Consider this

At a news conference in December, the Nobel Prize winners gave away their secret strategies for winning the prestigious, $1.5 million award: Don’t try! One man, who shared the Physics award, said that winning “requires creativity, humour and patience, with little aspiration to actually win”. The other man added, “It’s definitely extremely detrimental to think that you can win the Nobel Prize; then it basically occupies your mind… if you think and deliberately try to win the Nobel Prize there is something wrong”. The winner of the Chemistry award agreed saying, “I did not plan it, or try to do it, it just came by itself”. The winner of the Economics prize summed up his approach by saying, “Anyone who’s engaged in creative life – whether they’re a scientist, economist, writer or artist – has many ‘aha’ moments, many moments to discovery, otherwise they would not be doing it… they do not do it with some golden prize at the end”. Their philosophy may be summed up by saying, “Focus o

The other day, as my daughter and I watched “SpongeBob SquarePants” (I think he is funny), I started thinking about the commercials that we were seeing. First there was the “yogurt in a tube” that exploded and sprayed yogurt all over because it had “too much flavour to be contained”. Next a swashbuckling sea captain was in a sword fight with… well, someone who was trying to steal his cereal (Because that happens all the time). Then a remote control truck was climbing over rocks, smashing through brick wall and speeding down the sidewalk. Now, I am all for remote control trucks, but the kids in that commercial looked like they were having way more fun than that truck could provide. Most of the commercials were for unhealthy snacks and the premise of the commercial had little or nothing to do with the product. It was all hype. When marketing is aimed at children, it is easy for me to see how silly it is, but then I started to wonder “Am I as good at seeing it when it is aimed at me?

“Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:4-7). As I thought about my “New Year’s Sermon”, I could not get Philippians 4 out of my mind and so I have decided to make it the theme for our congregation this year. Throughout the year, we will come back and look at a little more of the passage, but this week I want to focus on just two words. The first word is “rejoice”. It has become fashionable in our society to be critical. You don’t have to sit very long in a coffee shop before the conversation turns to complaining about something. Maybe that is not unique to us as North Americans. Maybe it is human nature to look at life from the “half empty glass” pe