Three words make up this wish.  Three words that hold so much meaning.  Think about this…

HAPPY – This word is about more than just putting a smile on your face.  It’s more about being content or feeling blessed.  Things will happen in 2013 that will not make us feel happy. From our perspective, they will be unfair and we will wonder why they had to happen to us.  But from God’s perspective, they have the opportunity to make us stronger and better.  I always say we have two choices  – bitter or better.  That is why we can be happy.  Today, we all want 2013 to be the year that we grow healthy and stronger.  We can know that God will bring about just the right amount of blessings and trials that will be just what we need to make 2013 a year of growth and strength.  And this can make us HAPPY!

NEW – This is a new year.  Last year is gone (Thank God!!).  We have another chance to start over and have a fresh new beginning.  Today it starts over.  We all will make resolutions and set goals for how we want to improve.   This new day is a gift from God.  It reminds us that nothing goes on forever and we can always start fresh.  What will this new year hold for you?  Make it something NEW that will make you HAPPY!

YEAR – We measure time in days, weeks, months and years.  We describe ourselves by using our name and year.  “I am Chuck Holt and I am 45 years old.” We tell stories by the year it happened.  “When I was 15 years old” or “5 years ago”.  Each year marks the passage of time and reminds us that we are on this journey.  Our times is limited and we must make the best of it.  As you journey through life, what will this YEAR hold for you?

So the simple wish of HAPPY NEW YEAR is just the short version of this:  As you journey through life, no matter what happens, know that God is in control.  He will give you just the right amount of trials and blessings to make you stronger and a better person.  Move into this year knowing this and let it be your confidence and let it bring you true joy and happiness. We do not know what this year hold but we know who holds this year.  It is another NEW YEAR, be HAPPY!

Happy New Year!

It is no secret! I like people who do whatever it takes to get a job done.  Those that go the extra mile and are committed to seeing something through no matter the cost or consequences are ones that I most admire.  DL Moody, Billy Graham, Abraham Lincoln, Steve Jobs… these are among those whom I call heroes.  Heroes because they didnt just do the best that they could.  They were world changers.  There are others to be sure.  And of course, some change the world not for good, but for evil.

In my life, I want to go down in history as a world changer. I do not want to just do my best.  I want to do whatever it takes.  I wrestle with this though? I wrestle with whether it is just an ego thing.  Why can’t I be complacent to just do the best that I can do?  Is not that all they everyone is asking of me, of one another?  Few will ask us to go the extra mile, to do our task no matter the cost or consequence.  Few will ask us to go beyond our means and few will stretch us beyond our own ability.  And therefore, few of us will ever do more than “the best we can”.

I want 2013 to be the year that I changed the world. I want it to be the year that I reinvented the way we do social services at The Factory Ministries. I want to be a part of something bigger than myself. I want to be a world changer.  I know that no one will place these expectations on me, so I place them on myself.  I realize that to be a world changer I need to see the world different than most. I realize that I have to envision the impossible. I have to have a vision beyond my resources.  I realize that I cannot do it without being a man of prayer an a man of faith in the God of the impossible.

Who is with me? Who wants to be a part of changing the world?  What has God given you a passion to do?  Are you willing to change the world in that area?

Chuck Holt

As a parent of 5 children, I remember too well the emotion of fear.  I remember wondering if my wife and I had gotten the right one, the right size, the right color.  The anticipation of not surprising them or making them happy oftentimes brings a brief moment of fear over the parent.  Of course, this fear is something that does not go very deep and usually results in the same joy the kids display.  At the end of Christmas day parents sigh in relief that once again they made their children happy.

This Christmas, God has a present for each one of us.  He sent us his Son, Jesus, not just so that we could marvel at him as a baby.  God sent Jesus to us for a specific reason.  As if God knew we would misunderstand or misconstrue the whole reason, He wrote it down for us.  John 3:17 says that God didnt send his Son into the world to condemn it but to save it.  Did you hear that?  Most of us spend our whole lives living in fear that God is judging us or that he is not pleased with us and is punishing us.  But God didn’t send us the gift of his son to make us feel like failures.  He sent us this wonderful present in order for us to live life to the fullest in joy and in confidence and to be saved from our failures.

When the angels announced the coming of Jesus to the world they said, “Fear Not”.  Jesus does not want you to live in fear.  He wants to you unwrap your fears this Christmas and wrap yourself in His mighty love.  He wants you to know that he can take your life and make something beautiful out of it.  Despite the difficult journey, he will never leave you nor give up on you.  It does not matter what you have done or where you have been.  God is in the business of redeeming people and giving them a new start.

