Rob Marshall Online

Where do we go from here?

When I originally started this blog, it was going to be a place where I could share teaching with anyone who would care to listen.  Which isn't necessarily a bad idea, but the problem came because I put a lot of pressure on myself to only enter posts that were well thought and and researched.  That's a problem because it makes it all a little too sanitized.  And something that I'm coming to realize is that sanitized teaching is like hiding behind a facade.

So I'm back, but I want to take an entirely new approach.  That doesn't mean that I won't, on occasion, spend the time to put together a well thought out post, but that isn't going to be the emphasis. 

What I want to do is take a journey.  It's a journey of faith (and I will get back to that topic soon) and also one of abundance.  For too long I have thought in terms of what I have to do and what God can't do, or won't do for some reason.  What I have ended up doing is thinking in terms of limitation and scarcity rather than abundance.  And because that way of thinking is habitual, it has caused, and continues to cause, problems in my life.

Something that I want to accomplish through this blog is that I just simply share with everyone the process of change that I'm going through as I go from scarcity to abundance.

One thing that I won't be doing here is talking about reaching a certain level of financial wealth.  I do believe that having more money than we need for our day-to-day lives is part of abundance, and I am not, like so many others, going to say, "Abundance is more than just money..."  Yes, it is MORE than that but it also definitely includes that.  We can't live an "abundant" life unless we have more money than we can consume, in other words until we have enough coming in that we can freely (emotionally) give and serve others with our treasure (money) as well as our time and talents.

The posts may not be as neat and pretty, although I hope that they will still be easily understood, but I hope that they will be real.

God bless,

Rob

The Promised Land - How do we get there from here?

Do you believe that the secret to the "good life" is hard work?  That in order to have the best life has to offer you have to first pay your dues?

There is a popular idea running around that we all have to go through a lot of bad things before we can experience the good things.  And there seems to be a lot of evidence to support it.  Just listen to people who have come through hard times and are now enjoying a better life.  They will all tell you the story of the pain and suffering that they endured, and the sacrifices they made, on the long road to their prosperity.  Some of them seem to wear their painful past like a badge of honor that says, "I earned my success."

The blessings of God are all about His promises and grace and are not about how hard we have worked, how much we've sacrificed, and how much pain we've endured in order to earn them.  The bottom line is that we cannot earn God's grace.  And since everything we have in life comes to us because His grace, it is all a gift.

The Law of Attraction and the Bible

From talk shows to forums on the Internet, everyone is talking about "The Secret".  The main message of the movie is that a truth, the knowledge about a universal law, has been kept from the poor huddled masses.  The main conspirators are rich and powerful business people and, of course, the church.

The writer of the Newsweek article on the movie says, "You'd think the last thing Americans need is more excuses for self-absorption and acquisitiveness."  He places the movie in the general category of the kind of inspiration and motivation that has been preached by self-help gurus for years, but with an added stroke of marketing genius, combining the message with conspiracy theories similar to the Da Vinci Code.

"The Secret", Oprah, and the Truth

The movie "The Secret" has become very popular.  CNN quickly jumped on the bandwagon when Larry King Live did two shows, each with a different panel of experts, on the principles taught in the movie.  Ellen DeGeneres invited a couple of the speakers from the movie to her show, and recently a whole panel of them appeared on Oprah.  The reaction to the panel discussion was supposedly so great that Oprah decided to do a "Reaction to" show.

I'm not a real fan of the Law of Attraction as it's being taught, because it doesn't make sense that like attracts like, when everything I've ever learned about magnetism is that opposites attract.  Having watched "The Secret" a couple of times I think that there are some things we can learn from the movie, but also some things that don't line up with the real Truth, God's word.

Your Million-Dollar Idea - Are You Ready For It?

Regardless of what you think about McDonalds, whether or not you'd ever set foot in one or if you all too frequently give in to those Big Mac attacks, there is something that we can learn from Ray Kroc's little franchise.  When he first looked at the McDonald's restaurant in California, Ray saw something that the McDonald brothers hadn't seen.  He saw a way to create an empire the eventually led to great success.

Accepting Responsibility, Without Taking The Blame

There's no escaping the truth.  As Winston Churchill once said, "The truth is incontrovertible, malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end; there it is.

