It's A Small World

Think about the connections we have with people. Think about how you might have crossed paths with them in the past and maybe never knew it. How has this affected your life? Has it been a good or bad thing?

I love looking back at life seeing how things happened and seeing how things connected to cause one thing to happen that has importance to your life. Many times we have connections with people due to certain round about ways. It might be through a friend who you had no idea that they knew each other.

What is really cool is when you meet someone and you find out that they were at an event you were at and probably even saw each other but never realized it. I have a friend who this happened to. I was working a concert about two years ago and saw almost everyone come in and come to find out this year that they were there and that we almost undoubtedly saw each other but never realized it until about two weeks ago. It is really cool when things like that happen.

It is really cool to see how events that happen in your life build to creating this one key piece to the whole puzzle. This happened for some friends and I about two years ago. As follows is an account of what happened.

I was on a trip out east in the summer of 2009. I was out there with two friends. We were flying out of Dulles to Denver. Our flight was delayed by 45 minutes due to weather problems. We finally got on our flight and I soon realized that it was almost guaranteed that Katie was going to miss her connection flight from Denver and chances were that Kyle and I would miss our connection flight as well. We all fell asleep on the plane due to our lack of sleep from the night before. We woke up midflight and I looked at the time and was hoping that we would have been making really good time and could make all our connecting flights. However that was not the case.

When we were about 30 minutes out from Denver they announced that the following connecting flights were still active. However none of ours were listed. They let the people who still had active connecting flights get off the plane then instructed us how to go about getting back on for flights. As soon as we could we got off the plane and got in line with everyone else to get our flights figured out. We were on the phone with people letting them know about our status and what was happening. Some started working on things as well.

We meet a guy inline who I started talking to due to the bag he had. We asked where he was going. He told us Spokane and why he was going there. Katie was going to fly into Spokane as well. While waiting behind he I heard that he got a flight booked already on another airline. So he was trying to just get a refund. However they were not able to do that so he was put on a standby list for the next day.

Once we got up to the desk we started getting Katie’s flight worked out first. We got it so she would be on the standby list for the first two flights out in the morning but a guaranteed spot on the evening flight to Spokane. Kyle and I were able to get seats out of Denver in the morning on United (who we flew on to begin with) to Salt Lake and then a connecting flight to Boise on Delta. While we were getting this all figured out Katie was able to get ahold of a connection she had to get us a hotel room.

We were told to get on the shuttle bus to hotel and we would have a hotel room waiting for us. We got to the hotel and because of our flight situation we did not have anything other than our carryon bags. We got our room, which had a total of three beds, which was nice for the one lady and two of us being guys. We set alarms and got made sure we had a wakeup call because we had to be back at the airport early.

We got about 5 hours of sleep or less between that and our very long day before it was really had to wakeup. We got some free breakfast at the hotel then headed out to the airport on the shuttle. We got through security fast and to our gate. We made sure Katie would know where her gate was located. We all said our goodbyes then Kyle and I boarded our flight. We arrived in Salt Lake and got a voice mail from Katie letting us know she got on the second flight to Spokane. We all arrived home safely.

Looking back the only person ahead of Katie on the list for standby to Spokane on the flight she mad was the guy who we meet in line the night before. He flew out on a different airline and so he “missed” his standby for that flight. Enduing so it allowed Katie to make it on that flight because she was the last standby to get on that flight.

Policy In The Work Place

The other day I was thinking about company policies implemented in the work place and how they effect both the customers and employees. It was a specific policy change that really brought this to my mind. So I thought why not explore both sides of it and see what is good and what is bad about policy.

One major thing I have noticed about rules in the work place is that the more policies you have will effect the employees performance. Sometimes the effect can be good and others will dumb down their performance. I think there is some very clear reasons why it has one effect over the other.

When you look at the policy and the reasoning behind it and what it will do for the company and employees you can get an general idea how it will change things for the better or for worse. For example there is a policy that is put into place because it is thought that customers and not paying for services rendered. From what the few numbers looked at by the people at the top see it appears as if the customers are not paying for the services rendered and employees think the customer is being honest and paying. However maybe it is not just a cut and dry issue. When you break it down there is more to what the employee is doing that effects some small things that are not thought about. If he messes one small area up he gets in trouble but then when he is trying to cover himself from that he puts himself in a position that lowers is output of good work preformed.

I find that when I company puts a new policy into place usually lowers the employees performance by some because they will get in trouble if they break it and who wants to be in trouble. If you are always trying to cover you back and not get in trouble you are going to be more focused on that then the actual you are doing.

I am not saying that we should not have company policies. I think we approach them from the wrong way. Because of the American mindset we look down upon those who fail at things or make mistakes which causes people to worry about not doing them or failing and not have as much personal interest in what they are doing. Maybe we should have the policies but allow failure and be there to help the person when they fail and lift them back to their feet and maybe show them ways to do it better and see if it will help them. We are too focused on money that we seem to not care about people nearly as much as we should.

Misson Work Is It Good?

Recently I have been thinking about the missions trips people are taking and the effect they have on those involved. I have been asking myself some of the questions that I have asked myself in the past in regards to it. I have come to the conclusion that I should change some of my thoughts on them.

