WHAT IS A CREED? WHY IS A CREED INPORTANT TO LIVE BY?
Hello there, and thanks for joining me on the podcast today. Personal creed. That's my topic. Your personal creed. Do you have one? Here's a statement or a little quote that might be of interest to you. It says this. Don't let others define you. Define yourself as a pretty powerful statement, brief, but very powerful who you are and what you are and how you live your life and what you accomplish and how you relate to people and so on. You define for yourself. Don't let other people tell you what you are, what you ought to be, or how you should behave or you know, whatever. This is an area of self-definition. Now, um, Bernice and I were married in 1916 1961 a very famous man in American history died. Now you may not know who that is right off hand, but you'll know him as a oil businessman. He made his money in the big oil and the boom days. He was born in 1874 and or many years, dealt in the area of oil and made his money. He became a very rich man. His name is John D Rockefeller, jr. Now, most of us think of him only in the oil industry and as a businessman and as a rich man. But very few of us actually would think of him as a man of principle, a man of character. You know, a man of values, a man of a credo, but that's what he was. He was a man that lived by a creed. He was a man that lived by values. He was a man that set goals and live by them. So in other words, his life had purpose. His life had focus, his life had direction. His life had a unifying theme based on his credo. Now, you probably have never read his credo, but I'm going to read it to you. I'm going to give it to you for your edification. Over the last a year or so, I've done this on three or four occasions with different famous people. We looked at the credo of the green family. The green family are responsible for hobby lobby. We lived this for the family of Chick-fil-A. We did this with the president of grand Canyon university. In other words I've taken over the last couple of years, some very famous people and looked at the creed by which they lived. The creed defined them, people didn't define them, they developed a creed and then they live by that particular creed. And John D Rockefeller jr was no exception. So here's his creed. I give it to you from the point of view of you're not just listening to it, but see which are the points here that you agree with and which points maybe you don't particularly agree with or listen to it from the point of view of which of these points might be good for you to adopt and enter into your own personal creed. In fact, by the way, you should write one and have your own create, have your own pledge, so to speak, of how you're going to live life. So here's what a John B D Rockefeller said, okay, he's, I believe in the Supreme worth of the individual and his right to life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Never heard that one before. Well, you know where that one comes from, but that was number one in his creed. Here's number two. I believe that every right implies a responsibility. Every opportunity implies an obligation. Every possession implies a duty. In other words, it's not just what you have, it's what you do with it. It's not just what you're committed to doing, but it's how you're going to carry that out. Here's this third. I believe that the law was made for man and not man made for the law. That government is a servant of the people and not their master. They're very important. You know where that comes from. Okay. Here's another one. I believe in the dignity of labor, whether with head or with hand. The world owes no man living, but that it owes every man an opportunity to make a living. Now that's profound. We are not just to give them money, not just hand out money to people and not them not work, but he's saying give them an opportunity to make a living. Here's what he goes on to say. I believe that thrift is essential to well-ordered living and that economy is a prime requisite of a sound financial structure, whether in government, in business, or in personal affairs. Now there was money management. Make sure it's an order, then your life will be in order. He goes on and his Cree to say this, I believe that truth and justice are fundamental or fundamental to the enduring social state. In other words, how we live as a society or we live as a community is based on truth and justice. Not favoritism or uh, earning privilege in some way, but on truth and justice. Rockefeller goes on to say this, I believe in the sacredness of a promise that a man's word should be as good as his bond. That character, not wealth, not power, not position is of Supreme worth. It's character, not wealth. It's character, not power. It's character, not position. That's what Supreme worth is all about. And Rockefeller continues in his creed to include this. I believe that the rendering of useful service is the common duty of mankind and that only in the purifying fires of sacrifices is the draws of selfishness consumed and the greatness of the human soul set free. In other words, work, work hard and is created. Then it says this, I believe in the all wise and all loving God named by whatever name and that the individual's highest fulfillment, greatest happiness and wisest usefulness are to be found in living in harmony with God's will. And then he wraps up his creed by one last statement. I believe that love alone is a greatest thing in the world. That it alone can overcome. Hate that right. That right can and will triumph over. Might right over might for that one before. I'm sure. So that's the creed, John B, what? Rockefeller, that's the creed and it's the idea that you live by principles like this. You live by values set forth like this. You live with this in mind. With this in focus, you are driven by these kinds of principles. You read them every day. You read them regularly, you rehearse them, you memorize them, you keep them as part of your life. Lots of wise and very profound people have done just that. I think of Jonathan Edwards as well. 72 points to his creed resolutions. He called him. So we have these ways of focusing our life. Why don't you adopt one? Why don't you have your own creeds? Start with one point. Start with to start with three. You don't have to go on and have 15 of them, but just have a few that kind of shape your life and focus your life and give you a sense of purpose, but also a sense of fulfillment. To know that you live in your live consistently with the Cree that you've set forth, you'd be proud of yourself. In other words, bye for now.