Golf Devotion

Hurry, Hurry, Hurry, and wait… Waiting! None of us do it well, do we? We are conditioned for fast response in our disposable world. We don’t know the art of waiting anymore. We are a society who wants what we want now… and we don’t wait… we are impulsive and ready to go, go, go… As I sat waiting to play my next hole, the golf course pretty backed up, so I am waiting and my flesh crawls… I don’t like waiting. I came here to relax and play a quick 9 holes of golf and I am getting frustrated about waiting. How relaxing is that! NOT!! Relaxing no, bad attitude, YES! I am frustrating myself by leaning into the culture of go, go, go… it is about time I learn to wait and wait without frustration, just peacefully wait and enjoy the time in God’s waiting room. Golf was teaching me this today. The more frustrated I get when I am waiting, the worse I do life, as I step out to swing on the next hole, it isn’t pretty, because my attitude is bad, my shot is bad. So, life may bring us a “roadblock” or a backed up golf course, how will we wait? What is there to learn from waiting? “Kairos” God’s most critical timing is in play. God wants us to have our best day, so He makes us wait for the purposeful timing, for the best outcome possible. Thats My King! Always looking out for me. I would rush through everything and never enjoy a moment of it, never learn, stretch myself or grow through. He wants better for me. So if you find yourself waiting when you were hoping for a “quick 9” and your plans are changed up, your mapped out day changed up… then rest in the Kairos timing of God. Sometimes waiting is critical for God to make us ready so we can have the best outcome possible for us. Our best moment is ahead if we trust God in the times of “Kairos Waiting”, as we wait for that critical, purposeful, perfect timing of God. That Hole In One Awaits Us! God says wait… and we know He wants the best for us, so we yield to His timing and we wait in confidence that our Omniscient, Know it all God, is navigating us to our best moment. Perfect in timing, this is our God. We can trust Him in our waiting. God wants things to be perfect for us. He loves us. We want to go now… but God says wait, so we wait in faith, peace and hope, knowing the best is yet to come. Have fun golfers. Enjoy your day, even if you are waiting… SMILE! Dig Deeper: “Kairos Timing” Of God… It Is Critical Timing. “Kairos is an ancient Greek word meaning "the right or critical moment." It refers to an opportune time for action, distinguishing it from chronos, which denotes chronological or sequential time.”dictionary.com Strong’s Greek “Summary Kairos underscores the truth that all history—and every believer's life—is ordered by the Lord's perfect timetable. Recognizing and responding to these appointed moments transforms ordinary days into stages for God's redemptive glory and advances His kingdom until the final, climactic "time" when Christ is revealed.” https://thebridegroomscafe.com/live-responsible/ https://thebridegroomscafe.com/steady-on/ https://rumble.com/v6tutvt-hurry-hurry-hurry.html https://rumble.com/vam60d-weary-compassion-fatigued-soul-exhausted.html

Have you ever had those emotional “crash and burn” kind of situations?? Always a precursor of emotional exhaustion is three words: Hurry - Hurry - Hurry! We are so busy and harried people. We need to slow down, listen to God, hear His Voice and follow after Him, with His strength, not our own. Golf is like that too… I am a golfer, not very good because I don’t play as much as others do. I take at least one or two times a week to slow down my life and get out on the golf course. Golf always feeds my soul and slows me down on my life course, which does seem like a busy, fast paced life. Sometimes we put way too much on our plate. We are doing a little bit of everything and some of it is God directed, but some of it is not. Keeping up with an over-scheduled life makes us feel the “harried” feeling in our soul, like we just can’t keep up and we are exhausted… and if we continue on this course, we do crash and burn emotionally and it is not pretty… not pretty at all. We can avoid this! Stop! Listen up to God and stay in followship of Him. Be led by God’s peace. Take off all the unnecessary things off your life plate, reorder your schedule according to God’s direction. Just like in golf when we are in a hurry and we are hurrying up our swing, the ball doesn’t go in the right direction, or sometimes it doesn’t go at all… it piddles right off the tee.. embarrassing right!!??!! In golf when we hurry the ball is not going to make it to the hole in that “par like” fashion. We have to take our time, set up our shot and the approach to the ball is so important, if we jam ourselves up, the ball is not going to go very far. When we have a fast swing because we are in a hurry, the ball is going to go to places we don’t want to be chasing it. This happens in life too, where we hurrying and we aren’t set up, we aren’t ready and we don’t finish well. When we take the time with God, we listen up and we get the direction from Him for our day, we thrive, we finish the day well. The same goes with golf, when we slow down, we focus and we don’t hurry our swing, we do well. Less is more when it comes to being a person who finishes strong, less on our plate, more focus, more finishing well. What is the hurry? Slow down and finish strong! God bless ya! Dig Deeper: https://thebridegroomscafe.com/live-responsible/ https://thebridegroomscafe.com/up-to-par/ https://rumble.com/veg2qz-disruptive-emotions.html https://rumble.com/vawfcv-right-choice-first-time.html

