Vote Well

November 6, 2012 is Election Day in the United States of America.  In every election year, there is a lot of talk.  Ideas and ideals, objectives and objections, values and venom all seem to saturate the atmosphere as people from all sides of the political aisle weigh in with their opinion regarding how our government should be run.

This election is different than most.  There is more talk about style and less talk about substance.  We live in a day when people make decisions based on how they “feel” verses what they know.  I listen to interviews and talk to people on the streets. As I do, I become more convinced that the majority of people I talk to either do not know what our leaders believe, or they simply do not care.

People of all faith and people of no faith believe in the principle of the Good Samaritan, wherein if someone is in trouble and you have within your power the ability to help that person, help is in order.  They believe that if you choose to kill someone, it is wrong. Ask anyone and they will usually align with you when you declare, “if you do not work, you do not eat.” This is not a “dig” against someone who is unemployed – particularly in this economic environment when that problem has grown to staggering proportions.  This is a principle offered to those who simply choose to rely on others rather than find a way – any way, in some measure – to provide for their own well being.  By example, I offer what happened to a friend of mine a couple of years ago.  He is a business owner and while interviewing for a position, one man came to the scheduled appointment an announced he might as well confess that he was a “crackhead”. Oh, and he probably should not have had that beer before the interview.  With the interview over, he wanted to make certain that he interview was logged so that he could let the unemployment office he had been on a job interview that day.”  You get the picture.  

My point is, there are many shared values.  There are other values in which we are greatly divided.  Oddly enough, most of those values greatly conflict with the values we have in common. For instance, we all believe in equal rights.  We all believe that murder is wrong.  We have conflicting views about a woman’s right to choose and abortion. Even though science has proven that life begins at conception and pre-term babies have been born to live normal lives, the woman’s right to make choices for her life makes it possible to kill the child basically as long as it is still attached by an umbilical cord.

We have other conflicts. We want the freedom to say what we want and do what we want, but we wrestle with the cost that has to be paid to secure that freedom – forgetting that if we are not willing to ay that price, history has proven that those freedoms will eventually disappear. Our nation’s 200+ year history tends to ignore the history that precedes her. She moves along, making the same choices which led to the demise of many other civilizations.

The political world calls these “wedge issues”. They define these as issues that people bring up to stir trouble and divide us as a people.  They are used as leverage to sway an election.  I say if there is a wedge, it is found first and foremost in our hearts.  In the last decade, our nation has proven to be polarized.  We are basically split down the middle 50/50. Any first year science student knows that if you place an acid and an alkali together, they neutralize one another and render each other ineffective and powerless.  In many ways, that is what has happened to our great country. And, it did not start form the top down. It started in the heart of individuals fighting not for common good but rather for what was expedient for their individual lives.

The Bible tells us that a double minded man is unstable in all of his ways. A man who is a great worker and provider for his family and a caring husband and father can be plagued with an addiction to substance or even pornography.  Although he is clear on every other area of his life, the area of conflict with his own values system ill sooner or later eat at the fabric of every area of his life, neutralizing all of the good that he has done.

It is how it is with our nation. Men with a common interest of right and wrong, who even with varying backgrounds of faith held to tenants of faith with great conviction.  They designed a government with the clear understanding of basic right and wrong. They even allowed for a process of adjustment in that government, clear in the knowledge that they as men were fallible and that there would always be room for improvement.  Yet the improvements were never designed to work in opposition of basic truth.  Man has chosen to violate that, just as man chose to leave that, find a new land and start fresh, free from corruption. In shot, government has not made us. We made government.

In today’s society, what we believe is irrelevant. Christians will declare murder is wrong yet vote to put someone in office who, with great passion and intent, will fight for the right to condone murder.  They argue and say “That is not the issue. I do not need the government to tell me right from wrong.” Yet they will rely on the same government to get into their business and make other choices for them on how they are allowed to spend their money. What they can say in their churches and what their kids are allowed to believe in school.

As a nation, we are developing blindness.   

By ignoring what we know to be true, we can fight for how we feel.  We make decisions based on what we feel like we want.  That is the kind of thinking that allows someone to enter an affair against their spouse.  “They made me feel better.” “I felt like that is what I needed to do.” Who cares what is right or what I believe beyond the emotion I am feeling right now?