This Christmas God is so excited to know that he has given you the exact present you need.  It is the right size, right color and right gift! It is the free gift of a relationship that is all about love and peace and not fear!  As the angels sang that Christmas morning, “Fear not, for I bring you a message of great joy!”

Merry Christmas!

One of our favorite photos!

We are all on a journey.  The journey has its moments of joy and moments of sorrow.  My journey has been one that I would not necessarily wish on anyone but I would not trade it with anyone either.  I am thankful today that on my journey of life, God knew exactly what I needed.  He sent one of his best angels down here to be my wife.  23 years ago today, Claudia and I were married. Little did I know at that time that I was getting this life’s greatest gift.  She has limitless unconditional love and undying belief in me and unwavering passion to know and live out Christ.  She is truly an angel from heaven all wrapped up in human form just for me because God knew I could not live a day without her.

Since 1996 she has lived in pain every day of her life.  At times, for months, she cannot get out of bed.  Through it all, I have never seen her get mad at God nor has she ever stopped loving me or her family or living for others.  If anyone wants to see a real life example of true faith, it is my wife.   Whether she is in physical pain or emotional or spiritual pain due to the unfairness of life, she continues moving forward toward Christ.  This tireless devotion to God and to others often goes unnoticed but I know is achieving her a crown in heaven that will adorn her pain-free body for all eternity.

The best part?  I get to have her as my best friend while on earth and when we all get to heaven I get to say, I knew that angel of God when she was on earth!!

Thank you beans for being you! I am honored to be your husband and best friend!  Till death do us part, I’m yours!!

Then yesterday, two friends came over and to my great excitement, they finished staining the deck.  However, the moment they finished we had a huge storm.  The sky opened up and dropped a week’s worth of hot humid rain right on top of my newly stained deck.  Now I worried that the new stain would hold up.

About the same time they finished the deck I got the much anticipated call from my doctor. I had waited almost a week to find out if my tumor was indeed cancerous and if I was going to need to head back into the hospital and have another surgery.  Even though thyroid cancer is 100% treatable, I was very anxious.  I was looking at either a few more days recuperation or a summer of various symptoms resulting in my being out of commission.

The doctor told me the great news I had hoped for. He let me know that the tumor turned out to not be cancerous and that I was all done!  His congratulations seemed odd. It was like I had won some great prize.  I immediately thought of all my friends who had not received such great news from their doctors.  But the news was sweet and I enjoyed it immensely.

After a brief moment of basking in the good news I started to worry again.  I was no longer worried about having cancer. I was worried about my deck.  What if all this stain was washed off the deck and we had to do it all over again? Why did it have to rain the one day the deck was done?  Why couldn’t this storm pass by like the last three did the other nights?

Despite my worry I slept through the night for the first time in a week.  I woke up and look out at the deck. I had determined I would see bad news.  To my surprise, the deck handled the rain just fine. All was well. My newly stained deck was ready for a summer of pool parties.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks.  Just as my potential cancer was in God’s hands so was my deck.  You see, I didn’t change one thing by worrying about either one.  In the case of my thyroid, I was worried about the storm of life pounding down on me causing my summer to be a difficult one from the aftermath of thyroid cancer.  In the case of my deck, I was worried about the torrential downpour ruining the much anticipated staining of my deck.

Here is the lesson I am learning.  Regardless of whether my tumor was cancerous or benign and regardless of whether my stain was ruined or not, God is in charge.  He gives us both good and bad things in our lives to teach us what is important and what really matters.  My journey would not be a real journey if I did not have to deal with doctor reports or deck staining not holding.  Storms of nature and storms of life are a much needed part of the journey.

This morning I was drawn to King Solomon’s wisdom journal where he shares his struggle with much of these same things.  At the conclusion of a frustrating journey to find meaning in life, the king writes, “Here is the conclusion of my whole journey.  Nothing makes sense except to fear God and follow his ways.  This is the only way that life’s journey is worth it.”

Today I learn a lesson I have to keep learning over and over again. I learn that it is all in God’s hands.  Sometimes the call is that we have cancer.  Sometimes the deck needs to be stained again.  In either case, God knew it already and will give us the grace to deal with whatever storms we face.

What are you worried about today?  Let’s get together and talk about it.  Your journey matters to God and to me!

Recently, I was taking my morning walk rather early at 6am.  As I walked around our development and passed home after home I was struck with an amazing thought.  Behind each front door, within the walls of each house is a family with stories.  Each home is made up of the journey of those who live within its walls.  Some journeys are tough and some are easy.  Some have had intense pain and others have not.  How many homes in my development look good on the outside but are so fragile on the inside?

On my second time around the block, students started exiting the houses and heading to their bus stop.  Dogs peered through the window, barking excessively.  If the walls could talk I wondered what stories they would tell?  I wonder if those in each house even had someone who valued their journey, who cared about their story.