And when it comes to our lives the simple truth is that we are where we are in life because of the choices we've made.  Some of those choices may have been unconscious ones, things that we didn't really consider or analyze, but we made the decision, took the action, and here we are.

Would Jesus Hang Saddam?

At some point I want to come back and do a longer article on the doctrine of eternal judgment - I know, what a fun thing to do, right? 

But our understanding of eternity impacts our lives here on earth, so it is a very important issue for everyone.  My hope is that the following article will be a good starting point.  The longer article will look at a few more aspects of eternity that we need to think about here and now.  But in the meantime, what do you think?  Would Jesus hang Saddam?

Christians in America - An Unbelieving Generation?

In a lot of ways I'm pretty average.  I may be a bit taller than some, and probably weigh more than I should, but there isn't really anything extraordinary about me.  So when I read the stories in the Bible, and think about how the majority of the people who were there reacted, I assume that I would have done what everyone else was doing.

One example is the story in Mark 9:14-29 about a father who brought his demon-possessed son to be healed.  When the father came to the disciples, Jesus wasn't there.  He was with Peter, James, and John and they were on their way back from the mountain where they had seen Jesus transfigured before their eyes.  As they approached the other disciples they noticed that a large crowd had gathered, and that the teachers of the law were arguing with them.

When Jesus asked what they were arguing about, the man whose son was demon-possessed came and explained to Him how his son was being tormented by the spirit, and that he had asked the disciples to cast it out, but they hadn't been able to.  It's at this point that Jesus says, "O unbelieving generation, how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy to me." (Mark 9:19)

Reprogram Your Mind and Change Your Life

Someone once said that we were all created for success, but programmed for failure.  And even if our lives don't end up being complete disasters, far too often we are willing to accept mediocrity, and that's bad enough.  Too many people have set their sights on survival.  They hope to get to the point where they are "comfortable", but they would gladly settle for just getting by and keeping up with the bills.

When we believe that we are supposed just "settle" for something - whatever that something might be - we end up missing what God has planned for us.  We were all created to give glory to God and the last thing that He wants is for us to sell ourselves short and accept anything less than the best.  Our lives should boldly proclaim what God can do for someone who believes in Him.

For those who remember the movie "The Matrix," there is a scene in which Neo, who has been "woken up" and brought into the real world, is being given some training.  Because the people who had been in the Matrix were wired for direct computer access, they simply plugged Neo in and literally downloaded information, even something as complicated as Kung Fu, directly into his brain.

There are times when I think that it would be great to have a computer adapter in my head so that I could just download new beliefs and quickly, maybe even effortlessly, change my life.  Can you imagine being able to change the course of your life, overcome all the bad memories and fears that have been holding you back, and do it all in a matter of seconds? 

Using Our Faith - The Power of Visualization

We are constantly being bombarded with images.  We might think that most of them are marketing and advertising messages that we see on TV, billboards, or in the paper.  And when it comes to the Internet, advertising is everywhere from email to almost every web page you visit.

Advertisers and marketers have long understood the power of imagery.  If they can get a person to imagine a certain feeling, and then associate that feeling with a product, they have a much better chance of selling the product to that person.  The use of the proper images is extremely important because of the emotions they cause.  And once they get someone emotionally involved with something, once they have created or intensified the desire, the product is sold.  The simple truth is that most of us will more readily buy something that we feel we really want over something that we just think we need.

A couple of years ago my wife was tired of driving around in our minivan.  She really liked the Mazda commercials with the cute little boy that said, "Zoom, zoom!"  And started talking about wanting a little "zoom, zoom" car.  About that time she got refrigerator magnet that had one of those 3-D pictures that goes back and forth between two things.  The one picture was of a van and the other of the Mazda.

Not long after that she was visiting some of her family and noticed how her nephew, his wife, and their baby, car seat and all, were crammed into their little car.  They talked about it and decided to trade straight across, our minivan for their Ford Probe.  What we found out later was that the Ford Probe was actually built by Mazda.  She had gotten her little "zoom, zoom" car and didn't even realize it. 

What would happen with our faith if we would do the same thing that the marketers do, but substitute the desires that God has given us?  Would we find that our desire for the things of God would increase if we marketed them to ourselves?  And would we experience greater faith if we had a clear picture in our minds of the things we are asking for?  The answer is yes.