Back to November 6 – You have no right to be frustrated at the demise of our nation if you allow your decisions and your vote to ignore truth.  Neither do you have the right to be frustrated at the demise of our nation if your political decision is to forgo your right and responsibility to vote.  You cannot make it about style.  You cannot make it about what is cool. You cannot make it about the rhetoric that spins from both sides of the political aisle.  You must choose based on what is right and true.  The nation will not be blessed as long as her policies and values violate the will of God.

Vote well. Vote with a conscious. Vote.

The American Spirit

This past month has been filled with many significant events.  It was witness to National Conventions for the Republicans and the Democrats, in preparation for what will be a frustrating and mud-slinging filled presidential election.  It is the anniversary of the September 11 attack on our country - an event highlighted by attacks on our embassies. It is a time when a great deal of rhetoric about The American Spirit is being thrown out there by politicians and pundits, "news" (if you can call it that) commentators, an even john Q. Public, who mostly seems to rattle off information gained more from the spin of the formerly mentioned "news outlets' rather than from real honest to goodness research.  It all led me to think more about what the American Spirit really represents.  Everyone else seems to offer their two-cents worth.  Here is mine. TJB

"Good Night, John Boy!"  I grew up with "The Waltons".  The show was a portrayal of a simple American family who lived in the mountains of Virginia during the depression.  They plot and writing was simple, yet compelling - so much so, that the show is still regularly aired today.  Momma and Daddy were John and Olivia Walton, who had a house full of kids and Grandma and Grandpa, too.  Oh yes, family was family and family tends to its own.  It is the responsibility part of the American dream.  It has been lived, written about and portrayed through art throughout American history.

One time First Lady, Hillary Clinton, capitalized on the concept, as she pushed forward with her "it takes a village to raise a child."   

These days, reality shows have created a model, wherein they build a "pseudo family unit".  They cast people with different values and ideologies, who are from different walks of life, into a show where they live together. They build relationships (for better or worse), or more accurately form "alliances" for the pursuit of winning the ultimate prize, which is the bridegroom, the modeling contract, or the $200,000 at the end of the show season.

The problem is that throughout American history, there has been a steady decline in the family aspect of the American spirit.  "It takes a village to raise a child" sounds workable - up until a teacher is faced with a rebellious student and has to bring correction to that student.  More often than not, that teacher (and the administrative staff) finds him or herself on the angry end of a parent who vehemently argues, "You have no right to do that to my child."  When I was growing up, (seemingly the "Walton's" era but actually more the "Brady Bunch" era), the worse thing that could happen to me was to get into trouble at school.  If the principal had to deal with me, I could count on having Dad deal with me again when I got home.

There has been a steady decline in the family responsibility which used to play a vital role in the American spirit.   

People looked out for each other because family

looked out for each other.  

 Even when the Hatfield's and the McCoy's fought one another, they would stand side by side to defend their way of life from outside intruders.  Now, such a sentiment is considered archaic.   

We have evolved from such thinking.   Today's philosopher tries to invoke the sentiment, "Can't we just all get along." The answer is "no."

To get along means to be fitly joined together. It means that values must be common.  Goals must be shared.  For goals to be shared, each player has to have a goal that is larger than himself.  Even the simplest reality show has proven this about our society.  Some say that television is a reflection of life.  In reality, television has, for most people, become the “shaper” of life. Its programming has replaced reality as the educator of how life should be. 

Today's society does not reflect a true American Spirit.  It  is a society divided by extremes.  One extreme is the reality show, where everyone's goal is self-motivated.  Children today helping on the home, often do so because they "want something" rather than simply recognizing the importance of 

doing their share.

The opposite extreme is socialism, wherein all things individual are relinquished for the common good.  There are no individual goals, only common ones.  Oddly enough, throughout the years, those who labor to govern a socialist society usually manage to build incredible personal wealth and power.  It is one of the strongest forms of bondage in the earth.

The beauty of the American spirit is that it was fashioned in the way God designed us.  He created us with the ability to overcome and be victorious in our personal goals, while at the same time, make us effective in reaching common goals.  His litmus test was simple.  We are a part of His family and as a result, our individual goals are still in keeping with the values He placed before us.  The element which causes it to work can be carried through the family unit all the way to the success of a nation.  This has proven true in this country throughout her history.

When you have values of righteousness, you have the values of the family of God.  When your value system is founded in God's value system, your personal goals do not conflict with the goals of those who share the same values.  They enhance those goals.  Entrepreneurs flourish individually because they benefit others.  Family members excel because they have strength that comes from sticking together and making it work.  John Boy can be a writer.  Ben can own his own business. Mary Ellen can be a nurse.  Jason can pursue his music.  Elizabeth can find true love.  And, at the end of the day, the family unit flourishes because embedded in each of their goals is the understanding that we are stronger when we are together.