We live in a world where we keep to ourselves.  There is no longer a center of town where the stories of each home were shared with one another.  There is no longer the sense that we are all in this together. Instead, we travel down life’s road by, often by ourselves.  On the statue of liberty it says “No man is an island, no man stands alone”.  However we create little developments where we can live side by side yet be completed isolated from one another.

How about you? Do you tend to keep to yourself?  How do you share your journey with?  Wanna meet for coffee? I would love to hear your story!

My favorite this year was simple. I texted people and told them that I had broken down near their house and I needed a ride cause I had been wandering around for a few hours. Most fell for it! My son didn’t. So did you pull an April Fool’s prank? What did you do? I trust that you were not like my dad years ago and take your prank too far?

Of course being a fool to someone’s prank can be harmless and often ends up in laughter. We usually only do April Fool’s Day pranks to those we know best. But what happens when our lives are lived foolishly? Being a fool is no laughing matter. We all see people every day do things and we think to ourselves, “What a fool. Why would they do something so stupid?”. No one wants to associate or spend time with a person who lives like a fool.

An ancient proverb says “Let a man meet a mamma bear robbed of her cubs than a person living like a fool!”. Have you ever been face to face with a mad bear who is on the hunt for the one who stole her cubs? Me either, and I never want to be! Think of that image in your mind. A mindless, ruthless, out of control bear that is ready to destroy anyone in its path. That is what a fool is like to everyone else.

Ok, so by now you are thinking of someone else and referring to them in your mind as a fool. You are glad that your friendship only runs as deep as a Facebook friend. However, I want you to think about something. How often does your actions reflect those of a fool? Be honest. We all are guilty of acting foolishly sometimes. And to heap foolish on top of foolishness, we often fail to admit that our words or actions are those of a fool. I am guilty of this and so are you.

The Bible is full of one liners describing the fool. One of them is “Fools think their own way is right,
but the wise listen to others.” (Proverbs 12:15). Today I want to walk my journey not living foolishly. I want to realize that the world does not revolve around me and my thoughts.

Yesterday might have been April Fool’s Day but every day that I live like a mad she-bear in search for her cubs is actually a fool day. Today, let’s be intentional! Let’s examine the path before us and be wise. Let’s not think so highly of our thoughts and be open to the wisdom of others. Of course the assumption is that we are surrounded by other wise ones!!!

To end, here is one of my favorite quotes. I hope it is not describing me or you.
“When they discover the center of the universe, a lot of people will be disappointed to discover they are not it.”

While it might not be so bad to “check out” or go through the motions in some situations, it can be devastating when we do that with people’s pain.  Here is what I mean.  Someone asks us to pray for them concerning something really on their mind.  You say you will but never do.  When you see them again you even forget to bring it up.  Ouch!  That really hurts.  Another person has a real need and you know you can help meet that need.  You offer to help but then  forget all about it.  Whew!  That is painful.

Life gets so hectic that we often find ourselves just going through the motions.  We stop living with intention.  We no longer realize our purpose and place.  Our goal becomes to just get to the next event or day.  In the process we lose out on so many opportunities to be a blessing to someone and to be blessed ourselves.

Let me say this:   I do not want to live my life just going through the motions. I want to be intentional, strategic and live on purpose.  My guess is that you do as well.  It will require us to be more aware of what is going on around us.  It means that we have to live not just for ourselves but for others as well. It means slowing down enough to care.  It means redefinning what a successful day looks like.

Everyone has a story and is on a journey.  We need one another to make our life more complete and fulfilled.  We need others who are not just going through the motions.  If you are looking for meaning and purpose then be intentional in life.  Stop going through the motions and see what you can do or where you can make a diference.  Not only will you change someone else’s life but it will also change your life!

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? (Matthew 6:25-27 NIV)

Good question, Jesus!  The answer is no.  No, I cannot change anything by worrying.  So what should I do in place of it?  Jesus goes on and tells us.  He says, “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matthew 6:33 NIV)”

So my focus is to be on God’s kingdom not mine!  Hmm.  That changes alot.  My day needs to be spent not dwelling on what I need or what I want.  God says he will take care of those things.  If he can take care of birds and flowers, and I am much more valuable to him than they are, then he can take care of it.  In the meantime, he wants me to dwell on bringing about his kingdom and his righteousness.

What are you worrying about today?  Together lets commit to leaving those things in God’s hands and promoting his kingdom and righteousness. I realize that it is easier said than done.  But I think there is power in numbers.  If we all seek to live that way today then perhaps God will use us to take care of the worries in others lives!!  How cool would that be!

Hang in there!  Your journey does matter.  It matters to God and it matters to me!

Coffee?