Our devotionals during this Sabbatical Segment are all about the idea of being above average. We discovered a little about what that means in each of them.
From Peter and Anna’s combined session – Pursuing Excellence and Feeling Above Average we discovered that it helps to be have a focus in our lives and the importance of ours and other’s feelings.
Our over all focus would be God and what He would like for our lives but then we also have secondary focuses like our academic lives, our family and friends and what we’d like to do in the future. Having these areas thought through and pinned down helps when the distractions try to make us bounce all over the place, the feeling like we’re not getting anywhere and the frustration that goes with that. It also helps us when we struggle with feelings of discouragement. We also were challenged to be a positive influence in other’s lives by encouraging others and only saying positive things. Being nasty has no place in our lives.
Our second week we talked about Thinking Above Average. Wes gave us an illustration of how when we stand with our feet close together and someone pushes us, we fall over or lose our footing easily. Even if we spread our feet slightly we are vulnerable to being knocked over. However if we focus and spread our feet to meet the oncoming force we are very difficult to be knocked over or even budged for that matter. In the same way, if we keep our focus on God and take time to study His word and develop a relationship with Him along with building friendships that encourage us and and guide us we are strong and are not easily swayed by the ever changing, unhelpful and often dangerous whims and ideas the world wishes for us to adopt.
Last week Anna gave us the opportunity to Care Above Average by talking about things we can do for others even if they don’t know we’ve done them. We put together a Month of Random Acts of Kindness Envelope and chose 30 days of ideas of things to do for others. They were ideas to help us start thinking of what we can do for others. Thinking of what we can do for others helps us to get our minds off of ourselves and on to others. When we start thinking of others more than our selves, the world gets better-one person at a time. Are you up to the challenge?
We have two more weeks left in our series. Check in next week to see what the next one is….