This is the principle God gave His children from the beginning.  It is the principle which was introduced by the founding fathers of our nation.  It is the key to the survival and success of The American Spirit.   

 

A Trustworthy Man

A man is not measured by who enters or exits his life. He is not measured by the circumstances that surround him. He is measured by how he faces those circumstances and by who he chooses to be regardless of others. The hardest part about being trustworthy is in finding others who are equally trustworthy

My son, Josiah is such a man.  He is trustworthy. It is one of his greatest qualities. He is trustworthy even, at time, to his own detriment.  It makes him a hero to me.

Every man has his own measure of how he views himself and others.  That measure takes into consideration the thoughts, feelings and expectations that are embedded in the DNA of relationships. This means that a key factor in building relationships is understanding the measure of others. 

The closer your standard of measure, the greater strength and depth you can foster in the relationship. 

If the standard of measure has a wide gap, here will be a limit to the level of relationship.  Carry that relationship too far or too deep and the separation found in that measure will bring disappointment and pain.

The Bible warns us about being “unequally yoked”.  We tend to apply this to marriages and relationships on the basis of faith and belief in God.  I believe that this principle has much greater meaning. Many people of faith, who believe in God, still have different priorities and ideas about who or what is important in their lives. 

A trustworthy man is slow to relate and to trust because once he enters a relationship, he is all in. His loyalty runs deep.  He also looks for the person on the other side of that relationship to place the same level of value on that relationship. He enters such relationships slowly because he knows that if that measure is not “equally yoked”, there will be pain. A trust worthy man is often he one who has the hardest time trusting because others do not share his value of trust.

For such a man, and for all of us, the key is to learn how to recognize the measure that others hold in their own lives. Once you can identify that, you can develop an idea of the strength a relationship will have.  When you understand the priorities of another person, you learn to anticipate and expect how that person will respond.  You develop an idea of what level of strength and trust can apply to that relationship to keep it healthy.

To the trustworthy – never stop being trustworthy. It is a rare quality in a person. Others will not understand it.  They will even try to capitalize on your loyalty.  But in the end, there will be those who enter your life who share the same values. Such are the relationships of men like David and Jonathan, or James and John in the Bible.  Their loyalty toward one another changed the course of history.

To the trustworthy – you are a hero.

A New Name

This week marks the end of an era. Life happens in seasons and like chapters in a book, those seasons have a beginning and an end.  The church that I have the privilege of pastoring has come to the end of such a chapter.  For nearly twenty years, we have been known to our community as Bethesda Church.  

This week we transition into a new name – 

Connection Church.

The name change is not just a transition, but rather one part of a seismic shift that our church has undergone.  Much like a person experiences during a coming of age or entering a marriage, entering a new season of life brings on new joys and challenges. It is a time when you have the opportunity to embrace fresh ideas, insights, plans and dreams. It is also a time that can necessitate the release of certain ideas, insights, plans and dreams.  It is a time for change and that is a good thing because 

growth without change is impossible.

What’s in a name? Your name defines you to others.  Every name carries with it meaning and that meaning should reflect who you are.  There are numerous instances in scripture where God changed the name of an individual based on a shift that had occurred in his or her life.  Jacob became Israel. Simon became Peter. Saul the persecutor became Paul, the Apostle.

I identified our transition as a seismic shift.  A seismic shift is caused by a movement in the earth that creates tremors of enormous proportions or, earthquakes.  These tremors usually have highly significant consequences.  We are living in a day and time when the earth is being shaken.  More accurately, the earth’s culture is being shaken.  That follows scripture which instructs: “…that which  can be shaken will be shaken…”  That instruction continues: “…when the shaking is done, that which cannot be shaken will remain.”  We are living through such a shaking in our world. Obviously one goal is to be standing when the shaking stops.  However, our goal became more defined.  We are looking to those who are being shaken.  How will they survive? What will be left of them when the shaking occurs in their life? 

This seismic shift challenged us in several ways.  One, what needed to shaken free of our own lives? Two, how prepared are we to reach those who have been or are being shaken? Three, how are we positioned to actually reach those who need to be reached?

This drew us to a redefining of our purpose.  In order to reach people, bring healing to their lives and help them not only put the pieces together, but discover purpose, we needed to become more relational.  We were becoming connectors.  Our vision took on fresh meaning as we embraced the concept of connectivity – connecting to God, to each other, and to our community – all for the purpose of developing Kingdom relationships and fulfilling God’s desire in the lives of the people He loves.

