules well.

“Then comes the end, when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when He puts an end to all rule and all authority and power.

For He must reign till He has put all enemies under His feet.

The last enemy that will be destroyed is death.

For ‘He has put all things under His feet.’

But when He says ‘all things are put under Him,’ it is evident that He who put all things under Him is excepted.

Now when all things are made subject to Him, then the Son Himself will also be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all.”
—1 Corinthians 15:24-28

Amen.

How to build a time machine: shared space + quality time + classic…

Originally posted on Facebook on Thursday, November 23, 2023.

How to build a time machine: shared space + quality time + classic music + and a beautiful tour guide from a beautiful time.

On the drive to share Thanksgiving with loved ones, my mother and I had wonderful conversation and deepened our understanding of each other through each other's music. Dorothy Moore, The Manhattans, The Deele… It's amazing how music dates, places and connects us.

It's a moment that will stay with me forever, for which I am deeply thankful. I encourage us all today to focus on such moments, especially such moments with loved ones we've lost, and make more with the people we have.

Happy Thanksgiving.

I think, therefore I am.

I think, therefore I am. I am loved, therefore I live, which is greater. Think about it. If we…

Originally posted on Facebook on Tuesday, November 21, 2023.

I think, therefore I am.

I am loved, therefore I live, which is greater.

Think about it. If we were on this planet alone, all we could do is experience: feel with our five senses, think, know and change the location to do it all again.

This is how I once "lived", just going from one experience to another in an attempt to feel but remained numb, past feeling. This is how we can be animated but not alive -the walking dead.

But to be known and loved by just one other person, changes merely existing and experiencing to living and flourishing.

"For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known."
—1 Corinthians 13:12 (The love chapter)

A well established fact is isolation kills. Satan knows this and has sought to do it from the beginning.

"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,"
—Romans 1:18

God's wrath about sin is not because He's uptight, but because of the death it causes.

Lies block love.

But, Jesus came so that we could have life and life more abundantly (John 10:10), which He defines as knowing God and the one whom He sent (John 17:3) because it establishes this truth: God loves you (John 3:16).

For this reason, Jesus has come to destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8), the love blocking lie.

This is the mission of every believer born into this world, having received life in Christ.

My entire purpose in living is what I've seen in my Lord and elder brother Jesus Christ: to make the love of God real to you.

#perfectourlove

How My Children And Minecraft Taught Me The Only Thing That Matters

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - How My Children And Minecraft Taught Me The Only Thing That Matters

My children have taught me so much.

One of the greatest lessons of my life that I’m still learning came from playing with them a computer game called Minecraft.

Minecraft is like a digital version of the toy building blocks I grew up with as a kid called Legos. But, rather than building an object as you would with Legos, in Minecraft an entire world is generated on the computer that you can build and exist within.

It was a place you could both explore and shape to your vision with resources made available from within the game: wood, stone, metals, gems, crops, animals, etc.. You were only limited by your ambition, your imagination and your computer’s computational power.

We built grand houses and whole villages. We went on adventures spanning great distances across different biomes (green forests, snowy mountains, sandy beaches). We even built machines that automated processes such as harvesting animals into food. We explored and mined vast, dangerous caves to stock our chests with materials and priceless treasure to expand our builds or to use in our next adventure.

Among the heights of items sought after were enchanted diamond tools, weapons and armor. These items were coveted because if you had them, you could practically get anything else. I never achieved this feat, but my much more skilled boys did. It took exorbitant amounts of time, exploration, and great risk to collect all the items required.

We spent hours, sometimes days or weeks building or learning to build our Minecraft world. We even had our own private hosted server (before Microsoft Realms was available) called Blockhaven.

Today, we don’t know where any of that stuff is. The server has been shutdown. The great houses, territories, troves of diamonds, lapis lazuli, ender pearls, the wonderful inventions we worked so hard and invested real time (even real tears were shed) to achieve are all gone. Even many of the memories have faded away. But, the things that remain are the relationships we built and the closeness we developed. They are forever.

Therein is the lesson.

