Category Archives: Christianity

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2018

Change is good

The week after Christmas, I had some down time. I loved it. It gave me time to reset and reboot. It gave me time to think. Most importantly, it gave me time to rest.

I spent most of my downtime with my family. Life is good when I am surrounded by my family.

January 1st is really just a day like all others, but it definitely affects me. I can’t help but love the potential of a new year. I can’t help but think about what could be in 2018. I love it.

Some people argue whether you should have resolutions or goals and how quickly you will fail them. I have resolutions. It is just what I call them.

I have areas of my life that need to change. I need to change them. I am resolved to make changes. Yes, I most definitely may fail some (or even many), but I am resolved to make significant and important changes in my life. I like that we can use the first day of the first month of the year as a benchmark of where we are and where we are going.

I have some specific “places” that I want to go and I have some specific targets that I want to hit.

My biggest one: I want to change my business. I want to enjoy running a business that is all me. The other day, I went shopping with my oldest son for a new guitar. We found one and it just looked like it belonged to him. It looked like that is what my son would be holding if he could have any guitar he wanted.

That is what my business should be. It should fit like a tailored suit. (FYI – that is how your business should look too.) It should be a mirror to your core and reflect you.

I am going to struggle with this. I am going to struggle to be authentic and to make sure that I follow my heart when it comes to this business.

You may ask, why?

Simple. I don’t trust my real vision. I fear that others will not embrace it. I fear that it will not grow to be what I hope that it can become.

For years, I have struggled with explaining what I do. It has been something of a lie. I have tried to come up with the right words for the right things to say so that my business will connect with the right paying clients. But the real reason I struggle with how I need to explain what I do is because I am trying to tell the wrong story. I have been avoiding the reality of what my core vision for this business really is and therefore I am not telling an authentic story. And that is why I can never come up with the right set of words to describe what I do for my clients.

But I have come to a conclusion that I can no longer live that way. I have to finally unleash the kraken and let this business go where it deserves to go.

I appreciate you taking the time to read this. It has been a confession of sorts. But mainly it is a public announcement of my intent.

No longer will I try to hide from my real vision and dream.

If you want to find out what that is, please come back and visit this blog. I am pulling back the veil and will be uncovering the business I will be running in 2018 (and hopefully many years after).

If you own a business, I am the hired gun that helps you create a battle plan for your business. I have an armory of business growth strategies and tactics to help equip you to grow your business.

I will end this post with a quote from Og Mandino:

Today I begin a new life. … Today my old skin has become as dust. I will walk tall among men and they will know me not, for today I am a new man, with a new life.

– Catalyst John

 

cat·a·lyst: an agent that provokes or speeds significant change or action

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Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?

“Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be?”

These words from A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson are words that I need to hear daily. I want to reprogram my brain to truly believe in this and constantly be aware that I was “born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.”

Therefore, I’m deciding that I want to read these inspiring words every morning before I start my day. Imagine the world you would live in if you read the following out loud at the beginning of every day for the next year?

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
 
—-from A Return to Love, by Marianne Williamson.

– Catalyst John

Feel free to check in with me and hold me accountable by asking if I read it today!

If you love sleep, you will end in poverty. Keep your eyes open and there will be plenty to eat!

Proverbs 20-13

If you are too lazy to plow in the right season, you will have no food at the harvest.

– Proverbs 20:14

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God doesn’t change even when our circumstances do.

 

I just love the power of scripture.

Tonight, I am reminded how God does not change during or by our circumstances. Somehow, we rationalize that we can trust Him when all is calm, but we fail too often to trust Him when things are anything but calm.

In Joshua 3, God is directing Joshua to have the priests walk into the Jordan river which is overflowing its banks. Overflowing is such a calm word, but as I’m reading my Every Man’s Bible commentary, I see a different word – “flooding.”

Flooding has a different ring to it. It sounds more like the priests were to wade into a rapid, flooding river that could wash them away with ease.

It reminds me of the time Peter walked on water. In matthew 15, Peter has enough faith to actually step out of the boat; however, he was distracted by the high waves and began to sink.

In both of these circumstances, God was in control and our faith should not waver when the river is flooding or the water is rough.

Seek His face in all circumstances. Trust in Him and His path no matter what things look like around you.

 

Have faith,

Catalyst John

 

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When is the last time you really read the Bible?

I fell off the blogging wagon a while back when I chose to start podcasting. I’ve been thinking about it, but not acting upon it.

Today, I was in the Word and felt inspired once again to type.

May you be blessed by this message.

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When is the last time you really read the Bible? This is a new habit that I am trying to start. I am sure I have read the Bible before, but it has been so very long ago.

To avoid confusion, when I mean “read the Bible” I am describing the act in which you take your time and ingest the words that you are reading. Normally, reading for me is the act of getting through a section or just trying to do my daily reading.

However, today was different. I was in Joshua 2 reading about the “virtuous hooker” Rahab. I saw a note on the side of the page describing how “she was given a place in the ancestry of the Messiah (see Matthew 1:5)” (via Every Man’s Bible). My brain went “really???, wow!”

I looked up Matthew 1:5 and then saw another note that led me to Genesis.

It was a fun journey and I was able to see more into the scripture than normal. The reason is simple. I committed this week to start actually reading the Bible. I just want to read one chapter a day. Yes, just one single chapter.

Per the website blueletterbible.org (http://www.blueletterbible.org/study/misc/66books.cfm) there are 1,189 chapters in the Bible. I believe that success is showing up at least 80% of the time and based on that if I read one chapter each day (at least 80% of the days), then I will complete the entire Bible in just four years and thirty days.

Most people will react and tell me that you can’t take four years (YEARS!!!!) to read the Bible!!! However, I will easily counter that right now I’ve been saved for at least twenty one years and I have yet to finish the Bible once. In addition, I am for the first time actually paying attention and really digesting the Holy Scripture for what it was meant to be.

I don’t know where you are in life, but I do know that if you aren’t finding quiet time with God daily that you are missing out.

I am frustrated with myself, because I see God’s hand on my life and I see how I am not the steward He desires me to be. He has truly set me up for success and I am wasting the resources He sends me.

I reached my breaking point on Wednesday night. I walked away from the “world” and found a quiet place to cry out to God. I circled my prayers seven times by walking the lake I was at seven times and then laid them at His feet. (That is why I’m in Joshua this week – the story of Jericho).

As the clock switched over from Wednesday night into Thursday morning, I was with the King of Kings.

Many of us do not focus on spending time with the creator of the Heaven and the Earth. We forget that through Him we can literally move mountains.

My prayer for you is that this sparks something inside of you and that you cry out to God for Him to come reside inside of you.

Ephesians 3: 14-21

14 When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father,[a] 15 the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth.[b] 16 I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. 17 Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. 18 And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. 19 May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God. 20 Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. 21 Glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever! Amen.

I pray that you invite the Holy Spirit to dwell inside of you.

 Luke 11:13

13 So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him.

 

Acts 8:15-16

15 As soon as they arrived, they prayed for these new Christians to receive the Holy Spirit. 16 The Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them, for they had only been baptized int the name of the Lord Jesus.

I pray that you are filled with wisdom.

 James 1:5

5 If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking.

Finally, I pray that a day does not go by that you do not open your Bible or seek God in prayer.

Catalyst John, sometimes an Entrepreneur Coach, but mostly a Servant of God