I hope today’s blog will be of use to youth ministries family counselors, family devotionals, and family home evenings. There are many ways to teach important Christian principles and today’s efforts is gonna be to humor.
Joke: Face Lift
A 75-year-old woman went into life or death surgery, and she wasn’t sure she would make it through. During the surgery, she had a vision. She saw and spoke to God. She asked him, “How much time do I have to live?”
He said, “You have 35 years left.”
So that following year she had all kinds of cosmetic surgery. She a face lift, a tummy tuck, her nose reshaped, liposuction — she completely did herself over. She figured as long as she was going to live another 35 years, she was going to look young again. After all this was done and she was discharged from the hospital, she was hit by a cab and was killed instantly.
When she entered eternity she walked over to God and said, “What happened? I thought you said I had another 35 years. Why did you let that cab hit me?”
God replied, “I didn’t recognize you!”
Received from otchurch.
This is a cute joke to me because the woman altered herself so much that even God didn’t recognize her. But there are many ways we can improve ourselves besides by physical alterations. In our youth we can learn about the 10 Commandments and various wonderful stories in the Bible that teach us important principals and teachers of Christ. As each of us goes to school or learns from family and friends we begin to gain wisdom and knowledge. We also learn through trial and error and by the experience of others.
I have found that many promptings of the spirit can give me a hint of areas where I can improve as a person. Sometimes those perceptions might be how I interact with other people or when I’m not being charitable when I could be. The spirit might urge me to do a thoughtful act.
Today’s invitation is for each of us to not wait until the New Year, to think of new users resolutions. We can work toward a daily goal like the founding father Benjamin Franklin did. He had a list of traits and each day he would work on one particular trait. George Washington had a book that he liked that gave suggestions on how to act like a gentleman and how to interact with the people he associated with. We might access useful books one of them being the Scriptures, that can motivate us and inspire us to be our better selves.
As a class or family have each member discuss a time when someone has done something nice for them. Try to have each example be very specific and to include the feelings you had when you received that act of kindness. In support of self-improvement you might want to look at some scriptures that show where God has shown mercy and compassion the different times. This might range from examples we heal the sick offered comfort or taught gospel principles.
As a family you might want to discuss something with a family can improve as a family. It might be picking up toys and books after using them or perhaps organizing a planned act of compassion that the family could do for neighbor over someone that could use your help. Schedule some time for yourselves to plan out the designated task and then arrange a time to ask to perform the task. If there is a chance you can do the act of compassion in secret so that the person never knows you did it, that would even be better. After you perform the act of kindness discusses the family your feelings of how it felt to be nice if somebody else.
An act of improvement doesn’t have to be just on how we treat someone else but might be gaining knowledge for ourselves in a certain field that we are weak on. That might include doing something to make our bodies healthy or losing weight or altering what we eat.
The family could set a goal as a family and then each individual set a private goal of improving something about yourself and then you keep a private log of your success.
If you have a joke on object lesson that you would like to share that can help promote the theme of self-improvement, please feel free to contribute your idea in the comment section of this blog thanks.
