March 04th, 2014

What's your Mindset

RIVER?

OR

RESERVOIR?

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“The earth is the Lord’s and all its fullness, the world and those who dwell therein.” 
Psalm 50:1

Simply put, a River doesn’t ‘keep’ anything'. 
A river is merely a channel through which water flows, 
coming from the source on  its way to its destination.

 A Reservoir, however, ‘holds’ the water  from the source, 
and the ‘keeper’ of the reservoir determines its destination. 

In past articles I have quoted theologian Miroslav Volf and his thoughts from his book 
Free of Charge.  I have included some of his thoughts below.

A Reservoir Mindset?

 “But I’ve worked very hard. I’ve learned my multiplication tables and done my piano lessons; I’ve finished college and gotten a fine job; I’ve furnished a house, raised a family, and supported the poor. I’ve received a great deal, but I’ve achieved something too! Though I am not ‘a self-made man’, I’ve made something out of myself! Can’t I give to God from what I myself have attained?.

The very existence of human beings comes from God. We live, not so much on a borrowed, but on a given breath. We work, we create, we give, but the very ability and willingness to work, along with life itself, are gifts from God."

A River Mindset?

"Moreover, these are not just gifts we can take and then run with on our own. They are gifts that, like breath, must be given over and over for us even to exist, let alone accomplish anything. “What do you have that you did not receive?” asked the apostle Paul rhetorically (1 Corinthians 4:7). The answer is: nothing, absolutely nothing.”

“Most of us don’t quite “get” the extent of God’s gift giving, even if we grasp it intellectually. We live more or less like Raleigh Hays, the hero of Michael Malone’s novel Handling Sin. He was a decent citizen and a responsible family man who “obeyed the law and tried to do the right thing” and who thought he had secured for himself the decent middle-class life he led. He was wrong. Through a series of unlikely events, he had to be shaken into awareness that some “grace had given him, for no earthly reason, like surprise presents, everything, absolutely everything, he’d thought he earned, and sustained by his own will, and deserved. To come to believe that God has given us “absolutely everything” is to know what it means that, as creator, God is a giver.”

So, the thought for today?

God is the SOURCE of the ‘flow'  – He is the source of EVERYTHING.

Now, will I be a River or a Reservoir?

This is not a new thought to most of us. Yet, it is a reminder, that I need to
act and obey in response to what I know to do.

‘Lord, may I recognize that you are the ‘giver of all’. 
May I be obedient to be a River and not a Reservoir’.

Rivers Not Reservoirs
7982 Hillcrest Trail
Jonesboro, Georgia 30236
404.784.4618

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