Make a Habit; Break a Habit, on Amazon.

I’d like to come to your church and teach your people to develop life-changing habits. Whether you want lose weight (I lost nearly 40 pounds) or develop the habit of having a quiet time, the principles in this book can change your life.

I’d like to do these seminars on a different basis than previous seminars. I’d recommend the following schedule:

• Sunday morning — preach and/or teach all adults in Sunday School.
• Sunday night — two hour session.

I’d like to do these seminars with a different cost structure. I’d ask you pay my expenses and, instead of an honorarium, buy (or ask your people to purchase) one copy of the book for each adult in attendance on Sunday morning. If each of your people will buy a book, no other honorarium is required.

Contact me at josh@joshhhunt.com or 575.650.4564 for details.

Motivation is over-rated

Sometimes, you will hear someone say they just can’t find the motivation to work out or read their Bibles or work on their marriages. We don’t need motivation, we just need to do the work. Motivation is overrated. We say we need to be motivated when we don’t. Unmotivated work will do just fine. You’ll take off just as many calories on an unmotivated run as you will on a motivated run. Motivation is overrated; continue the work.

Galatians 6.9 says, “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” By the way, I think we should get tempted to get weary from time to time. I think it is a good thing that we work hard enough that sometimes we are tempted to get weary. But, the command is that we not give up. We keep working. We keep at it whether or not we feel weary.

I love what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:58 (RSV), “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.” When you feel like quitting, be steadfast. When critics oppose you, be immovable. Don’t just do the work that God has called you to do, abound in it. Your labor in the Lord is not in vain even if you struggle to find the motivation.

One more passage:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. Hebrews 12:1-4 (NIV)

Can I paraphrase that last line for you? I think if this were written today, it would read, “Don’t be a crybaby,” “Cowboy up,” or, “Sissies need not apply.” I think the writer would have appreciated the speech where Winston Churchill said, “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.”[1]

If you can get a friend to take the journey with you, it might help. It might make it easier if you have it firmly in your mind why you want to develop this habit and what it will cost you if you don’t. Make a long list and keep that list prominently before you. You want to try to find the way of escape and make it as easy as possible to do the new habit and not do the habit you’re trying to break.

This book is dedicated to the cause of making a habit or breaking a habit easier. But, let’s not sugarcoat it. It won’t ever be easy. If going to school is easy, everyone would be doctors. If losing weight was easy, everyone would be thin. If being consistent in daily Bible reading were easy, everyone would do it. This is work. This is war. There is an enemy who is out to get us.

When Paul described Christian living, he used words like straining and striving. For Paul, Christian living was pushing and struggling and sometimes failing and trying again. I love this quote:

“It is not the critic that counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or the doer of deeds could have them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the Arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but he who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great devotion; who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails while daring greatly, knows that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls, who know neither victory nor defeat.” — Teddy Roosevelt[2]

Nothing of significance is ever done by people that just feel like it. I doubt the SEAL Team that took out Bin Laden felt like training. I doubt Michelangelo felt like painting every day. Great achievements are accomplished because people work through the dip. They do when they don’t feel like doing. They practice when they don’t feel like practicing. I doubt Mother Theresa always felt like helping. She had this inscribed on the wall of her home:

People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies. Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. Be honest and sincere anyway.

What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous. Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, will often be forgotten. Do good anyway.

Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.

In the final analysis, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.[3]