Messi is considered the natural successor to Diego Maradona, and if you have ever seen him play, you will know why.

Take a look at this YouTube comparison of both Maradona and Messi to show why he is so highly regarded (if you like soccer of course).

Messi wears the coveted Number 10 in Argentina’s World Cup team currently competing in South Africa.

I caught about 20 minutes of Argentina’s game against Korea on Thursday night.

In that short time I was captivated by the creativity, deft touch, and at times, the sheer audacity of Messi as he teased his opponents with his free flowing skills.

The soccer field is Messi’s natural habitat.

He is utterly at ease executing one piece of inspiring play after another.

Maradona is now national coach of Argentina. While this guy  has had as many scandals as Michael Jackson no one can doubt his God-given skills on the soccer field.

It is interesting that Maradona has given Messi almost free reign on the soccer field this World Cup. Messi has been freed from playing the conventional positions and is thus has the liberty to create opportunities for his team to score.

Of course you have to be a Messi to enjoy that kind of liberty. Only a handful of players have that kind of freedom. Their brilliance demands some extra space to express itself.

I was also impressed that Messi, despite his brilliance, was a team player.

Messi used his unusual abilities to further his team’s interests rather than simply trying to go for goal himself every time.

Let me glean a few good lessons from the mesmerising Messi:-

1. Exceptional individuals (whether in society or in the church) need to be allowed to thrive rather than constantly trying to be equalised with everyone else;
2. The body of Christ is made up of exceptional members (how could they not be since they are gifted by the Holy Spirit?) and each should be able to thrive doing what they do best for the benefit of the whole body;
3. The importance of the ‘team’. No matter how good the Messi’s and Maradona’s of this world are, they still need 10 other players on the field otherwise they have no hope of winning. Behind every Spurgeon, Wesley or Whitfield is a thousand unknown faithful believers serving behind the scenes. God uses and has a place for all of us.
4. Innovation (and dare I say change) always involves some risk. It is unavoidable so make sure you are really want to innovate or change before taking the plunge.

The iPad makes your research tools more accessible. Logos has a version for the iPad which gives you access to your books in the iPad form factor.  This is one step closer to the resolution of the debate between paper vs. digital commentaries.  PDF documents are common in pastoral libraries.  Many of the original sources have been converted to PDF thanks the ceaseless work of the people at Ages Digital Library and other groups such as CCEL.  I like to print out my PDFs and mark them up with a yellow highlighter and red pen.  iAnnotate for the iPad gives you the same functionality with the ability to correlate your annotations for easy reference when you’re trying to remember where you got that incredible quote or illustration from.   Another neat feature in iAnnotate is the ability to open multiple PDFs in a tabbed interface allowing for cross referencing.  The convergence of Apple iBooks, Amazon Kindle, B&N eReader, and free programs like Stanza onto one device is a great benefit for book lovers.  I’m reading Os Guiness’ The Call through Kindle and a book on the history of China through B&N.

The iPad can change the context of your working environment.  The evangelists of the Great Awakening used to study and pray on horseback.  Ministers now have the opportunity with a form factor that fits somewhere between a traditional notepad and a smart phone.  I see a lot of benefit in the prepaid 3G plans for Australian readers.  It allows you to use the Internet and email in the native form factor when you are out of the office.

Taking notes on the iPad produces mixed results. As a touch typist, I find that if I trust the flat interface it produces excellent results.  At this point I am still double guessing myself as my hammer-fingers look for some form of tacticity on the glass screen.  I might get used to it – but the Bluetooth keyboard is a great addition.

Most of the ministers that I know adopted some form of PDA (palm, pocket pc, etc) prior to the adoption of smartphones.  I don’t think that you can classify the iPad in the same category.  Give it a try and let’s get some more ministry-related feedback on its potential.  I’ll be happy to answer your specific questions as well.  By the way – don’t think that the iPad will magically cure daydreaming, tiredness or difficult textual problems.  It’s only a tool.

Jessica’s ambition and abilities are unusual, compared to most teens.  Still, her achievement has reminded the world that teens can do hard things.

This is refreshing, because our society seems to lower the bar of expectations for young people.

