Basic Truths | Finding God in Everyday Life

 I’ve spent much of my life in school. 9 years of elementary school, 4 years of high school, 4 years of college, one year for my Master’s degree, 2 years for my pre-med courses, and 4 years of medical school. I’ve taken a lot of tests over the years, some of them stressful, others pretty easy. I never questioned the idea of taking tests. I’ve actually found them useful because they forced me to really try to understand the concepts that I was supposed to be learning.   The object of the tests we take is not for us to fail but to help us grow in the knowledge of whatever subject we are learning. They help us understand where we need to improve. In the same way, the trials in our lives serve a purpose. God doesn’t allow them to occur in order for us to fail the test but to strengthen our faith and draw us closer to Him. As Peter wrote to the early Christians who were being perse...

  I’m a procrastinator. I have a hard time finishing projects that I start. I have to write out a “To Do” list and stick to it in order to get things done. I find it hardest to do those things that require multiple days of consistent effort to finish them, rather than things that can be done with a big effort in a single day.   The Jews were allowed to return to Jerusalem from their exile in Babylon in 538 BC. They rebuilt the walls around the city and rebuilt their homes. However, the temple had still not been rebuilt eighteen years later. God sent a message to the people through the prophet Haggai, “Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your paneled houses, while this house remains a ruin?” (Haggai 1:3). God went on to say that the poor crops and other problems they had were due to their neglecting the temple in favor of their own lives. Once the people started the work, God promised them, “From this day on I will bless you” (Haggai 2:19).   Has God be...

  Every so often, I think back to my days as an intern at John Peter Smith Hospital in Fort Worth. For those of you not from the area, JPS is the county hospital for Fort Worth and surrounding communities. I was doing my Emergency Medicine rotation. Due to a quirk in the schedule, there was a time each week when I was the only doctor in the ER. That’s right – Medicine, Surgery, Ortho, GYN, Trauma – just me. I felt like a pinball. One day, I was stat paged overhead to the trauma area, where I found a patient in the midst of a medical crisis. We started to work and I felt okay until somebody told me that the patient was a close relative of a VIP. I suddenly felt very inadequate. I kept working, but I asked the staff to get the head doctor for the ER down here STAT. Fortunately, everything turned out well, I kept my job, and went on to finish the rotation and the year.   We will never be at peace as long as we feel inadequate, i...

  I used to love to watch the old game shows. Some of the shows had a basic premise that the contestants had to agree on an answer in order to win. I remember watching the Newlywed Game and seeing couples argue about whose answer was correct. Most of the time I could tell that the arguments were mostly in fun but sometimes I’d watch a couple and wonder whether their marriage would last.   Paul wrote to the Philippians, “If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose” (Philippians 2:1-2).   Paul admonished the Corinthians, “I appeal to you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought. There are quarrels among you…..O...

  Those of you who have been around me long enough know that I don’t like talking to a computer on the phone. The answers the computer gives me never seem to be responsive to what I’m trying to do and I find myself getting more and more frustrated so that, by the time I get to talk to someone, I’m not a very pleasant person anymore. We all tend to get a little aggravated when the answers we get, whether from a customer service representative, repairman, coworker, or family member, are not what we wanted to hear.   I find the story of Jesus and the Canaanite woman to be one of the most fascinating stories in the Gospels.   It’s the only story I know of in which someone speaking with Jesus got to have the last word. The woman asks Jesus to heal her daughter. Jesus declines, saying “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs” (Matthew 15:26). The woman doesn’t take offense at being referred to as a dog; rather, she replies, “Yes, Lord, but even ...