What we learn, what we do, what we achieve, what we build only matters to the extent of what it builds in and establishes with others.

What we build in and establish with others makes everything matter, whether we’re a potato peeler or a Nobel prize winning nuclear physicist. Without it, nothing matters whether we’re a potato peeler or a Nobel prize winning nuclear physicist.

One day, this server that we exist in will be shutdown.

Consider 2 Peter 3:11‭-‬12,

“Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat?”

And, Hebrews 12:27,

“Now this, ‘Yet once more,’ indicates the removal of those things that are being shaken, as of things that are made, that the things which cannot be shaken may remain.”

But, for those in Christ, we focus on what cannot be shaken —the eternal.

“While we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.””
—2 Corinthians 4:18

What is eternal? What cannot be shaken? What can survive the fervent, purifying fire of the coming day of God?

“And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”
—John 17:3

What is eternal, what cannot be shaken, what can survive the fervent, purifying fire of the day of God? Life —to be of the same kind of fire as the coming fire of the day of God, us being set ablaze by the Holy Spirit through faith in Jesus Christ.

“In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.”
—John 1:4

“Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, so are we in this world.”
—1 John 4:17

“Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. For our God is a consuming fire.”
—Hebrews 12:28‭-‬29

The time you get to work does not matter,
That report does not matter,
That money does not matter,
That elite, grand achievement does not matter,
That world changing discovery or breakthrough does not matter in or of itself.
It only matters to the extent of how its done or how its used to build in and establishes with others something eternal.

This is why it is written in Colossians 3:23,
“And whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not to men”

Today, I implore us to believe Jesus so we can truly see what matters: what we build in and establish with others; the only thing that is eternal —relationships and closeness developed in Christ.

What Do You Do?

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - What Do You Do?

My job title doesn’t sound too shabby. Actually, I’m honored to do what I do professionally.

But, I’ve always found the question, “What do you do?” off-putting.

I hate it actually, and I’ve never really understood why, until now.

Ask a flower, or any living thing what it does and the answer is simple and profound, “It passes on life.”

When people ask this question, it’s largely a product of the plastic, manufactured system of this world.

And, when people ask, “What do you do?”, it’s though they’re sitting back waiting to calculate how much respect to give you as though your value is being assessed on the Dow Jones.

The question is essentially asking “What thing do you produce that might be of value to me according to this world’s value system?”

But, we’re not machines on a production line, we’re persons —we’re living things.

And, as with all living things, we’re part of a delicate ecosystem. Something that seems small and insignificant, such as the seemingly benign phytoplankton or the understated honey bee, would spell utter disaster for the entire world if they were loss.

God speaks of us as members of a body, a living thing, having placed each one of us purposefully, as He pleases:

“But now God has set the members, each one of them, in the body just as He pleased.”
—1 Corinthians 12:18

And,

But now indeed there are many members, yet one body. And the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you”; nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” No, much rather, those members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary.
—1 Corinthians 12:20-22

So, we are not machines to produce dumb things to be sold and traded, but we are persons, living things created for a purpose: to pass on life.

And, what is life?

“And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”
—John 17:3

So, the measure of my success is not in the things I produce.

Jesus said,

“Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses.”
—Luke 12:15

But rather, the measure of my success is in the fruit I produce, life being passed along to others.

And to be clear, Christ is the vine. I am just a branch and can do nothing without Him.

“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me.”
—John 15:4

So, when I’m asked “What do you do?”, I will respond with the answer to the better question, “How are you passing on life?”

And, my answer will be a description of however Jesus is producing beautiful life in me in that season, and how I’m sharing it.

I’m doing it now.

“If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you.

By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.”
—John 15:7‭-‬8

Happy birthday Pepper Liddell, one of my favorite and one of the…

Happy birthday Pepper Liddell, one of my favorite and one of the most influential women in my…

Originally posted on Facebook on Tuesday, November 14, 2023.

Happy birthday Pepper Liddell, one of my favorite and one of the most influential women in my life. There. I said it! (I hope you screenshot this Pepper, because it ain't happening again.)

