Today's Word: Yahvah's Delete Button! This Is Worth The Read

My Faves: The People I Keep Creating a new cell-phone directory tested my commitment in ways I didn't expect. by Gordon MacDonald, Leadership editor at large From my journal: A few weeks ago the cell-phone people notified me that I was eligible for a new phone at a rock-bottom price and that I should stop by their store and do a deal. A day or two later, I converted from TREO to Blackberry. A technician transferred the contact data—my electronic "phone book"—from the old phone to the new one. "You've got a lot of stuff in the memory," he said referring to the over-three thousand names and numbers I'd accumulated during the past years. "You might want to think of purging it." In the days that followed I did what the techie suggested, and shrunk the list from 3,000 names to about 1,500. I ended up with 1,500 keepers and 1,500deleted…people that is. It is not always an easy task to separate the keepers from the deleted. The exercise forced me to do some reflecting about the nature of my personal relationships. I quickly saw that the "keepers" fell into four categories. There were my loved ones: (they were not only keepers but they made my speed-dial list). There were my friends—dearly valued people who have long been in my life through the darkest and the brightest moments. Then there were colleagues: those to whom one relates because of shared work. And finally there were the networked: people you think you want to keep in touch with because you have common goals and objectives. Oh, a fifth group: the snow-plow guy, the hardware store, and United Airlines. Keepers: all of them. The more challenging experience was in the deleting. Purging my phone list has been a healthy exercise. It has reminded me that there is a certain collection of people in this world whose friendship and partnership I really prize. Wonderful people whose love for God and commitment to his agenda are inspiring to me. Yeshualike people who working with has been (and remains) a humble privilege. But there were other lessons for me. That I actually liked deleting some names forced me to realize that as much as I believe in no grudge-holding, there is always a bit of residual vindictiveness deep in my heart, in all of us, perhaps. It bothers me that in some cases I really enjoyed hitting the delete button. Oh, there was one more lesson. I was forced to wonder if Yahvah would ever be tempted to purge his list of people. Did this happen in the Noah story? Was it about to happen the day he told Moses he was at his wits end with Israel? Has Yahvah ever wished to quietly delete me? Does Yahvah even have a delete button?  Who's in YOUR PHONE?