We are so easily distracted. Why is that? Honestly because I think we are in a hurry. We don’t want to put the time in that it takes to grow through. It is the same with our golf game. We need to practice and get our swings down, so we swing through, but we don’t take the time to work on our swing, we just want everything to work without putting in the work to make it work. There is so much you can learn from the game of golf. I was sitting at the first hole waiting to tee off and thinking of all the golf disciplines I need to remember to have a good round. But if I want to finish well, I need to do what I already know. I know I need to finish my swing well by swinging through. It is the same way in life, we just want things to come easy without having to take the time to learn it. We don’t want to grow through, we just want to go through. Be willing to be taught by God. He is a teacher. Take the time to grow through “swing through” this life and grow with God. Taking the time to “listen up” and hear the instruction of the Holy Spirit and make the necessary changes in our lives and learn and practice the characteristics of godliness. It is not always going to be easy-peasy in this life where we can just roll through it. We will have times of teaching. So slow down and grow through. Things may not come easy, we don’t get to “just go” without learning something new. God teaches us through our life situations, and it is His way, His timing and His outcome. It is not about what we want. Our human nature is the easy-peasy human condition where we look for the easiest way out. God wants us to wait on Him and let Him show us the things that will help us play well in this life as we take the time need to be instructed, practice and grow through with God. This is how we finish well. https://rumble.com/vhk7mj-finish-well.html https://rumble.com/vat2yf-trying-something-new.html https://thebridegroomscafe.com/simplysignificantly-up/ God has purposefully allowed the collapse of common sense. It is nowhere to be seen or heard in these times. There is no more common sense. Can you agree with this? Why do you think this is so? Within a culture of the downplay of common sense, we are more apt to be completely dependent upon God, in followship of God, because there is no other understanding available. We can’t make human sense out of the goings on in these times. Followship is the new common sense. https://thebridegroomscafe.com/listening/ God has so much to say today, let His Holy Spirit guide you. He is speaking in that creative way only He can, open your ears wide to Him. He knows exactly what you need to hear this moment. Your heart to heart relationship with God is also known as a Vital-Vertical Relationship, simply-significantly the most needed thing in your life. I highly encourage you to stay wholly-holy aligned with God, soul synchronized with Him, making it personal with Him from every moment into every choice. The most constant conversation in your life should be you and God.

Do you have your least favorite thing you don’t like to do? I have a few of them and I dread them. It is like that with my golf game too. I have my least favorite hole on my course, one that I don’t often do well on. Sometimes I call it my “cursed hole” yet I know it is all about me. I don’t do well on that hole because I dread it, I get in my head and then I don’t play well. This is a great example of how our golf game can teach us some really good life lessons. Dread gets in our head, and when we dread something, we know that it isn’t going to end well because dread sets us up for failure. In life when we dread things, absolutely dread them, we do our worst. There are things in our lives that we don’t handle well because we start out with an attitude of our soul… dread. Dread is a victory squasher, it is setting us up for failure. We don’t need to dread. God is in every moment to every choice of our lives. If we don’t like doing something, we need to change up our mind set to the reality of truth that God is with us, it is not about what we can do, but it is all about what He can do through us. We put way too much performance pressure on ourselves. God is not putting performance pressure on us, we do that to ourselves. Dont dread, don’t get into your head, just relax and swing through and watch that ball fly. It is the same with our game of life. If we are all tensed up with dread, our emotions will be all over the place, we will not be able to relax, let be, be still and know that God’s got us. Don’t let dread get in your head, let the peace of God rule you, all of you from your head to your soul, to your spirit, to your heart and to your goal, just roll with God and you will grow through ever tough situation smoothly and with God’s navigation, it will end well. Dig Deeper: https://rumble.com/v3adkxg-shake-it-off.html https://thebridegroomscafe.com/uphill-battle/

