Timothy's Thoughts

T here is a thing that is bothering me. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but many young people aren’t taking on the responsibility of adulthood. I’m taking it out of context to use it this way, but I am reminded of I Corinthians 13:11, “Whan I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things.” A preacher friend, Bro. Fox, once quoted that verse to me. He and his wife were like a third set of grandparents to us and I learned a great deal about leadership and Christian service from him. I look around and I see young men—and perhaps the young women are worse than the young men—who have failed to mature, as they ought. They reach the age of eighteen, head off to college and instead of taking on the responsibility like they should, it is just like high school without parental supervision. I heard a man that I would guess is in his forties say, “Don’t call me Mr. Smith; that’s my father.” Literary agent Rach...

I ’ve heard it said that 90% of what a person will learn in his lifetime he learns before he turns age five. I figure that statement is just one of those things that someone threw out there to highlight the importance of teaching young children rather than having much basis in fact. Even if someone attempted to back up this claim with a scientific study, the big question is what you consider to be learning. Young children learn a lot. They learn to talk. They learn to walk. They learn to dress themselves. They learn to draw and paint. Some may learn to cook. They learn to play together and share. They learn to turn on their favorite television shows. They learn all of this before they turn five. But people learn throughout much of their lives. Whether we realize it or not, we’re learning something new every day. Look at all the people who can talk coherently about which professional athletes will have a good season or why a trade is going to ruin a team’s chances. It’s debatable how ...

L ast week, I alluded to the fact that pride looks for one’s own success at the expense of others, while humility seeks the success of others. I was speaking primarily about authors because authors struggle over the issue of praising their own work. Looking at my own work, the two non-fiction books are very clearly books that are designed to help other people. But it’s never so clear when we look at novels. If our goal should be to help others, what should a novelist be doing? The traditionally published author can say he’s helping the publisher’s employees put bread on the table. But even the most haughty author can make that claim. We would hope that there would be something significantly different between the haughty author and the humble author. If the author puts aside pride and takes on humility, we would like to see some change that takes place in the way he does things. With novels, it’s all about the story, so any difference will show up there. I think the difference betwe...

I f you want to get God upset with you—and I mean really upset—take credit for the things he has done. That’s pride . Isaiah 42:8 says, “I am the Lord; that is my name. And my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images.” When we lift ourselves up with pride, we try to take God’s glory. The Bible gives many examples of blessings lost because of pride. Recently in some writer circles, the topic of pride and humility came up. Some writers are opposed to false humility, referring that people would just say what they really think of their work. Honest pride seems better than dishonest humility. And when you consider how the publishing industry is structured, I can understand that feeling. Writers who are trying to succeed have to promote their work. But some people have the idea that it isn’t pride if we let others validate our work rather than just saying we think it is good. Look at what happened to Herod in Acts 12. He gave a great speech to some visitors an...

A uthor Jeremie Kubicek recently stated on Michael Hyatt’s blog that if you are a leader, your followers will be asking “Are you for me, against me, or for yourself?” I agree with what he says, to a point, but it seems to me that it may not just be your followers who ask that and how they answer that question may determine whether they are willing to follow you or not. In any case, that is certainly true with books. If you are an author, one thing you want to know is why people aren’t reading your books. I visit the forums on Amazon.com occasionally. I participate until the conversation gets old and then I stay away for a few months. One of the things I’ve noticed is that people on the forums hate authors who self promote their books, even to the point that some become angry if an author even mentions he has a book. If we look at this as a moral issue, there’s nothing wrong with an author self-promoting a book on Amazon.com. The whole reason Amazon.com provides a forum is to sell st...

R ecently, Michael Hyatt blogs about The Benefits of Playing Full Out . In that post, he begins by saying, “I attend a lot of conferences and meetings. I have noticed that most people play it safe in these settings. They are reserved—arms crossed and skeptical—or simply distracted, hunched over their smart phone. Precious few take the plunge and play full out.” But rather than focus on what attendees ought to be doing, I’m more interested in the question of what we can do when we are speaking to a crowd like that. We can’t send the audience to a conference attendee training session before we start and yet, a speaker’s success requires that the audience learn. The crossed arms and skepticism, as well as playing with the smart phone, are protective mechanisms. Instead of faulting the attendees for fearing things we think they ought not fear, if we want to engage the audience, we must become the protection. One thing people fear is the dunce cap. In a room full of people they don’t ...

W oodrow Kroll coined a word which he used on Back to the Bible, oughtness . He used it in relationship to prayer, in that we ought to pray. He defined oughtness as "that inner sense of obligation to obedience that many Christians find annoying and therefore unheeded." In the context of prayer, we sometimes find it difficult to pray because we pray and it seems like nothing is happening or we feel like we don’t have time. But we ought to do it. One of the things that stood out from what Woodrow Kroll said is that he made a distinction between oughtness and legalism . It would be easy enough for us to make this into a legal requirement for religious practice. We might tell people, pray three times a day or God won’t bless you. But it isn’t a legal requirement. It is just something we ought to do. But oughtness applies to more than prayer. There are a number of things that I see church people doing or not doing that bother me. Some of it is things clearly defined in the ...