So our name changed to represent who we are and what we do. 

Our purpose is to establish an atmosphere where specific relationships can be fostered and developed. 

The first and foremost is the development of a relationship with God that is not just a Sunday experience, but a real straightforward 24/7 relationship with Him. Next, we want to foster relationships within our church family that not only recognize, but add dimension to the value of each individual life.  Third, we want that relational atmosphere to impact the people in our community, creating an environment where we can demonstrate the true love and light of Jesus Christ, and where, through the process, people can come to recognize the value and their need of being connected to God.

A new era – a new vision – a new name. 

                                     We are Connection Church. 

Limiting Parental Access At School

It has been a while since my last blog.  We are in the middle of a HUGE transition at our church. 

Next week we are changing our name and re-introducing ourselves to the community as CONNECTION CHURCH.

This has come after three years of preparation and we are very excited to see what God will do.

Part of the reason for the name change is to better identify with how we relate...to God, to each other and to our community.  In the interest of community relations, we have had a difficult situation occur this week regarding our school system.  I personally did not want to divide my focus during the transition we are facing, but considering our commitment to community involvement and the detrimental nature of the problem, i found myself compelled to become involved.

There is a new policy in place in our school which greatly limits parental access to the classroom of their children.  I have sat in on the school board meeting, approached and met with school board officials and have communicated my concerns with local media, as well as encouraging others to do so.  In this blog, I will post an editorial scheduled to run in this week's local paper, The Coastal Courier. I offer this advance copy to my friends and readers to ask you to pray for a positive solution to the conflict our school system and community are facing.

Liberty County School Classroom Parental Observation Policy

There is a great deal of controversy that has arisen in the wake of a policy that was put into place in the Liberty County School System. This policy affects a parent’s ability to access his or her child’s classroom for the purpose of observation.  Those behind the policy maintain that its sole purpose is to protect children and teachers from outside dangers.  They communicate that his policy is about limiting school access in the interests of safety. However, the people being limited are not unknown people. They are the parents who registered their children for school, met with teachers and administrators, and pay taxes into the school system.

The same policy that removes almost all parental observational access from the classroom has requirements for visits to the school. They include sign-ins, a requirement of legal guardianship of a student in the school, and even a provision to require photo identification to be presented upon entering school property.  The only exception to these requirements occurs on days when there are special events, when a parent and community residents -meaning anyone - can enter the building unescorted, walk unnoticed into a crowd of most or even all of the students.  If this policy is about safety, this issue should be addressed. The ability for a stranger to walk into the crowd is a far greater and more realistic threat than the likelihood of a stranger to enter school grounds and especially a classroom on a given day.

In these times, our children must be protected in the classroom and the school system has a daunting task of maintaining their safety. This issue has been spun as a safety issue. Yet, while it does little to address real safety, it does offer a great deal to protect teachers from unannounced observation by a concerned parent. To call it a safety policy damages the credibility of the system and the trust between parents and teachers. It makes it more difficult to deal with both issues.     

Today’s teachers are limited in how they can maintain discipline and order in a classroom. As a result, there are things that can occur which can greatly hinder a child’s ability to learn. Teachers often resort to raised voices in the classroom and occasionally, the classroom environment becomes unruly – even chaotic, which can be confusing and even damaging to a child. Such an environment can promote misgivings or even fear in a child and in so doing, can paralyze that child’s ability to perform and produce in the classroom, resulting in greater failure, not only academically, but in the child’s ability to relate with the teacher as an authority figure.

A child’s greatest hope in that moment is for his or her parent to have a real understanding of what is occurring in the classroom – not what is occurring in a pre-planned 20 minute observation visit, but what is occurring in the chaotic moments.  Should a parent have unfettered access? No. But a parent should be able to address an immediate concern, approach an administrator and, with that administrator, enter a classroom in that moment if there is reason for the parent to believe that the classroom environment is detrimental to the child.  This is no different than the policy that the Division of Family and Children’s Services (DFCS) imposes on a household if even one concern of a child reaches their attention.  If the classroom environment is as it should be, you have the reinforcement of witness of the administrator.  If the classroom environment is jeopardizing the learning process, it has a greater chance of being recognized and addressed properly through the administrator.

