The Olympic Will to Win

Spiritual Truths from Contemporary Life to Build You Up

I was thinking….

Every time the Olympic Games come around, the human heart leaps with ineffable happiness. History and geography coalesce around faster, higher, stronger human beings. We cheer when our own countries do well. We admire those who win from other nations. We marvel at human agility and ability. We sit glued in front of televisions to take it all in—human beings at their finest physical prowess, performing in near mechanical perfection.

On the other hand, we are disappointed when the will to win occasionally overrides a person’s, team’s or nation’s sensibility. Athletes may be encouraged by coach, team-members and even athletic committees to artificially enhance their performance.

If athletes didn’t possess a will to win, they wouldn’t be worth watching. It’s more than a mere wish to win. It’s their will to win that generated the hard work to win over years of training. The will to win must be matched by their work to win, in preparation to win.

However, the will to win at all costs—especially relational and ethical costs—reduces a person to physicalism, even to being regarded as a mechanism.

Aren’t the finest athletes, who get and keep our attention during a record breaking 100 meter dash or 8 gold medals, more than physique or machine? They are really human. But we shall not consider them, and they shall not consider themselves, as gods to be worshipped. Indeed, they are merely human.

What do you think?

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Ramesh Richard

SleepWorking

I was thinking…

You’ve heard about sleep-walking, an often harmless medical condition. I recently heard two stories of sleep-working—a very harmful vocational condition. Actually, it was not working very well.

Sleeping Chinese, originally uploaded by baraka meek.

A surgeon fell asleep while performing surgery and was fired by his hospital for this rather inappropriate behavior! The state has also since suspended his medical license. (Article Here)

The US Air Force released reports about three officers who fell asleep while guarding a classified nuclear launch codes device. The Air Force is taking punitive action. (Article Here)

In the former case, the patient is at risk. In the latter case, the public is endangered.



As far as I know, no one is paid to sleep on his job, though the night watchman at our gated apartment in New Delhi was regularly caught napping at night. He too was let go.

The premise for punishing those who go to sleep when they should be awake and at work is simple. The greater your responsibility (especially for other people), the more alert you ought to be in your job. In fact, staying awake is a moral obligation! Sleepwalking may be permissible; sleepworking is unacceptable.

Are you sleepworking? sleeping when you should be alert? Alert about your self? Aware of others? Are you morally awake? Watching over people? Working to help them? Or, has moral sleep gotten the better of you? I think you should awake from your slumbers or fire yourself from your obligations.



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RAMESH RICHARD

Useful Garbage

Spiritual Truths from Contemporary Life to Build You Up


I was thinking…

Can garbage become useful? Can waste turn a profit? Can what we don’t need generate what do we do need?

It’s happening, with new technology. Much garbage, collected and compressed over the years is slowly turning to fuel that can heat homes and cook meals.

Bio-technology turns a trash burial project into a huge plus for their community. They lay pipes into the garbage which pump in landfill liquid to saturate the trash and make a better food source for naturally occurring organisms. As the organisms feed on the on the organic material in the trash, gas is produced. A second series of pipes extract the gas, send it to a processing plant, where carbon dioxide is separated from methane. Methane gas is the main component of natural gas. Thus, waste becomes useful.

You and I have “wasted-sides” of our lives. Wasted years, wasted work, even wasted sorrows. Some times we have actually thrown away what we thought was not useful to us—especially times of stresses and experiences of suffering.

And yet, God is able to turns waste into power; worthlessness into usefulness; pain into gain. If you’d like to know that God can really perform this miraculous change, you have no recourse than to entrust yourself to His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who runs this incredible plan of transformation—changing weakness to strength, scars to stars, life-waste to life power.

What do you think?


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Ramesh Richard

Majority Religious Belief

Spiritual Truths from Contemporary Life to Build You Up

I was thinking…

“Most Americans agree with the statement that many religions – not just their own – can lead to eternal life. Among those who are affiliated with a religious tradition, seven-in-ten say many religions can lead to eternal life.”

This national poll (released June 23, 2008) on what America believes comforts us in terms of social relationships. Social relationships can easily fray when they are driven by ideologies and demagogues. We must treat each other humbly, and view all religions respectfully. All people are precious. And religions are precious to their followers.

What we must avoid, however, is translating majority opinion to confirm, verify, and substantiate truth, especially salvation truth.

The Man and the Crowd, originally uploaded by Vesuviano - Nicola De Pisapia.

It’s a simple thought: “just because the majority believes so, is it so?” And a good question, since the only person whose opinion really counts in this regard is the One who provides the road to eternal life. And I don’t believe He was consulted in this opinion poll.

And if He wasn’t consulted on the matter of eternal life, should the poll make news headlines? Or take valuable headspace?

What do you think?

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Ramesh Richard

Mountaintop or Valley?

Spiritual Truths from Contemporary Life to Build You Up

I was thinking…

Recently I met Bedouin tribesmen in the arid deserts of the Middle East. Nomadic, they move from location to location with one focus—to find water. Water keeps them alive and going.

He asked me to take a panoramic look at the landscape and asked, “where do you find greenery?”

“In the valleys,” I noted.

“Ah,” he said, “a spiritual lesson.” We are often against God taking us into the valleys. Except in this setting, valleys are the place to find and grow life.

Think about it. If we begin to consider valleys positively, and mountain-tops negatively, then it is better for life to go from valley-to-valley, than from mountain-top to mountain-top. After all, in God’s view of things, valleys are the where the vegetation is found. Do we still only want to stay on the mountain-top to dry up and die?

What do you think?

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Ramesh Richard

Wasted Power

I was thinking…

“Scientists across the world are seeking ways to turn waste heat from motor vehicles into power, to achieve lower carbon dioxide emissions and lower fuel consumption.”

All the best scientists! We are waiting for this and other answers to the huge energy crisis overwhelming our world at the moment. Hopefully, this and other crises will be solved before long, making this dated news.

I’ve got spiritual good news for you. Even though your full spiritual capacity is being wasted at this very moment, God has provided for a spiritual thermoelectric converter to take your wasting life and turn it into a powerful, purposeful life. All your spiritual electrical needs can be met by His Spirit who first converts you to generate His life in you. Then your sinful, polluting carbon dioxide emissions will be lowered. It will take less of your own resources to live your life, because God’s spiritual resources will compensate for your life’s lacks.

What do you think?

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Ramesh Richard

Fighting Spouses

Truths to Build Your Life

Fighting Spouses

I was thinking…

I heard recently of a fist-fight that broke out at a wedding, between newly wed spouses! I am told that they had to sleep in separate rooms on their wedding night.

Indeed, a troubled way to start a wedding. And certainly a terrible way to continue a marriage.

You’ve noticed that the ones closest to us can cause us the greatest pain. We have to find ways to overlook light offenses, the fender-benders of life. However, deeper offenses demand a strategic solution—forgiveness.

We can overlook stuff, but forgiveness ends stuff.

How can we go from being fighting spouses to becoming forgiving spouses? Here’s a hint: it is impossible to give horizontal forgiveness, unless we have received vertical forgiveness.

What do you think?

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Ramesh Richard