Facebook.... not today

04/21/2012

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I have logged out of facebook.  Now to you that may seem like no big feat. But for me, it's an accomplishment.  You see other than times when I have to restart my computer, or defrag it, I have been logged in about five years now.

I am the only person who uses this laptop for the most part, so there really is no fear of anyone writing something awful under my name.  It just wouldn't happen.   

There is always a tab at the top of my screen that shows FB and the little number next to it that tells me how many "friends" have accessed my page via a comment or "like."   When I see more than one has done so, I go to that tab and see what's up.  Until today.  

I also resigned from all 20 Words with Friends games.  Now there's a time-waster.  When you're playing with 20 different people you can stay busy for hours on end between 6 p.m. and 2 a.m.   And I do.  

What a waste.  

I know God has been tugging on my heart to do a new thing and to start oh.... about a week ago.  But I didn't have the time.  I told God I didn't have the time as I was re-shuffling my tiles to make new and complex words worth at least 40 points.  I spent two hours doing that already today.  And it's just noon.

But God won.  I knew He would.  He always does.   He didn't do anything remarkable other than to whisper to  my heart.  He speaks in that still, small voice to me.  And because I know I don't want that voice to stop speaking to me, I need to heed it when He speaks.  

Colossians 3:23  Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men,   

So... God isn't happy with my ability to make large words out of scrambled letters?  Probably not.  He's not happy with my "likes" of my friends deeds for the day?  Nope.   

I will still check in.  It's a great way to see pictures of my grandson who lives far away and to talk to his mom daily.  Or to see what my kids are up to.  I will still see what requests for prayers are posted by members of our church and my other FB friends.   It is a great way to talk to my sister whom I almost never get to see.  But that's it.  Those things don't take more than a few minutes of my day.

God is calling me to a new venture.  One that doesn't need Facebook.  And so I have bravely logged out.

It's time to move on.

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Waste not... want not

03/02/2012

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There is some guy in a car in the parking lot across the street from my office who must be made of money.  I say this because he is sitting in his car revving the engine for who knows what reason.  Over and over.  And over.  Huh, you would think a guy with money to burn like that would have a nicer car... 

At the price of gas, he's really running up quite a tally.  Six dollars... seven... eight...

He doesn't really seem to pay much heed to the fact that the gas station down the street posts the premium fare of $3.79 a gallon for this golden liquid.  And I believe "golden" might be an accurate word here.

Nine dollars... ten... eleven...

Again and again he races the engine.  Blue smoke is coming from his tailpipe.  Well, not his tailpipe ... the car's.   The tachometer in his dashboard must be all the way to the "red-line-o'-danger" ...  twelve... thirteen... fourteen.

What a waste.

In my job I am developing something for Kids Church (my job is what I do when I'm not rambling on incessantly here) and it had to do with being a good steward.  You don't know what that is?  Let me 'splain it to you.

Every good thing we have comes from God.  The Book of James says so.   My money would fall under the category of "good thing."   We were given these things to have dominion over them ... to use them for the best things.  Perhaps even to make it grow, as in a bank investment, CD or the like.

Matthew 25 is about the man who went away and gave his property to three different people to care for it.  The parable of the talents.  One was given ten talents, the next five and the last one was given one talent.  Two of them were really good at making a profit.  One was not.  He wasted what the owner had given him by burying it in the ground.

Waste.  It's not how God wants us to spend what He has entrusted to us.  We are not to waste our time, our energies, our gifts, our abilities... nothing.  It is all to be spent wisely.  To be used for a greater purpose than just on us. 

Do we waste the abilities God has given us?  Do we throw away the good gifts with which we have been blessed?  Bury our talents so no one knows which ones we possess?  Possibly. 

Why would we do that?  Maybe it's so no one asks anything of us.  So we aren't asked to step up to the plate.

Ahhh... but here's something you probably don't remember.  We were all given whatever talents, gifts, abilities, our desires yes, even our experiences to make us who we uniquely are.  You are unique, just like everyone else.  And God has a plan for you (Jeremiah 29:11).  That plan includes all of those gifts, talents.... you get the idea.

You were designed to be someone God could use for His specific purposes.  Don't waste that good thing He has given you.

Don't be like the guy across the street (seventeen... eighteen... nineteen dollars) working on his car.   And yet the engine is revving as it has been all the while I have been typing away on this white screen. 

Trying to fill... and not waste... this space.





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Words with Friends... on Facebook

02/06/2012

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Hello.  My name is Jamie Oehme.  And I am addicted to Words with Friends on Facebook.  

Is there a self-help or recovery group for this?  I have to admit that I will stay up for hours (and hours, and hours) waiting for people to play their tiles making some of the most unusual and longest words I have ever seen.  I keep dictionary.com open on another window so I can check and see what some words mean.  I'm accumulating quite the list of words containing "z," "x," and "q."  It is, after all, the trick that will put you over your opponent.  A well-placed "z' on a triple letter tile near a triple word score can be the make-it-or-break-it move in the game.  I'm not sure if I am proud or ashamed of the fact that between Lexulous, Words with Friends, and Scrabble I have had as many as 47 consecutive games going.  Yikes.  

Talk about a waste of time.

How sad is it that I can spend hours on end coming up with strategies to put me over the top, and the pile of books I've been meaning to read is an ever-growing stack next to the very rocker in which I sit as I contemplate how to manipulate my score.  (I am a master of the run-on sentence.)

Lately I have been feeling a little guilty about the time I spend on this distraction, after all, that's really what it is if I'm honest with myself.   It's something that keeps me from the very thing I am supposed to be about.  I've been completing games and not starting any new ones.  I only go to the site two or three times a day instead of sitting there for hours.  I have stopped looking at absolutely every letter on the board before making my move.  Just play and go.  

Here's where the guilt is coming in... I want Jesus to be proud of me.  I want the time I have left in life, whether years, months or days, to matter for something worthwhile.  Something that matters beyond bragging rights of winning a silly little word game.  Something that lasts.

As a pastor, no... just as a Christian, I am supposed to put the plans God has for me above all which means I am to be seeking Him continually.  Asking Him through prayer what He would have me do rather than wasting time online.  (Matthew 6:33  But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.)  Seek

That will never come playing against people who are only known by a player number.  Only the things done for Jesus will last.  That's all that matters.  It's all I am supposed to be about in this life.  

Life.  That's an eight-point word.  
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