Don’t we underestimate God way too much. I think for me, I get stuck in my worldly viewpoint. I was golfing the other day and I had a long putt to make par, so I automatically discount it in my head before I even putt the ball, I think, I can’t make it. Why are we like that? Why do us human beings lean into the negative first, instead of leaning into God and realizing with God, all things are possible. When we lean into God's Kingdom Perspective, we say: Yes I Can! Golf is one of my hobbies, I love the game, it relaxes me, but lately God has been speaking to me, giving me His godly wisdom while I play my game of golf. I think that is cool, that He meets me where I am at. And this is why I know that I must learn to lean into His Sovereign Sway more often than not, because this will help me know: Yes I Can! When it comes to golf, I am not really as serious in my striving to make a par, but when it comes to my life with God, I want to make that par, I want to be successfully being a godly influence in the lives of others and be creating a reputation, a living legacy of a life lived well for God, a person who finishes well with a par every single time. How do I get to a par when I have a long putt? There are so many variables in this life and I get distracted easily and don’t count the cost of making the par. Like… how fast are the greens? Are the greens wet? Is their an uphill battle? Is there an obstacle on the green I don’t see. Does the green have a curve right before the hole? How can I make that par with a long, long putt? Well, the one thing I have going for me is I am equipped by God daily. He has taught me much, especially about being alert to His Presence and wisdom that is right here, right now wisdom from every moment to every choice I make. I am finding out that the only stumbling block that keeps me from par is my own self doubt. God has shaped and designed me to play the game of life and set me up to win. I have been personally designed by God to be a person who makes par. It is my own head, my own thoughts of self-doubt, that keep me over par. The Word of God says differently and my past victories say differently. Yes I Can. I can make par. I know God is with me, I stand on His Promises. I rehearse the victories I have had in the past because of Him. I remember Whose I am, where my identity is placed in Christ Jesus. I believe with Christ in me, all things are possible and I know whatever He has brought me to, He has purposefully equipped me for. So I pick up my putter and I putt for a par. God Wins. Dig Deeper: https://rumble.com/v2lmn60-god-relationship.html https://thebridegroomscafe.com/golf-life-lessons/ https://thebridegroomscafe.com/god-intervention/ https://rumble.com/v4yy070-thwarted-dreams.html

I can’t even count the number of times I have missed the mark. We are human beings and sometimes we just miss the mark at times. Something may be off when we get up and we follow after our feelings, instead of connecting with God, and letting His Holy Spirit lead us. Really, just like in golf, we can miss the mark by the slightest wrong move. Like picking up your head… hmmmm that makes for a really ugly drive. I usually do that on the first hole. It is kind of like my curse hole because I try to do it in my own strength because I am coming in cold and haven’t practiced at the driving range. Things happen… We also can misalign our shoulders, our feet and our aim, and end up taking a lot of dirt with us on our iron shot and not going very far, missing the mark of that par because of a bad shot. Many times God has instructed us not to lean into our own understanding but to look to Him to navigate us with His wisdom. He has the whole picture, we do not. God sees so much more than we could ever see and knows so much more than we could ever wrap our mind around. He is trustworthy in that way of leading us with the best of the best. If we seek His kingdom first, before we kindle our own fire and walk by the light of a man made fire that will flame out, we will not miss the mark. I was thinking about that when I was golfing the other day and I missed a par by one stroke because I was casual about the put and did not focus and I missed it. I was frustrated with myself. But I feel like these are really good teaching moments for me. When I miss the mark, I am still so very loved and God does a “course correction” gives me a little bit more wisdom to help me next time to not miss the mark. He loves me that much that He is so willing to let me fail so I can learn the best lesson, the wisdom that leads me to change. Just like God says No sometimes for the greater YES to happen in our lives, God also lets us miss the par in life to teach us a better lesson, to change it up in our lives. I am okay with that. It lessons my frustrations and I use the wisdom I learned to make a par next time!! Missing the mark, missing the par are things that happen in this life! It is okay. Just get up and try again. Just like with golfing. If I really mess up on the hole, I have another hole right behind it to redeem myself, to realign my thoughts, my stroke and remember the right things to do. We can’t let a bad hole in golf dictate our day or give us a bad attitude, or we will just get worse and not better. Even if we get off course and find ourselves in the weeds of life, God is with us. God will navigate us out of the weeds and bring us to the way to life, peace and truth. I think the best thing to do is when you miss the mark on something, is to get back up right away and reconnect with God, wholly-holy align your life with His. God does not condemn us or forsake us because we mess up. God is right there with us to encourage us, course correct us and get us back on the move with Him. I love that about God. I feel like I have room to grow that if I do miss the mark, I can get back up and start again, and He is right there to cheer me on, teach me and be my navigator. Dig Deeper: Hold on to loyal love and don’t let go, and be faithful to all that you’ve been taught. Let your life be shaped by integrity, with truth written upon your heart. Trust in the Lord completely, and do not rely on your own opinions. With all your heart rely on him to guide you, and he will lead you in every decision you make. Become intimate with him in whatever you do, and he will lead you wherever you go. Proverbs 3:3,5-6 https://thebridegroomscafe.com/family-prayer-13-remember/ https://rumble.com/vb691x-enfuego-shine-bright.html https://rumble.com/vam3bz-have-you-had-a-misstep.html