It is fitting that her birthday falls in proximity to our wedding anniversary because without her, we wouldn't be here. It's like God ordained it beforehand, before my wife and I married, before we met the Liddell's and became students in their marriage ministry, before this wonderful woman was even born who is now celebrating 75 years! 75 years where?! (dang it, I was nice again).

We would have definitely been in Atlanta to celebrate this momentous occasion with you if we had not been traveling, celebrating the marriage you, by God's lavish grace through you, helped to preserve. We love you, honor you and pray that God our Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, grants you the grace for many more wonderful birthdays!

Prayer

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Prayer

Prayer is not talking in the air.

Prayer is spiritual.

Prayer is companionship with God

through communication,

“to open into each other” (etymology),

mediated by Jesus (as matter is to sound -without it nothing carries. He is The Way.)

and facilitated by the Holy Spirit (as language is to sound -without it no information is transferred. He is the Spirit of Truth).

God shares,

I share,

to be understood and to understand.

Prayer is sharing that builds on each other and illuminates the hearts.

The purpose is to be clear, to have no darkness at all -the truth in love removing every offense (anything that would cause me or another to stumble – lies block love), to be made one, so that I can walk according to His light, so that His light might shine through me.

“God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.”
—1 John 1:5

To this end, with full expectation,

I pray.

I speak to be seen.

I listen to see.

Because of Christ, God hears me.

Because of Christ, God is a Father to me and so speaks.

“In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name…”
—Matthew 6:9

The Father’s speech is the pressing of the keys of the kingdom in our heart.

“And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
—Matthew 16:19

The more we consume His Word -the person of Christ, the more we work with a full key-board when we pray and the closer, and consequently (God’s love burns away sin), the more clear we become

for His glory.

#prayer #definitions #heartdictionary #heartwords #perfectourlove

Why do we act as though a relationship with God should mean I’m…

Why do we act as though a relationship with God should mean I'm supposed to get what I want and as…

Originally posted on Facebook on Tuesday, October 24, 2023.

Why do we act as though a relationship with God should mean I'm supposed to get what I want and as though it should prevent me from experiencing hardship that's a part of this life?

In what relationship is it acceptable to use someone in such a way, that if I don't get what I want, I call their character into question or question the value of the relationship and stay poised to walk away?

Why do we treat God like this, like someone who is only as valuable as what they can do for me, as someone to be used rather than someone to know and with whom deep meaningful companionship is the prize?

Imagine telling a friend or your spouse,

"If you don't give me what I want or if you allow my life to get too uncomfortable, I'm going to have to go in a different direction…"

I've done that to God.

And, I'm so sorry. I repent.

The treasure is not the conditions, the treasure is Him, and to be with Him through whatever life may bring.

God is such a wonderful friend.

Father, forgive me and create in me a heart that appreciates You, that is satisfied in You, that sees that You are more than enough -more than I could ask or think. Give me Christ's heart, I pray, and for His sake. Amen.

Should Christians Be Passive?

Paul Luckett | Brainflurry.com - Should Christians Be Passive?

Are Christians supposed to be passive?

No.

It’s not that we’re not supposed to fight. The issue is we don’t understand what to fight for.

Christians are big on fighting for all the wrong things; standing up for themselves and their rights.

Does Jesus do this?

No.

But, if you dare come between the Father and His children, Jesus starts whopping folk and flipping over tables.

Is my fight as a Christian for liberty, religious freedom or the…

Is my fight as a Christian for liberty, religious freedom or the American way of life? No. It…

Originally posted on Facebook on Friday, October 20, 2023.

Is my fight as a Christian for liberty, religious freedom or the American way of life?

No.

It makes no difference to me if my adversary wins political power (he already has it) and throws us in prison for what we believe.

My fight is for the family of God and against everything that separates us, as Christ fought. And, what separates us are not issues of liberty, property or political power. It's sin in and between us.

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

As it is written: 'For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.'

Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.

For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
—Romans 8:35-39

Anyone who says otherwise is an enemy of the cross, such as American Family Radio .