Consider the average marrying age for Australians.  The average woman marries at age 29.  The average Aussie male marries at around age 30.  The  marrying age has continually increased since the seventies.  Demographer Bernard Salt describes the difference:

“The perception of what is acceptable has changed completely.  In 1971 it was marriage at 21, kids at 23, a three-bedroom brick veneer out in the ‘burbs and a husband who works. That was utopia and it was important in those days to get the sequences right,” he suggests.

“These days the sequence doesn’t really matter. Then, if you were 25 and a woman and not married you were on the shelf. Now, if you get married at 21 you’re a loser.”

Look at the normal process for obtaining a driver’s license.  Teenage drivers in NSW must use a restricted license for at least four years, progressing through L-plates, then red P’s, then green P’s.  Only then are they eligible for a full license.  Why is this process so extensive?  One reason is the recklessness of some young drivers.

Driving responsibly is hard (apparently!).  Financially supporting yourself is hard.  Marriage is hard.  Being a mature follower of Jesus is hard.

None of these should be faced casually.

But we do not grow up by deferring these goals indefinitely.

Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. James chapter 1, verses 2-4

Ben Kwok

Bingham turned to running in his early forties. He was a self-confessed couch potato. Inactive and overweight, Bingham found his physical salvation (and satisfaction) in running.

He has written columns for running magazines for years, authored a few best-sellers and has inspired thousands of very ordinary people to get off their sofas and onto the streets.

Bingham is known to the running community as ‘the Penguin’ due to his stature and running technique. While he does not claim to be a born-again believer, Bingham writes insightfully, transparently and wisely on life and character issues as they relate to fitness and running.

The Penguin’s motto is ‘The miracle is not that I finished, but that I had the courage to start’.

Frankly, I have found the Penguin’s writings to be a real source of inspiration and refreshment.

Let me give you a sampling of inspiring ‘penguin thoughts’ from one of Bingham’s books, No Need for Speed: A beginner’s guide to the joy of running.

On having to tackle his weight problems Bingham wrote:-

When it finally occurred to me that I had no choice but to be more active, I didn’t embrace the idea with much enthusiasm. I was grumpy. I put on the shoes and shorts of a runner, but I did so like a man going to his execution. I knew I had to pay the price to get healthy and fit, but I was hoping to get a discount…..

I was going to be the one who found a way to be both decadent and fit. I was going to be the one who could overeat and overtrain. I wanted to be the person who discovered the secret of how to change without changing, how to grow without growing, and how to become a whole new me without losing the old me.

Concerning personal honesty he confesses:-

As a 43-year-old smoker with 36 excess kilos and a long history of overeating, I didn’t want to face my own reality. I’d become very good at ignoring my body and even better at ignoring my own soul….

You have to get real and stay real. You have to start by being honest with yourself, then continue to look honestly at where you are, where your going and where you want to be. It isn’t always easy and it isn’t always fun, but the more honest you are with yourself the more likely you will succeed.

On turning fear into courage:-

But in spite of my determination not to change, I did. The process of becoming a runner began with my first running step.

The more you run, the more you are a runner. It sounds simple and it is. There’s nothing more to becoming a runner than running. It isn’t how fast or how far you run. It isn’t even how long you’ve been running. It’s only that you run that makes you a runner.

It becomes more and more difficult not to be an athlete- not by design, but by default. You begin to look forward to the feelings of effort that you once avoided. Instead of shunning the fatigue of honest effort, you go out of your way to find opportunities to exert yourself.

About what it means for him to run, the Penguin poignantly reveals:-

My running shoes have become giant erasers on my feet. Every foot strike rubs away some memory of a previous indiscretion with food or smoke or drink. Every successful mile releases me from the grip of the demons of failure. Every starting line is another chance to prove that my past will not determine my future.

Behold, You desire truth in the inward parts, And in the hidden part You will make me to know wisdom. Psalm 51:6

For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, not to be regretted; but the sorrow of the world produces death. For observe this very thing, that you sorrowed in a godly manner: What diligence it produced in you, what clearing of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what vehement desire, what zeal, what vindication!… 2 Corinthians 7:10-11

By Robert Apps

As long as I have a mouth and stomach, the battle will rage.

For anyone with long-term weight issues, an important truth needs to be remembered: The fight to control your weight is much like the war against Terror.

There is no conclusive point in time victory, just a long struggle ahead. The battle field shifts and changes and the enemy is everywhere. Territory that has been conquered yesterday can be up for grabs tomorrow.

