4 minute read<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFlee the evil desires of youth and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.\u201d (2 Timothy 2:22 NIV)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We have a choice where we focus our attention. Darth Vade<\/a>r, arguably the number one villain <\/a>of all time, chose the dark side. He pursued all things evil. His deep, gravelly voice and heavy breathing makes every word out of his mouth sound ominous. He sought evil intentionally, we seek it unintentionally. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIf we want to live well, we can\u2019t live unintentionally.\u201d <\/em>Mike Cooke<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n When we unintentionally spend our days doing whatever, we aren\u2019t living life to the fullest. Time slips away, never to return. Opportunities are lost as we mindlessly move through our daily routines. But if we choose to live with intentionality, life\u2019s adventure never ends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Live well intentionally.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n My friend and pastor, Mike Cooke, is teaching me how to live intentionally. Listen to his story in this video at 1:17 minutes<\/a>. Sitting with Mike, listening to his story is heartbreaking. Victims of robbery, shot five times, his son Bryan, killed. His words at 1:23 minutes touch my heart:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis earth has lost someone who literally loved everyone. I had a number of choices. One of them was to give up on God, the other one to stay in mourning and grief and suffering, just focus on those negative aspects. God wouldn\u2019t let that happen.\u201d Mike Cooke<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n None of us can understand another person\u2019s pain. We all have hurt we\u2019re dealing with today. But we also have a choice of how we live. We can choose to live unintentionally, allowing the suffering in our lives to consume us, or we can live intentionally with God. <\/p>\n\n\n\n One of Mike\u2019s favorite verses has become one of mine as I begin to understand its meaning:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.\u201d (<\/em>John 10:10 NIV<\/em><\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n At the end of Mike\u2019s story, he talks about the ability to laugh again. Miracles happen every day. To me, having walked through these past two years with my friends, the ability to laugh is a miracle. God called Mike into a journey he never wanted to walk, but he\u2019s not traveling alone. I\u2019ve witnessed family and friends surround them and help them. Life Resources<\/a> and their counselors are invaluable to the family\u2019s ability to move forward from this tragedy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Intentionality is a daily choice. Each morning when we turn our eyes heavenward, we set our intention. You can choose whether you allow Satan to steal your joy, or you can live life to the fullest with God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Question of the Day:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Are you living your life intentionally?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Further Reading:<\/strong> <\/a>Jeremiah 44:24-47:7 NIV<\/a>, 2 Timothy 2:22-3:17 NIV<\/a>, Psalm 94 NIV<\/a>, Proverbs 26:6-8 NIV<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 4 minute read \u201cFlee the evil desires of youth and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart.\u201d (2 Timothy 2:22 NIV) Pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace. We have a choice where we focus our attention. Darth Vader, arguably the number one villain… Continue reading WHAT SHOULD YOU REALLY PURSUE IN LIFE?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","without-featured-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2637"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2638,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2637\/revisions\/2638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.honestreflections.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}