Daly Focus Blog
Where were you on 9/11?
If you’re old enough to remember that Tuesday, I’m sure that question instantly brings an answer to your mind.
It was early in the morning here in Colorado when the news broke. I had been having devotions and turned on the television just before the second plane hit the World Trade Center. Like everybody else, I spent the rest of the day glued to the television, watching one of the most epic and tragic moments in American history unfold.
We’re fast approaching the fourth annual Bring Your Bible to School Day, when tens of thousands of public school students across the nation will celebrate on Oct. 5.
I’ll share more about it in the coming weeks, but in case you’re not familiar with Bring Your Bible, let me give you a quick explanation: it’s a student-led event sponsored by Focus on the Family where children and teens from all 50 states will share God’s hope and celebrate religious freedom by bringing their Bibles to school and talking about it with their friends.
“My coach from my senior year could look at me and knight me with his eyes.”
That powerful comment illustrates the hunger of every boy to have a man, particularly a father, draw him into manhood. It comes from Dr. Robert Lewis, who has been associated with Focus on the Family for years. Back in the late 90s, he wrote a book with Focus called “Raising a Modern-Day Knight.” Since then, it’s been our number one best seller.
In his popular Morning Briefing yesterday, Southern Seminary president and former Focus on the Family board member, Dr. Al Mohler, wisely summed up the current challenge facing Congress regarding DACA – the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy – this way:
“Our current immigration laws are a complex of confusion; they do not reflect either what this country intends to enforce, by means of its police and its law enforcement agencies, nor does it reflect a coherent sense of national priorities.”
How can any reasonable person disagree?
Officials say that Ohio’s problem with heroin is reaching epidemic proportions. Ohio has the nation’s highest rate of deadly heroin overdoses, killing at least 23 people in the state each week by some estimates.
And as so often occurs when it comes to drug abuse, children are among those who suffer the most.
About half of all the kids in Ohio’s foster care system are there because one or both of their parents are drug addicts – and some counties report a rate of over 80 percent.
“What would Jesus do?”
Remember that pop-culture phenomenon from a few years back? Lots of people wore “WWJD?” bracelets and T-shirts or slapped a sticker on their car bumper.
It’s too bad that such a deep and meaningful question has become better identified with trinkets and deprecating parody than with life-changing self-reflection.
We’ve sanitized the gospels.
To answer what Jesus would do requires a closer examination of the life He led and the gritty world in which He lived.
Do you know your “why”?
God’s purpose for your spiritual journey, for your work, and for your family starts with your “why.”
People ask, “How will I serve God? Where will I serve God? When will I serve God?” Unless you tackle the “why” question, everything else becomes a mountain that prevents you from moving forward – your finances, your background, your education, your training, your age, and so on. If you know your why, those mountains somehow don’t appear as big or as insurmountable.
For many of us, busyness is like a badge of honor. We take pride in running from the moment our feet hit the floor in the morning to the moment our heads hit the pillow at night.
But busyness can also be a tool of the enemy. It distracts us from what really matters in life. We can’t do it all. Sooner or later, something has to give.
Recent surveys detail what people say they’re sacrificing to their busyness:
56 percent lost sleep
52 percent cut back on recreation
51 percent quit hobbies
44 percent spent less time with friends
34 percent sacrificed time with their families
The secular survey didn’t ask about faith, but time with the Lord is often one of the first things to go when we’re too busy.
Dimas Salaberrios grew up in Queens, New York. By age 10, he had discovered the seedy underbelly of the city ruled by gangs and drugs and had mapped out his future.
He wanted to become the “Street God.”
He became a drug dealer at age 11. By his early twenties, he’d been arrested nine times, but never served time in jail. His father knew a lot of judges, and his mother had the money to protect Dimas with well-paid lawyers.
I want to share with you an interview I did with CBN on the topic of Joe Kennedy, the football coach who lost his job because of his custom of praying on the 50-yard line after every game. As you can tell from the interview – and my Fox News op-ed last week – I feel strongly about this story. (Click on the image to watch the interview.)
I hope you’ll click over to watch the interview – and come back and let me know what you think about Coach Joe Kennedy in the comments section below.
Jim Daly is a husband, father and President of Focus on the Family and host of its National Radio Hall of Fame broadcast. His blog, Daly Focus, is full of timely commentary and wisdom designed to help you navigate and understand today’s culture. His latest book is Marriage Done Right.
