I’ve shared with you how my oldest daughter now has her learner’s permit so she can drive. She’s been doing pretty good. The other day I was trying to teach her about the infamous “blind spot.” I was driving down the highway with her in the passenger seat, and a car began to pass us. When it got into my blind spot, I sped up a little so he would stay there. I then calmly had my daughter look and explained to her how she needs to be careful and always aware so the blind spot doesn’t end up causing problems for her.

I’m sure the guy in the other car called me a few choice words, and my daughter was the typical teenager and acted like she would rather eat glass than listen to my important life lesson. But because I love her and want her to be safe, she got the blind spot lesson.

We don’t just have blind spots in driving, but also in life. The other day someone lovingly helped me see some blind spots in my life. I would have rather eaten glass than listen, but deep down I know if I listen and learn that I will be a better person.

What are your blind spots? Chances are you don’t know, so it is best to ask someone you love and respect and ask them to point out some blind spots in your life. It won’t be fun. But you’ll be better for it in the long run.

My old church met in a school, so we would do the set up and break down every Sunday. I’d be lying if I told you it never got a little tedious, but overall it was a lot of fun and something I didn’t mind doing. I would meet a church member named Oscar at 7am every Sunday, we would hook up the trailer to his truck, haul it the 6 miles to the school, and unload it and begin setting stuff up. It soon became a time I looked forward to, and through the course of that singular purpose we developed a friendship.

Oscar visited our church on the very first Sunday. The truck the church owned actually broke down on that first Sunday and we weren’t able to use it to get the trailer back to the storage unit. Oscar volunteered to pull the trailer back with his truck, and he never missed a Sunday helping out with the trailer after that, unless he was out of town (which wasn’t very often).

Now I am living in Iowa. Oscar was in Indiana on a job, and he “dropped by” to see us. I looked at mapquest, and he made a 496.59 mile trip to drop by. He was here for about 3 hours before he had to head back to Houston. I’m glad he stopped by; it was very good to see him.

Do you remember that thermometer I told you about awhile ago? It is wireless, we have a sensor outside, and the base tells us what the temperature is outside and inside as well as the lowest and highest yet registered. So far the warmest day we have had was 75 degrees, until a couple days ago.

I was outside grilling some stuff for supper and I went inside to get a drink. The base to the thermometer sits next to our fridge, so I glanced at it to see what the temperature was outside because it felt good. I mean I was grilling outside, so it had to be decent. It said the temperature was 90.7 degrees!

I was amazed it was that warm, then I remembered where the sensor was. It needs to be covered so it is out of the weather. I had put it on the shelf underneath the grill with the wire hanging out a couple feet behind it. It was picking up some radiant heat from the grill. It still felt good outside, but it wasn’t 90.7 degrees.

This reminded me of something Jesus said when he spoke about how he is the vine and we are the branches and we can’t do much of anything unless we’re connected to him. We may feel like Superman and we’re invincible and don’t need Jesus, but sooner or later we’re gonna be reminded that we do need him. We might as well make it a point to be connected to him on a regular basis now so we don’t have to go through a potentially painful reminder later.

As a pastor and church planter, it is too easy for me to hit the ground running or get bogged down in details when I should be spending time with Jesus and working on my connection with him so that I can indeed bear fruit. I’ve got to be intentional. How about you?

I went to the Redbox at McDonald’s this evening to return “I Am Legend.” Good movie. I had to wait for a couple minutes because someone else was using the machine trying to rent “27 Dresses.” The machine wouldn’t accept his card.

Anyway, while I was waiting I noticed a young mother who was dining there with her child. The reason I noticed her is because her child was throwing a fit. The kid was sitting in a high chair and couldn’t have been more than a year old, but was making enough noise for 5 or 6 kids. I turned around and looked, and this mother was sitting there with a smile on her face, holding a huge ice cream cone, saying, “No, I need to hold it. No, I need to hold it.” It was obvious that she was sharing her ice cream, but the kid was wanting to hold the cone and eat it all himself. How ungrateful. How immature. But not really surprising.

We expect that kind of behavior from babies, don’t we? I thought it was cool that this young mother was being patient and kind and cool under pressure. I give her props.

But how often do we act like that child towards God? You know what I’m talking about. God gives us a gift, but we focus on what he hasn’t given us. He grants us goodness, but we want so much more and we want it right now, so we view his timing as a lack of compassion.

Do you act like a whining, blabbering, snotty-nosed, fit-throwing kid towards God sometimes? I know I do.

Last evening I went to my daughter’s track meet. She just runs a couple events, so I am only fully engaged for about 3 minutes of the 4 hour track meet. But as I sat there watching, I finally noticed something that is really cool.

Something that has bugged me was how at each track meet so far they run at least a dozen 100 meter dashes. The kids line up, the gun goes off, the kids run as fast as they can across the finish line, then the next group of kids line up and the process starts again. I always thought they were wasting time.

But last night I was actually paying attention and I noticed as each group takes their turn, it becomes obvious that the slower and “less fit” kids are taking part. During some of the other events, some kids are even lapped.

Here is what I have witnessed so far … no kid has ever quit. Even though they do not look the type and are running well behind the leader, they are giving their 100%. They are trying their best. And as these lone runners are making their way past the stands, the crowd claps and cheers and many of their team mates encourage them on as if they were about to set a record and win a gold medal. Very cool. In the big city the competition is so much that these kids would not even be allowed on the team.

I’m glad we’re back in an area where kids can be kids and everyone is part of the team. It’s amazing the things you notice when you pay attention.