Changing your Bait

I went fishing the other day and I must confess that I love to fish. I enjoy all types, but mainly, I enjoy bass fishing. Now, any good fisherman worth his weight in salt will not spill his beans on his lures he uses to catch his fish. However, I will share some insights on what happened yesterday while fishing with a relative.

I had my "favorite" lure attached to my favorite rod/reel combo. I was casting and casting and casting and absolutely nothing happened. Well my fishing partner was fishing with his favorite lure and he was catching them left and right. So, guess what I did? Nothing! I kept on using my favorite lure to no good.

Here is my point.

Sometimes we have to change to catch the fish we desire to catch. I had some people from El Salvador attend our restaurant church this past Sunday. I now have to learn Spanish. Now, you may say they need to learn English. Well, that is true and that would be nice. But, they told me they have been living in my town for 7 years and not one time have they been to church. 7 years with no church. Someone has to reach them for Christ. I think that I will start to learn Spanish.

I will change my bait.

What do you value?

I was recently watching a re-run of M*A*S*H the other night and something Hawkeye Pierce said struck a thought in my mind. We as Americans have lost our value system. Hawkeye was the attending Physician to a wounded soldier. This soldier was wounded in his knee. His dad was a General and was visiting him. The next day Hawkeye came into the Generals trailer and told him his son had died. The conversation that followed is amazing. The General asked Hawkeye if he had any children. Hawkeye said, "No, i'm not married."

There use to be a time when we all said that. Children were associated with people being married. A Man and Woman united and then the children were born. Today it is not that way. Our society is littered with people who desire to experiment with living together first and if we have kids, no worries. Our values have changed.

According to this website, http://www.fatherhood.org/media/consequences-of-father-absence-statistics 24 million children live without a Father in the house. This same website says that between 1989 and 1990 217,798 children were born and infants without a father's name on the birthday certificate were 2.3 times more likely to die the first year of life compared to infants with a father's name on a birth certificate.

It is not an acceptable lifestyle to live together.

It is not an acceptable lifestyle to have children out of marriage.

Now, you cannot change what has happened. However, you can surely change once you have opened your eyes and seen the truth. Hawkeye may have had a whiskey distill in his tent, but man, he sure told us what he valued.