Everyday we wake up we have to ask ourselves a question or two. One of those question is will we take ownership? Ownership of what you ask watch the video, and then ask yourself will you take ownership?

Does it ever seem like all everyone around you does is complain? Whether you’re at work, the store, out to eat or even church people just seem to be complaining about life. I know sometimes I’m even guilty of this. It’s like no matter what our circumstances might be “good or bad” we find a reason to complain. It’s gotten to the point to where we don’t even  call it complaining we just say we’re stating the facts or just telling it how it is.

• It’s hot outside
• I don’t like my job
• That lady was rude to me
• I don’t like the clothes my pastor wears
• There’s nothing but negative stuff on the news
• I hate what the government is doing
• That customer is being rude
• My boss is a jerk
• I don’t like this
• It’s cold outside
• Even complaining about people who complain

So I want to present to you the 30 day challenge called “How high can you count?” It’s simple for the next 30 days just count your blessing and not the complaints.

• Thankful that I have AC or shade tree
• Thankful that I have a source of income
• Thankful I have the money to bless my pastor with a new shirt
• Thankful I can go out and impact the world for Christ
• Thankful for the life God has blessed me with
• Thankful I can show the love or Christ to people no matter how the treat me
• Thankful for the coats and jackets I own and can share with others
• Thankful that Christ first loved me

When you begin to count the blessing and we stop complaining. The lives we live being to look a whole lot more like Christ. I image Jesus could of complained a lot but he came to serve and be a blessing not a complainer.

So will you take the 30 Day “How High Can You Count “challenge? Do it and watch it change the way  you see the world and how you can impact it.

Grab your pen and some paper or make and excel document and see how many you count. Then ReTweet it or share it on Facebook

Every week thousands of pastors all around the world stand up in front of millions of people and proclaim the word of God and while no one is perfect including pastors. Wouldn’t you find it a bit strange if your pastor stood up every Sunday to preach God’s word and he was still drunk from the night before?  How bout if he gave his mistress a kiss in front of everyone right before he began to pray. We might all say there un-fit to be preaching.

Yet every week pastors around the globe stand in front of the congration and they’re unfit.  I’m not talking about them cheating on their wives or hung over drunk. They are unfit in the literal sense, in other words they’re not healthy. They are over weight, they don’t exercise, they have horrible eating habits and they don’t even come close to getting enough rest.  Most spend their time pursuing the passion that God has given them and ignoring the physical body God has given them to carry out these passions.

Now I’ve never heard of a pastor being unfit to lead because of their unfit lifestyle choice and I’m not saying this should be the case.  The reality is that this is an issue that needs to be addressed. As pastors we can’t simply assume that our health is going to take care of itself.  That would be like walking on stage every week never preparing a message, not establishing a church budget or any of the other things required to be a successful ministry leader.  Just because you ignore your health, doesn’t make the problem go away.

I talk to and hear about pastors experiencing burnout on a regular basis.  I have also been to conferences and heard pastors talk about the importance of health and how important it is to longevity in ministry.  As a Pastor who also happens to be a personal trainer, I feel the message of the importance of health often times seems to be ignored.  The message of health being consistently ignored would be equivalent to a pastor consistently preaching a giving message about the importance of tithing and people sitting in the congregation for years and never writing a tithe check.

This does not have to be a complicated matter; the bottom line is that Walking with Christ is a lifestyle that looks different than any other.   The same is true of a fitter lifestyle. In a world that says lets do what feels good in the moment and a country that is more over weight than it ever been.  The reason you want to pursue a healthier life is so that you can continue to do what God has called you to do and not be in hospital or doctors appointment or popping tons of medication.  You never want to say no to something God’s called you to do because you chose not to take better care of you body.

The question is, “Where do you start?” and the answers is simple think EAT, MOVE & REST. Most people Eat, Move & Rest on a daily basis, the problem is they aren’t doing it to benefit the body, but rather in a way that hinders it.

Lets look at the simple way that benefits the body.

EAT– real food, I know as a pastor you’re on the go a lot you get invited to a lot of lunches dinners and coffees. You get baked cookies pies and more. No excuses you would never stop reading the Bible and just read books about the Bible. It’s the same thing when it comes to food eat the real deal.

MOVE- I know you go from the bed to the bathroom and from the house to the car and so on and so on. That’s not enough your body was designed to move. Just as you exercise your faith you need to exercise your body. The great thing about exercise is there are hundreds of things you can do it. From swimming, running, biking, tennis, rowing, wii fit and more.  Find out how you like to move and get a MOVE on it.

REST – This always seems to be the hard one for pastors. They can’t ever seem to tell anyone no and they are always on the Go. (That rhymed)  Jesus rested and you’re not Jesus you definitely need to rest.  Sleeping only 12 hrs in week never taking a vacation does not equal REST.  Rest and enjoy the gift of your life that God has given you.

Be who God called you to be and take care of the vessel that He has given you.

God has gifted me with not only being a pastor but a personal trainer and if you are a pastor and have no idea how to get started or what to do feel free to contact me I would love to help.

Are you an Unfit Pastor?  Do you know any Unfit Pastors?  Why is this a taboo subject?

It is finished! After 7 months from when it began my little girl Adriana is now officially mine. As we were standing before the judge and I watched him sign the final decree it brought tears to my eyes. It made my heart happy to know that it was official. Even though I know it’s just really paperwork and that no matter what she was and would always be my daughter brought closer for me and my wife to something that started out so tragic almost 3 years ago.

It’s always amazing to see God use anything for His glory. One of the things that I love about this is that as God children adopted in to His family I had the chance to the same thing for an amazing little girl. The other day we asked her if she was ready to be a Parker and she said “I thought I already was” and in our hearts and minds she was.

