I’m preparing for my summer break and excited about the books I’ll get to read during my time off.  One of the books I’m looking forward to reading is entitled, “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There” by Marshall Goldsmith.  I picked it up at our local Half Price Books and have been anxious to see what it has to say.

Just the title gets me thinking about so many people who believe for different results while they perform the same actions.  I heard that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

Here’s one of the things that holds people back from obtaining all God has for them – lack of faith.  Hebrews 11:6 tells us that we cannot please God without operating in faith.  If it is impossible to please God without faith, then why don’t we activate it?  Instead, many are displeasing to the Lord because they fail to step out in faith.

What are ways to please God with faith?

• Believe God for healing
• Volunteer in a regular ministry
• Listen for His voice then do what it says
• Go witness to someone about Jesus
• Teach a class even though you feel inadequate
• Go pray for someone even though you feel uncomfortable

God responds to people of faith!  If you are wanting to go to the next level with God and see Him move in your life in incredible ways, then don’t just keep doing what you’re doing and expecting different results.

What do you need to do different to achieve different results?

If I could give my best advice to any parent and only had one shot at it, this is what I would say, “focus on being more than doing.” In other words, what you are is more important than what you do. Most of the time we go around asking, “What can I DO about raising a teenager, or getting my child to cooperate, or not drive me nuts?”

Instead of spending so much energy looking into techniques and tools to manipulate our children into doing what we want them to do, I think we’d be better served focusing on modeling. If we would model the right behavior then our kids will know how to react when things don’t go their way. Warning: this also works in reverse, when we show bad behavior, it teaches our kids negative ways to respond to circumstances.

Christianity is not just a weekend sport. It needs to take place as a daily lifestyle. When it does, it produces a powerful example of how to be instead of what we do. Instead of just church being what we do, it’s who we are that matters most. Let’s focus on living it in front of our kids! Isn’t this the tough part?