I look at the lives of Americans and what we do to feel like we are needed and being useful. I see that as Americans we tend to make choices more on feelings more than practicality. Is that all bad, or does making choices on feelings have some credence?

Lets look at mission’s trips as a whole and see what sort of questions we should be asking ourselves before we take “sides”.

1. What is the purpose of the mission’s trip?

2. What is your purpose of going?

3. What is the lasting result of it?

4. Is it cost effective?

5. Is the experience going to change you?

6. How will it affect your spiritual walk?

So what really is the purpose of the trip? Are you going to help teach at a school? Are you going to help build something? Is it just to experience the culture? Teach the gospel? All of these should be asked. Teaching at the school can be good but what about the language barrier or is there one? Building something can be good but when an item is just given to someone they don’t value it as much. Just experiencing the culture is more of just a trip or vacation than anything. Teaching the gospel is always a good thing but the language barrier can be an issue again. If someone does make a profession of salvation who is going to follow it up? Who will disciple them?

What is your purpose of going? Are you going because you want to experience another culture? Are going to because your friends are going? Is it to appear more spiritual? I can understand wanting to do all of those. I think those can all be included in your reason. I think our purpose for going should always include showing Christ’s love, glory to His name, and spiritual growth to all involved.

What is the lasting result of the trip? It could be the work that you do. It could be the lives that you help change. It could be the effect that it plays in your life. Either through how you view life, how you view the world, or appreciation of what you have been given.

Is the trip cost effective? Could the money spent be used better if just given to the missionaries their? Is it possible that maybe just doing a missions trip in the United States be more effective? Our culture is struggling enough spiritually that maybe we should look here first before we look elsewhere. I was told once by a missionary family that the preparation that it takes for them to have a team come over and to get projects together for them to do while there is really straining to them and causes them to spend more money that it would be better if people would raise the same money and just send it to them. I see their point and tend to agree with them. However that leads me to the next point.

Is the experience going to change you? I have no doubt that it will change you. I believe it is up to you and how willing you are to allow it to change you. Will you be a more prayerful person? Will you trust God more? Is it going to be trying to you as a person? Will you have more respect for those who make the commitment to be missionaries? Will the change affect you long term of is it just going to be a short-term thing that you forget after a month or two? I know personally that when I was in a situation that made me rely upon God more and be more prayerful that I lost focus and seemed to forget what I learned from that time in my life. May that not be so for you. May you learn from those around you and grow from it and not forget what you learned.

How will it affect your spiritual walk? As I touched on just above, I believe that it will affect you but it is how you choose to let it affect you. It can be a very good thing for you spiritually. If you allow God to work on your life in ways you would normally not allow Him too then do it. Open you life to Him and let Him mold you into who He wants you to be not who you want to be.

I have been of the opinion that I would not want to go on a mission’s trip but have since changed my mind. I believe that it would be a very good thing for me to do. I am looking for options that maybe I could do it within the next year or two. I would love the opportunity but still am not sure where I would like to go on one. I know that I would want to go on one where I had some connection with the missionaries there.

Do you love someone just because...

Do you love someone when they give you something or treat you a certain way? Do you still love them when they don't treat you like your special? Do you love them when they are not giving things to you? Is your goal to try and make that person happy? Are you just fine with only monetary rewards?

Love is not a feeling that comes and goes.

Love is just more than a feeling, more than a gift, more than a night, more than a kiss, more than just things we see or feel.

The music industry has only damaged what love means. You hear songs everyday that tell you what they want to you think love is or is not. If we trust the opinion of the music industry then we should probably conclude that love is a myth or something of the “gods”.

Not to let the advertising industry go without comment, love according to them is about looks more than anything. If you wear this or if you drive this then you will find love or be loved. If you are only loved for what you have or the way you look are you really anything? Is there more to you than just looks or belongings? Only if love was that simple we could all love.

Love is not made or created.

We you look at how people loosely throw the word “love” around you wonder if love is even real. It is as if the word “love” has no real meaning. You can say “I love that car” even though you don’t really know anything about it.

Love is not an emotion that we fall in and out of.

Should the results of love be forced actions? I don’t believe so, because then it would no longer be love. So should we do all the actions of love on a certain day just because everyone else is and the day is supposed to be about “love”? As we all know relationships have ups and downs in them. So how many people are really in the ups in their relationships when that day comes around every 14^th? I doubt many really are because of where the focus is on that day. The holiday is all about the external and not the internal. We buy chocolates and flowers that are over priced compared to normal MSRP. We book dinner at an expensive restaurant that is filled with others just like you. We book a hotel room that is themed to someone's likes. We spend all this money one day that is really not like any other except the inflated prices. Is it really needed to help your relationship? Is the money and external really worth it when at the end will all fade away?

Love is not just a simple reaction to someone's behavior.

Having said that what are other options? How much time and money do you spend the rest of the year on your relationship? Maybe we should be focusing on that a little more the rest of the year because it will last a lot longer than just one day. It should be a “because I want to” rather than “because it is expected”. If we are doing it spontaneously then maybe it would keep that “fire” that people talk about in their relationship. don’t get me wrong I am okay with planning stuff, I just think we are too focused on one day rather than a lifetime.

Love is a commitment.