Thank you for all faithful prayers and support on so many levels. In a case where we know it was all God who made it happen.

Check out a few pics of my little girl over the years.

This is question we’ve all want to know the answer to for years. Why didn’t I finish college, how come that fitness program didn’t work, I keep trying but can’t get out of debt. The hundreds of things we try daily but for some reason some things we can succeed at and others we fail time and time again until we just give up.  So here it is drum roll please……………………………………..the #1 reason you fail is “you start at the beginning and not the end”. Now you’re saying that make no sense I thought you were going to say something profound not something stupid like that.

Let me explain, let’s say you’re hungry and your goal is to feed yourself. Now at this point you know what your end results should be, to no longer be hungry. Now you’re on a mission you’re looking for something to eat. You have a few options you can cook, get take out, and go sit down at a restaurant or something as simple as picking up and apple and taking some bites out of it. Yet no matter what your choice you have not taken your mind of the end results no longer being hungry.

See that how it is in all of our goals if we  start out with I’m going  start working out and have no end result in mind it easy to quit, fail or just give up. Instead of thinking I’m going to start something lets think I’m going to finish something. Think about every time you’ve heard someone say I’m going to start this and they do but they never finish. Versus the people who say I’m going to finish this and they do. I can think of the countless times in my life how something that seems so simple now makes so much sense.

Now that we’ve decide we will finish things and not just start them we must all ways remember to not take our eyes of the finish line because it’s when we do this that we quit, fail and just plain give up.

Share your thoughts why do think we just do succeed sometimes?

So this past Sunday myself and 3 of my close friends play church hooky and went and played 18 holes of golf. It’s not that big of deal we went on Saturday night with our families.  Now this is only my secound time  to play golf so my score was more like a good round  of bowling. Yet while playing I noticed some things that are simular with our walk with Christ so here goes.

• When you first start off you think this is going to be easy
• It’s great to have a group of friends to encourage you when the time get hard
• As soon as you think you got this thing figured out you swing and you miss
• Its a character builder
• patients is a virtue
• sometime you just get frustrated
• not everyone has been playing the same amount of time
• You have to put in work to get better at it
• Sometimes the people around you can hold you up or bring you down
• It’s a lot of fun
• If your not aiming in the right dircetion your ball will end up anywhere
• it doesn’t matter how nice of clubs you have if you can’t play you just cant play
• it’s all about the foundation

Now what do you think? Do you ever do anything and it reminds you of your walk with Jesus?

In my 34 years of living I’ve done a lot of stupid things and even though I try not to do stupid things every now and then I do. I’ve also sinned a time or 2,( ok you got me I’ve sinned alot)  but I’m thankful for what Jesus did on the cross  and paying the price for my sins. Yet why I try not to sin I do make mistakes but I’m thankful for a Merciful and Forgiving God. So I thought why not make a list of f things that people do they may not be sins but they are stupid.

• Playing video games all night and you have to be at work in the morning
• Riding your bicycle of the roof off your house
• Not telling you spouse you love them everyday
• Surfing on top of moving car
• Playing in traffic
• Shaving off you eyebrows
• Anything you  do after  saying  “hey watch this”
• Watching reality TV(ok it may not be stupid but you watch enough of it, it might make you stupid)
• Texting and driving
• Not asking for help or advice when you never done something before.
• taking gum of the bottom of a park bench and chewing it (and thats just nasty)

Do you have some things that you think are stupid that may not be sins, share them.

If you don’t already know, earlier this year God granted me the opportunity to adopt my lovely daughter Adriana. We weren’t sure how we would pay for it, but we knew God never starts anything he doesn’t plan to finish.  So about a week ago I tweeted “Does anyone know of a way we could raise money for an adoption?” I got several great responses that my wife and I had planned to look into. The next day I got a call from a friend asking how much we needed. I told him and he responded, “Give me a couple of weeks and don’t worry about it”. So we didn’t.  Within less than a week, God used my friends to make it happen. They came up with the money!

Words cannot describe the thanks we want to give to our friends who just gave us the money to proceed with the adoption. We just want to say thank you!!!  It means more than you could ever imagine. I want to praise God for what he has done in your lives to make you want to share with us like that.

When I think of my friends it reminds me of this:

“And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved”. Acts 2:42-47

I know God will continue to use this amazing group of people for His Glory.

This is one of those videos you watch and you know you just have to share it others.

Like most of us in this world we couldn’t wait till we were grown and on our own. Why?  So people couldn’t tell us what NOT to do. Well today I going to change things up and give you a list of things you should NOT do this week. I know sometimes we get so caught up in what to do we forget what NOT to do.

• Do not take the easy way out – You’ll never learn anything new, nor will you get better this way.
• Do not give up – Even the best of us at times wants to quit but those are the times we need to keep pushing on.
• Do not do what you’ve always done – Even if this has worked for years change it up or you’ll keep  getting the same results and in this ever changing world you’ll soon be left behind.
• Do not stress out – I know with bills, dead lines and everything else going on it’s hard to not do this, but if we give our best in everything we do it makes this easier.
• Do not ignore your family – I know life is hectic. You’ve got work to do around  the house and your family loves you for that but they also just want to spend time with you.
• Do not be cocky – Yeah I know……… your the Lebron James of what you do. Let your work speak for its self – not your words.
• Do not eat out everyday this week – Sure its the easy thing but take a nice healthy lunch with you – your body with thank you.
• Do not be in a pain in the butt – Always treat people with kindness, respect and honor.
• Do not watch 30 hours of TV – read a book, go for a walk, and do something beside being a couch potato.
• Do not ignore what God has called you do to – yes it risky, your not sure what  might happen but that’s why it’s called faith.

What do think are  there somethings that you should NOT be doing, share you thoughts or your own list………….