Dream Big

I am a real creature of habit. There are so many different types of food and restaurants here, yet Im content going to the same places and ordering the same exact thing. The only real variety is which day I’ll go to which regular spot. I think I have about 15 regular eating spots. One of those is Dairy Queen. On Sunday quite by happenstance I stumbled into a Dairy Queen for lunch. I was quite surprised that it was the first of a three day customer appreciation event. Everything on the menu was ½ off. Since that point, I have eaten at Dairy Queen seven straight times. It doesn’t end there. Yesterday I took the South African there for lunch. For dinner, I bought everyone in my Positive Living Group dinner from there. And for lunch today, I bought everyone in the office their own meal from Dairy Queen. I needed and excuse, and that excuse was that it was the first day for our new sales person.

Now its an interesting thing with Indians. Most of them don’t make enough money to afford fast food so they are not used to eating it. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. But it was quite a treat for them today. The most interesting guy was Ahmed our driver. He’s a stubborn old guy that’s been with Khalifa for 15 years. He’s very loyal, and always does his job. He won the Indian lottery once, and used his savings to buy the world’s worst toupee. He’s a very funny character and I’ve learned to really like him a lot. He was complaining when I was sending around the menu to take everyone’s order. He would rather just have the $6 I would have spent on him, so he could go buy briyani for .50. Sorry Ahmed it doesn’t work like that. If I want to treat these people I will. I know $6 doesn’t sound like much, but when you spread it out over nearly 20 employees, I can’t do it all the time. Plus it was half price so that gave me even more incentive. Culture shock got to me when he refused to make an order. Simi told me that Ahmed doesn’t like sandwiches. What????? Who doesn’t like sandwiches? Apparently a lot of Indians. I guess it is western thing to eat with bread to keep the meat from getting on your hands. That’s not a problem with Indians, they eat with their fingers, so of course its going to get on their hands. What do you need bread for? Its just a different clashing of cultures again. I find it incredibly fascinating. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. I think it made the new sales guy feel very welcome.

God has really been speaking to me lately…not just for others but for myself. In this time of financial insecurity with the recession I’ve done the only thing I know how to do. That is to “Seek First the Kingdom….” It’s a funny thing whenever I do that, everything seems to work itself out. Im not sure If I shared this before. I always repeat myself as I am my father’s son. But I think the life of the Christian should be a simple one. The beauty is in the simplicity of God’s design. God created us for one purpose, relationship. So for that relationship he essentially gave us two rules, love the Lord your God will all your heart, soul and mind and then Love your neighbor as yourself. That’s it. All the rest are details to fine tune your life. But if you just do those two aforementioned tasks everything else is easy. If you are seriously following God, then all the details that the Bible mentions, like the 10 commandments, the Beatitudes, Paul’s instruction etc… that all becomes second nature. Loving God, and loving others makes its really easy to do all the details even to the point where you don’t have to think about it. I think its “us” that makes it all the more complicated. Like you have to jump through all these religious hoops to earn your salvation. Its not that way. Salvation, Joy, Peace, they’re all gifts. We mess it up. That’s why Im not a huge fan of organized religion. Organized religion serves a purpose, but sometimes legalists get too involved with the rules and the didactic interpretation of those rules. I grew up with those rules, and they were burdensome. Now that Im overseas and seeing life from a totally different perspective I see the beauty in God’s plan. I have enough. Im content with what I have. I’m positive it’s all a result of “Seek First….” I think that’s my message to the world now. Follow those two rules…the rest is down hill. That’s not say you won’t have troubles…but “Seeking First…” will give you the solutions to all those troubles before they weigh you down. Im pretty fortunate the amount of enlightenment that God has shared with me over here. He’s always been urging me to this point, he just had to have me isolated in order for me to really receive it. Now I believe its my calling to share what I’ve learned with the rest of the world through media. It’s an awesome responsibility that I have to keep reminding myself that I am capable and worthy of doing. Miss So. Ca said two words to me the other day that have been resonating with me even since. She said…”Dream Big.” I’ve always been a dreamer…and now I’m trying to dream bigger than ever.