When I was little, about 5 or 6, I watched a show on TV about a man doing tricks.\u00a0 He did this trick where he moved this pencil with his mind across the table.\u00a0 Boy was I impressed!\u00a0 I thought for sure I could do that simple trick if he could!<\/p>
I went into a quiet room, put a pencil on the floor and got to thinking.\u00a0 I really tried hard to move that pencil.\u00a0 It didn\u2019t budge.\u00a0 For a long time I wondered why I couldn\u2019t do it when this man on TV could.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>
As I got older, I realized it was just a trick, and he was a magician.\u00a0 That is what magicians did.\u00a0 I was so convinced that he was just plain magic without realizing it! It got me thinking.\u00a0 How do we discern truth now?\u00a0 There is so much information floating on the Web.\u00a0 We hear different things depending on who you are listening to.\u00a0 Many times we are across the table from someone we love and there is controversy.\u00a0 Do we focus on what we think is truth, disregarding the other who doesn\u2019t believe the same?<\/p>
This may sound cliche, or like a broken record. Could Jesus be the answer? Yes. He is the answer. He knows the truth. <\/p>
We may not be able to control most of what is around us but we can control our choices, who we are, how we treat others and most importantly we can trust that God is aware of us and will keep us safe as we lean into our relationship with Him.<\/p>
He hasn\u2019t left us alone in this chaos. He is here right beside us, guiding us through the misinformation, and the lies. Are we listening?<\/p>
I hear him saying love one another.\u00a0 Have compassion for others.\u00a0 Lift others.\u00a0 Help each other.\u00a0 If we focus on Him, we can see what really matters.<\/p>
<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When I was little, about 5 or 6, I watched a show on TV about a man doing tricks.\u00a0 He did this trick where he moved this pencil with his mind across the table.\u00a0 Boy was I impressed!\u00a0 I thought for sure I could do that simple trick if he could! I went into a quiet room, put a pencil on the floor and got to thinking.\u00a0 I really tried hard to move that pencil.\u00a0 It didn\u2019t budge.\u00a0 For a long time I wondered why I couldn\u2019t do it when this man on TV could.\u00a0\u00a0 As I got older, I realized it was just a trick, and he was a magician.\u00a0 That is what magicians did.\u00a0 I was so convinced that he was just plain magic without realizing it! It got me thinking.\u00a0 How do we discern truth now?\u00a0 There is so much information floating on the Web.\u00a0 We hear different things depending on who you are listening to.\u00a0 Many times we are across the table from someone we love and there is controversy.\u00a0 Do we focus on what we think is truth, disregarding the other who doesn\u2019t believe the same? This may sound cliche, or like a broken record. Could Jesus be the answer? Yes. He is the answer. He knows the truth. We may not be able to control most of what is around us but we can control our choices, who we are, how we treat others and most importantly we can trust that God is aware of us and will keep us safe as we lean into our relationship with Him. He hasn\u2019t left us alone in this chaos. He is here right beside us, guiding us through the misinformation, and the lies. Are we listening? I hear him saying love one another.\u00a0 Have compassion for others.\u00a0 Lift others.\u00a0 Help each other.\u00a0 If we focus on Him, we can see what really matters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1356,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[43,44,42,40,41,45],"class_list":["post-1355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-thoughts","tag-blessings","tag-fingerprints-of-god","tag-god","tag-hope","tag-miracles","tag-tender-mercy"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1355"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1355\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1357,"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1355\/revisions\/1357"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebighopeletters.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}