This is important. Our imagination is an incredible and extremely powerful tool and it can be used to lift you up or to tear you down. There have been many many books written on the subject but every one of those ideas were birthed in the book of proverbs in the bible. Without writing 40 pages on this subject, the short explanation is that you are and you will become the image you see of yourself. If you see yourself failing, you most likely will fail. Your self-image could be the most powerful weapon outside of prayer, you have that determines your future. Create some positive imagines of yourself and reflect on them every day. We all struggle with the failure images in various areas of our life so why not create some positive ones that you can think about also.

This is not some hocus pocus TV evangelistic magic. This is why God gave you a mind, heart and soul that is more powerful than anything man will ever invent. In the King James Version of the bible, 1 Timothy 4:15 says “meditate upon these things (means uplifting things), give yourself wholly to them that thy profiting may appear (be shown) to all.” Your imagination and your thoughts are powerful and ask God to help you find some good images that lift up your spirit.

I can’t say I do this every time because I don’t but I have had times when my mind is idling and an image of something bad happening just pops up. In those moments I try to imagine something great and uplifting to counter act the earlier image. I go to sleep every night thinking about the White Christmas Movie because it is happy, clean, peaceful and joyful. If I don’t think about that movie, my minds starts on all the things I need to do the next day and who said what and who did what and yada yada yada. Therefore I force myself to concentrate on that old movie because it helps me shut down worrisome thoughts. As you know I sell hotels, and the funny thing is when I think about that movie, I imagine that I have just bought the “Columbia Inn” in Pine Tree VT and as I am walking through the hotel I see that all the cloths, furniture, movie props and the old woody car were all left there just as they were in the movie.

Your mind and your imagination are powerful things and we should use them to create uplifting images that bolster our spirit rather than letting our minds give us an image of failure. Be bold. KT

There is a passage of scripture that could be one the most important passages in the bible. It is Luke 5:5 and the story is about the Apostle Peter.

Early in Jesus’s ministry Peter had heard about Jesus and knew there was something special about him. Peter and his crew had been fishing, “tolling,” all night and they had nothing to show for it and had caught no fish. They brought the boats in that morning and went about cleaning the nets and securing the boats from the night of fishing. Jesus was walking along the shore and there were a lot of people wanting to hear and see Jesus. Jesus asks Peter if he would push the boat out just a little from the shore and let him stand up in the boat and speak to the people. Peter said sure and then went about cleaning his nets while Jesus spoke to the crowd. Side note here, Peter was listening the whole time he was cleaning the nets.

When Jesus finished speaking, he told Peter to let down his nets for a draught (lot of) fish. Keep in mind the boat was just a few feet from the shore. Peter must have thought, what a foolish thing to ask of a fisherman. Then he said the words that probably represented the most important decision Peter had ever made in his life. He said in verse 5,”Master we have toiled all night and have taken nothing, nevertheless, at thy word I will let down the nets.” He let the nets down and they filled with fish to the point that the nets began to break. At that moment Peter became a believer.

This story means so much to me because many times in our lives we have done the right thing, been accountable, been faithful, been a giver and lived the way we should and yet sometimes we have watched others succeed that didn’t do any of the right things. It is easy to look at others and ask why I can’t seem to make it.

In this passage Peter said “nevertheless” I will follow you. Sometimes in our lives we need to have a “nevertheless” moment where even though we may not be in life where we thought we would be, we still say to God, “nevertheless” I will still follow you. In life many times it is about staying with a job or a business or raising the children even though sometimes you feel like quitting. I believe God honors consistency in how we live, how we give and are we giving our best.

Next time you feel like giving up just say in your spirit “nevertheless” and keep going because it will get better and it will improve and you will look back on a life lived honestly and be glad you didn’t falter and or quit. KT

Life can change so quickly. Don’t wait to do what you know you need to do. Every single one of us knows in our heart what changes we need to make in our lives. There are no gray areas, no questions and everyone knows what to do. We just sometimes don’t want to do it.

I have attended many funerals for people far too young to have passed away. I suspect that with many of them, they woke up that morning and did not know it was their last morning. The bible says to not put off till tomorrow what you can do today. That is very sound advice for family, health, business and life in general. It doesn’t mean you have to accomplish the full thing, it just means you have to start. It is the starting where I believe God gives us a special grace and a special anointing for that moment because he knows it is the most fragile period. The starting point is the hardest part.

I believe each person who is at the one yard line of life, if they have their mental faculties, want one more day. If they were given that one more day, they would tell everyone in their life that they love them, they would do the best they could to fix a strained relationship. They would do the most important things for their family so there would be no question, they were loved.

There are some things I can change in my life and some I can’t. For instance, I am ugly and I stutter, but there is nothing I can do about those things. It is how God saw me in his eye before I was conceived in my mother’s womb. He knew a thousand years ago exactly what I would look like and be like and talk like and the precise time era I would live in. On grave stones there is a beginning date and an ending date and usually there is a dash between the dates. God knows the length of the dash and he knows exactly when we will be called home. Yes, called home. That is what heaven is, our ultimate home and he knows exactly when each of us will open the front door to that home.

Don’t put off doing what you know you need to do. In fact, do it or start it before you go to bed tonight and ask God almighty to give you the strength and will power to see the decision through. We all have fears and anxiety and all hide things behind the veil so other people can’t see it but we know what needs to be done.

Face the fear of the thing you are most afraid of and I believe you find out that it is simply a shadow. Psalms 23 says; that we shouldn’t have fear when we walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Let me say that again. The valley of the shadow of death. Have you ever seen your shadow? It is much larger that you actually are. It looks scary because it is so large. That is what God is talking about in Psalm 23. He says to not let the size of the shadow scare you into thinking it is so big. The thing you probably fear the most, when you face it head on, is probably not that big after all. KT