This is not meant to discourage anyone but it will help us be realistic about the battle ahead.

In fact, the same truth applies when dealing with other temptations. No one ever gets final and complete victory over lust or covetousness. But it is a daily battle that can be won as we rely on the Lord.

I have found two powerful weapons in the battle of the bulge: weight training and jogging. I hated both of them when I began the journey, especially jogging.

It was because I could barely jog more than a few hundred metres at a time. It was agony trying to push around my large frame with Matt next to me hardly breaking a sweat.

The weights weren’t that much better. I was so out of shape that even after a light session I was ready to puke and to cap things off, was sore all over the next day.

All you need to do is a five minute search on Google to discover the benefits of weight training and jogging. I always feel invigorated after a good work out.

While no amount of exercise can undo bad or over-eating, these disciplines will speed up the weight loss and will actually make you healthy rather than simply not fat anymore.

Any food lovers amongst our readership will also be glad to know that if you exercise more (particularly weight training) you can eat more!  Not too much but a bit more nonetheless.

The Bible talks about believers ‘building up’ each other and being ‘exercised’ or ‘trained’ by God’s dealings (though sometimes hard) with us. In other words the Christian life involves deliberate activity, change, response and growth.

We have to move from the theoretical (or should I say theological) to the practical. It is not about head knowledge only.

Matt was at me for weeks about correct diet before the penny dropped and I started doing what he was telling me to do. Then the kilo’s really started to drop!

All the newly acquired knowledge was of no profit unless some action took place.

Action that I trust will simply be the beginning of a lifetime of changed habits and actions by the grace of God.

But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit Jude 20

Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. Hebrews 12:11

By Robert Apps

In summary: 1) The wealthy in China have property and technology, 2) Furniture will be the next status symbol, and 3) Buying furniture from China is unacceptable (this is ironic considering where the rest of the world buys its furniture…).

The article informed and established an emerging benchmark for determining wealth and status.  Living in Australia – we are exposed to this kind of article all the time through every form of media with increasingly sophisticated levels of interaction.  Facebook and Gmail parse the content of your communication and your browsing habits to deliver targeted advertisements.   We love to talk about our next purchase or our next experience.  We would never admit to this – but we are defining ourselves by what we own and what we have experienced.

Devout men and women in the Middle Ages understood this threat and they cloistered themselves into monasteries to live a chaste life before God.  This disengagement and personal striving led to great theological error.   Equally devout men and women have fused God’s blessing with personal prosperity so closely as to relegate trials to the unbelieving heart and the demonic world.

Consider this:

1)    We have everything we need in Jesus Christ.

2)    This life is temporal – the next life is eternal.

3)    You have an opportunity to glorify God and love others… today.

Since trying to lose some pounds, I quite enjoy watching it online (without the distraction of the ads, including those involving food).

There must be tens of thousands of people who (vicariously) watch the contestants try and do something about their weight problems.

The competition goes for a few months and the transformation in the contestants is nothing short of remarkable.

It is hard not to be moved with compassion and joy for those who lose 40-50% of their entire body weight after all their hard work.

In a controlled and focused environment and surrounded by the best trainers and gym equipment, healthy food and medical supervision, people who once thought they were hopelessly overweight are shedding anywhere from 3-10kgs per week! It is not always like that but these figures are pretty usual.

The contestants are seen warts (or should I say weights) and all. There are loads of tears and conflicts within themselves and with the other contestants as they battle their dietary demons. All in full view of a watching public!

Each week they submit to the ‘weigh in’ to see who will fall below the dreaded ‘yellow line’ and face elimination.

It seems to me that those contestants who have succeeded are the ones who have literally had to die to their old habits and ways.

Mild reform and some tinkering here and there just won’t do. As Jason would say, “These people are intentional.”

They have basically ‘repented’ of their previous lifestyle. They have become accountable to their trainers and families- even an entire nation. How do they back out now?

While the show is somewhat artificial (how many people can drop out of the game of life to lose weight this way?) and people are learning self-help techniques rather than dependence on God, there are still some valuable lessons we can learn.

God wants us to be the biggest losers!

Not so much in the physical realm but as we learn to deny self and follow Christ in our choices and direction of life.

