Keys to the Kingdom

I have an outgoing and upbeat personality, but I sure didn’t act like it on my first day of first grade back in 1964. Since kindergarten hadn’t been invented yet, I was venturing into very-scary territory. I was sad and distressed as I entered Mrs. Neill’s room toting my cigar box with a tear on the lid. As I sat at my table waiting for the teacher to begin school, I watched another classmate acting like she was at a party! Patsy was boisterously    interacting with the other kids and having a blast. I couldn’t believe she could act like that in such a traumatic situation. But it was quite obvious her attitude was, “Yippee! Kids to play with, and so many of ‘em all in the same room! This is great!” My attitude was, “Gloom, despair, and agony on me!”

Although Patsy and I were experiencing the same environment, our attitudes were on opposite ends of the spectrum. Attitude is a mindset, outlook, or perspective about something or a particular situation. When we have a set way of thinking (whether right or wrong), it’s reflected in our behavior. I had an attitude of distress and I was completely miserable. Patsy had an attitude of fun and she was as happy as a lark.

God is not honored when His children have bad attitudes. It’s really important that believers have the same attitude as Christ. “Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had” (Philippians 2:3-5 NLT). Just as Jesus is willing to go the distance to reach, love, and care for us, we should want to do the same for others.

Having a selfish mindset runs contrary to God‘s purposes and guarantees a life of misery. But those who choose to pursue a Christ-like mindset reap the benefits of an abundant life now and eternal life later. “…those who live by the impulses of the Holy Spirit are motivated to pursue spiritual realities. For the mindset of the flesh is death, but the mindset controlled by the Spirit finds life and peace” (Romans 8:5,6 TPT).

Christ followers are not to live in hopeless confusion like the world. When nonbelievers  close their minds and harden their hearts against God, they’re cutting off their nose to spite their face. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. “…let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes” (Ephesians 4:23 NLT). When believers fill their minds with life-changing truth from God’s Word, there’s no room for the enemy to fill them with his rotten lies. However, Satan loves it when he finds a lazy believer who’s made no effort to fill his/her mind with God’s Word. An empty head is a lot easier to hoodwink, and the devil is more than happy to oblige.

If our attitude stinks to high heaven, we can make a life-changing decision to fine-tune it or completely overhaul it. Nothing is impossible with God. Our thoughts direct the course of our lives because we act and speak according to what we think. “As a man thinks in his heart, so is he” (Proverbs 23:7 NLT). Do yourself a favor, up the ante and get on board with the right train of thought.

The Key: Trade in your old soggy cigar box for a new game-changer attitude.

Over the course of my 42 years in the business world, lending to hundreds of businesses during that time period, I have rarely seen people succeed by accident.  Big success stories are almost invariably preceded by big planning.  Yes, these plans have had to adjust on the fly sometimes, but the fact that people are thinking strategically on an ongoing basis gives them a better chance at meeting their objectives.

That being said, I have seldom encountered effective planning by communities.  Perhaps it is because a 10-year plan seems meaningless to a politician whose term lasts for four years, but it is more likely because it is a herculean effort.  No matter what state, county or city undertakes the process of producing a plan, the project must be undertaken by credible citizens, and the diversity of the whole jurisdiction must be considered.  In today’s world of caustic social media, who among us has any critical mass of credibility left?

Despite these obstacles, the people and communities of Bourbon County must try; if we fail to plan, we are planning to fail every day.  We will all wake up one day and wonder how we have drifted so far away from the best we can be.

Some communities engage outside organizations to drive this process.  I don’t mind the thought of getting a consultant involved to give some guidance, but a third-party who drives the process misses the point of our own community learning to engage one another on a healthy basis and do our own planning on an ongoing basis.

What is involved in a Bourbon County comprehensive plan?  It starts with a solid vision of what we want to look like in 10 years, 20 years, etc.  The vision has to be doable and make sense in context of who we are now, what resources are available, and what we realistically can be; for example, it would not make sense for us to aspire to be the entertainment capital or the Silicon Valley of the Midwest.

Once we have a vision for the county, and every jurisdiction inside the county, we can begin to create processes within realistic timelines, set priorities and allocate resources.  There also needs to be standards and procedures set for reviewing the vision and adjusting it as conditions change or new opportunities present themselves.

Bourbon County REDI will begin discussions of the who, what, when, where, why and how of community planning.  Get ready to be a contributor, not just a social media naysayer.  If you have thoughts and ideas as to how community planning should unfold, we would

If you watch the news, you saw it.

A public relation’s nightmare unfolded in the White House.

Barak Obama, the U.S. President from two terms previous to Joe Biden, was invited to speak to a group of selected Democrats applauding the 10^th anniversary of Obama Care, a universal health care program unearthed under Obama’s tutelage.

Following the charismatic Obama’s talk, those in attendance encircled him, fawning over this opportunity to be near their political hero.

The cameras caught a rejection tragedy live, for President Joe Biden looked like a lost soul, struggling to find someone to pay attention to him.  Biden meandered on the outskirts of the celebratory Obama swarm, reminding me of middle schoolers sitting alone at a cafeteria table, desperate to be noticed.

The airways played that tape ad nauseum.

One doesn’t have to be a Biden fan (but everyone should respect the position of President) to imagine what those few moments of feeling like a “nobody” had to be like. I mean, I’ve known rejection, but never in view of the entire world.  Here he was, the president of the most powerful nation in the world, and no one cared.

A week later, someone sent out a musical version of President Biden first trying to get Obama’s attention, only to finally give up, wander aimlessly in the background and ultimately reach for the hand of some woman in the audience. The song “All By Myself” played in the background, and I thought, this scene by itself is tragic enough; adding a musical score truly compounds the humiliation.   

 But then I realized something.  If Jesus—whose humanity was a picture of rejection– wasn’t above such shaming, why should any human, no matter how powerful, be different?  And yes, I know that Jesus had no music accompanying his tortuous death, but he did have celebratory Roman guards competing for his clothing and mocking his pain.  More tragically, on the cross he endured the ultimate rejection. Matthew 27:45 tells us that at the ninth hour Jesus cried out, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?”  God Himself had turned His back on His son, the one representing the sins of the world—us! —for which he willingly gave up his life.                                                                                                                                                     Rejection hurts, so if we felt sorry for President Biden when Obama turned his back on him, I get it.  But maybe it needs only to point us to the rejection we deserved but never endured.