Over the course of a year, a child will spend the better part of 180 days at school. Counting a seven hour day, this means aside from extra-curricular activity, that a child will spend in excess of 1,200 hundred hours in the authority of his teachers and school administrative staff. Under this policy, unless federally mandated, a parent is only allowed to observe his child in a learning environment for 40 minutes of those 1,200 hundred hours. 72,000 minutes of school – 40 minutes of observation – preplanned, pre-prepared observation.   That is a ratio of 1/1800 minutes.

The school system touts that it wants the parents to be involved in the education process, but in reality, this policy only allows the parent to observe the classroom environment – the most important environment - for one minute per thirty hours of school.

I respectfully ask this board to reconsider this policy. Parents need greater access than this to the classrooms and teachers of our children.  You need to consider that you are sending the message that this policy is not simply about security and protecting students and staff, but about also protecting staff from a child’s voiced concerns, and about limiting a parent’s access to ascertain true information regarding that child’s concerns.

How PIlots Care

 Being a pastor of a church brings with it certain expectations. You oversee a family of sorts – people who share common interests and beliefs, who are there for each other and care about what happens in each other’s lives. I am honored to be a part of a church family that not only offers such great caring, but also goes to great lengths to extend that care beyond the walls of our church family to the lives of people on our community.

As a pilot, much of the same sentiment exists. Airplane people function as a community and look out for one another.  You do not even have to know each other. The fact that you are a pilot brings you “into the fold”. Today, July 25, 2012 was an extraordinary day for me.  It was a day when I was the first hand recipient of such caring.

It was a beautiful sunny day. The radar indicated no storms or inclement weather. I know this because I was rather frustrated at having to spend the day cooped up behind a desk and at several intervals I looked at the weather service to see what the weekend would hold in anticipation of a day at the beach.

Things changed rapidly. As I was at my desk, a huge flash and a crack of thunder occurred out of nowhere.  I tapped the app on my phone to discover radar that was completely clear except for a bright red indicator over Fort Stewart, Georgia. I counted it as nothing and continued my work until moments later I received a call from the manager of the Fixed Based Operations at Mid-Coast Regional Airport where I keep my plane. 

“Tim” stated Charlie, “there has been an incident out here." 

"A tornado or something just came through the airport. It ripped your plane from the tie-downs and sent it airborne. Your plane flew a moment then crashed into the ground. You better come out here.”

I sat there in disbelief. The sun was still shining. This had to be a joke. But it was real. I got to the airport to find chaos. Trees were ripped apart. All of the planes had been twisted in their moorings. Some of them appeared to have suffered damage to their landing gear. Then there was mine – nose to the ground, tail in the air.  My sturdy, reliable PA-28 was bowing forward as if to offer to me a formal hello.

The two hours that followed were hectic. The plane was not in a safe place.  It was untied and sitting near the fuel station. It was also in proximity to other aircraft where left alone the wind could pick it up and send it crashing into another plane. We did not want to move it out of concern that the insurance company would need an adjuster to survey the situation. At 5:30 p.m., I called AOPA.  At 5:45 p.m. an adjuster called me. He was very reassuring.  He gave me instructions on photographing the site and gave me the option of moving the plane or for him to send a recovery team to move it for me.

I opted to move it myself and returned to the airport to figure out how to do that. When I arrived, there were a host of pilots standing around my plane. They all offered their concern and asked if I was okay. No one said, “I know how you feel.” No one said, “At least you weren’t in there,” or “you have your health.” Those things were obvious and yes I am grateful. On a scale of life, the loss of an object does not measure up to the loss of life. Things can be replaced.  But I think you would almost have to be a pilot to understand the pain I was feeling in that moment. They did. They instinctively knew that I did not need to hear those things in that moment.

They also worked in concert to formulate a plan and devise a way to move the plane in a manner that would not cause further damage. My friend Charlie called and cancelled his evening engagement to stay and help solve the problem. Another, perhaps 25 years my senior, insisted on crawling under the wing with me and together, we lifted the plane with our backs to place a wheeled dolly under the broken main gear.

Another pilot, who is a new friend and an A&P (airframe and power plant) mechanic talked to me and to others over the phone as to how to move the plane safely. He then had the FBO manager open his hanger and produce the tools necessary to facilitate the move. He also offered to me several scenarios surrounding whether or not my plane would be a total write off or repairable and thought he was enroute to Texas, assured me that before the weekend was over, he would survey the place with me to see if it was salvageable. He has already located a donor aircraft to scrounge for parts in the event that the frame on my plane is salvageable.