Be under no illusion: while there is a life to live for Christ, there is also a death to die.

Then He said to them all, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will save it. For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and is himself destroyed or lost? For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, of him the Son of Man will be ashamed when He comes in His own glory, and in His Father’s, and of the holy angels. Luke 9:23-26

I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. Galatians 2:20

Most assuredly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain. He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. John 12:24-25

“To each his own.”

It’s the only absolute truth for most Australians.

Here’s a rebuttal in four characters:

9/11

It’s not rocket science after all. If you leave the terrorist to “his own,” the people in the plane die. And the building. 2,973 of them in all.

We know intuitively that “to each his own” is a stupid philosophy. So why do we cling to it? What’s so attractive about it?

It matters what you believe

At it’s core, “to each his own” rests on the idea that it doesn’t matter what you believe.

If this is true, then why make a lot of fuss over nothing? After all, it doesn’t really matter. You have your beliefs. I have mine. It’s much easier to shrug and say “well, you know. To each his own.”

We cling to such silliness because if we admit that what we believe matters, then we are responsible to find out if what we believe is true. And that’s a lot of work.

But that’s not the worst part. The worst part is that if we find the truth, then we’re just like those arrogant jerks who think they have “biblical Christianity.” Who are they to judge anyway?

“To each his own” is our only escape from absolute truth and absolute morals. If we admit that some people—like, maybe terrorists—are absolutely wrong, then we betray the basic premise of Postmodernism—Pluralism.

The compassion of rebellion

That’s why a true Pluralist can’t just come out and say the terrorists are absolutely morally wrong. They have to try to present it in social terms. “It’s wrong because it hurt other people and that’s not nice.” In other words, “it’s wrong, but not because God said it’s wrong (after all, who is he to judge?!). It’s wrong because I decided it’s wrong.”

Meanwhile, the average Aussie bloke will tell you what’s blindingly obvious—it’s wrong. Plain, old, simple, absolute wrong. Then, as you question his authority for such a judgement, he’ll shrug and say “well, you know. To each his own.”

There was a point made in the introduction of the message that utterly intrigued me. It touched on an episode of Abraham’s life that I had never given much thought to.

It concerned the incident in Genesis 21 when Abraham’s servant Hagar and her son Ishmael are sent away. Abraham of course fathered Ishmael at the insistence of his then barren wife Sarah to try and fast forward God’s promise of a son. Local customs allowed female servants to be treated in this way.

Whenever we try and hurry along God’s eternal plans, it always ends in heart ache and disappointment.

Ishmael had to leave because Abraham’s other son Isaac had come to age and
his continuing presence along with that of his mother Hagar was causing
great conflict in Abraham’s home.

We are told that Abraham grieved greatly because his separation from Ishmael, even though God had promised to protect Ishmael and to make of him a great nation. Abraham obviously had a close relationship with Ishmael as well as with Isaac.

Imagine that: the Patriarch Abraham, a separated dad!

It’s not just the dad’s (or mum’s) that end up in a lawyer’s office needing advice about their rights to see their kids after a difficult separation that carry such emotional burdens. There have always been deep burdens associated with God’s first ordained institution.

My point is simply this: the Bible does contains enough truth, even through the stories of its great characters, to comfort us thousands of years later. They had the same problems as we do because they had the same heart as we have.

So we can approach the Scripture to find consolation and understanding as we work through the complex labyrinth of human relationships.

For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope. Romans 15:4

The thought of watching another Christian movie made in America with a happy ending sounded completely uninspiring. However, my wife’s gracious persistence paid off.

What a movie! It had humour, action, pathos, at times heart rending glimpses into the tensions within all marriages, and a compelling message: you need Jesus in your life to remove sin and restore relationships.

Even though I am old enough to remember actor Kirk Cameron in his unregenerate days in Growing Pains, he did an admirable job portraying the young fire-fighter trying to save his marriage single-handedly. It is a blessing to see someone previously in the grip of Hollywood step out to receive Christ and use his acting gifts for the kingdom.

We have already used Fireproof for evangelistic purposes and it comes with study questions and other useful tools. It has had really pleasing results.

While it is still the preaching of the Cross that God uses to declare his message, there are other mediums like cinema, when used wisely and sparingly, that are wonderful means to getting the Gospel out.