Dr. Larry Brandenburg, an old and dear friend and mentor stopped what he was doing to talk me through the process and encourage me. He joked with me over the phone and let me know it was going to be okay. He reminded me that it wasn’t “just a plane”. It was my first – a faithful friend that had been the one to lift me off the ground and experience a freedom others never understand. A friend in whom I had placed the trust of my life, to lift me up and bring me safely back to the earth. He said it is appropriate to mourn, because while it was made of metal, fabric and wires, it was not a mere inanimate object, but a part of me. It was a representation of that first taste of freedom.  He said, “Timmy, I am over eighty years old. I have flown for more than sixty-five years. I still remember my first one.”

This day should have been terrible – and it was.  Still in the middle of all the chaos the day wasn’t so terrible. Those men surrounded me as if it were a part of the daily process and carried me through the moment. It is how pilots care.

I left that moment to return straight to my pulpit for a Wednesday night service already in progress. I thanked my congregation for having the same fortitude in demonstrating care toward others and challenged them to consider the value of their actions on an even greater level. I also offered this thought which I now offer to you: “ If we could show that same love and concern for others – if we could lay aside our agenda just for a moment when we see someone in need – how much better could we make our world? What kind of difference would we make in the lives of others? Think about the difference you can make today. 

The "Greater Than" Life

In elementary school Mathematics, one of the topics that is taught is values.  It is taught with the use of two mathematical symbols:  ">" and "<".  ">" is the symbol which means, "greater than".  "<" is the symbol which means "less than". 

For example: 16 > 8 is stated: 16 is greater than 8.  7 < 12 is stated: 7 is less than 12.

Values are a part of our everyday existence.  They are what drive the different aspects of our day.  Each and every activity of our life carries with it a specific value.  It is what decides how man prioritizes his life.

It is sadly humorous that if you poll average people about what is important to them, they will almost always offer you a list of things which are supposedly significant to their lives.  They will offer a list that ranges from health and weight loss or control, to financial security, to strong family and spiritual relationships.  Yet for the average person's ability to offer these things as the most important - they generally prove to be the least important aspects of their life.

It has become very easy complain about one's weight or physical condition only to, moments later, order the greasiest, most fattening thing available to put into one's mouth.  It is very common to determine that one needs more time with his family, only to go home and spend three or four hours mindlessly watching television.  Many talk about the concern they have for their financial future, only to pull out the credit card or refinance papers on their home to purchase the next thing they "have to have" for their lives.

God's people need to rediscover the "greater than - less than” principle.  We are, by God's design, incredibly inventive creatures.  I can remember having a discussion - almost an argument with my teacher over "greater than - less than" in math.  In one assignment, I determined that 7 > 12. She marked the problem incorrect.  By her way of thinking (and the math book's), seven is not greater than 12. 7 is less than 12.  However, my argument was that 7 was my favorite number.  It was the number that God made as completion (Sunday School at work) and therefore was the GREATEST of all numbers.  I suppose it is all in how you define it.

That is precisely how we look at life.  We have one set of values (like the math) which operates on facts and data.  We have another set of values which are purely subjective based on our immediate desires and whims.  Is 7 really the greatest number?  Is it of greater value than 5, which is the number of grace?  Or, perhaps 3, which is the number of the Trinity?  Where would we be without good old number 8, the number of new beginning.  

Many quote true realistic values as if they were priorities.  However, they live by the things which are of real importance to their desires; things which promote immediate pleasure, even at the cost of sacrificing the true priorities.

You need to develop a true grasp of what is really greater.   

Immediate gratification always costs more - and always increases the desire for more immediate gratification.   

If you can learn what is truly greater - if you can master the Master's value system, then you will have accomplished a great thing. You will have positioned yourself to truly succeed.

A life whose values are based on the emotions and desires of the moment ultimately becomes an empty life.  King Solomon proved that.  A life which is measured by the things that truly matter is a life of great worth.  God created a value system.  He defined it in His word.  He created you with the inventive ability to capitalize on that value system.  If you do, you will prosper from the soul out.

Start communicating a desire for good health and a firm, fit body.  Then, quit stuffing that body full of things which render it nearly impossible to obtain that good health.  Make the statement over your life that being debt free is "greater than". Then, quit pulling out the credit card because you need that new gadget or item.  Stop spending money which could be used to eliminate debt to buy the next thing in the attempt to alleviate the pain of lack.  These always prove to be the most costly of medicines.

Learn the difference between what is "greater than" and what is "less than".  Let the litmus test for it be the fruit which is produced over time, not by the moment.  If you do, you will find yourself living a "Greater Than" Life.