Mr. Phifer

by Joey Davis

I sat under the tutelege of Mr. Phifer for nearly a year. He taught Marketing and Finance at the southern university where I attended. He looked and talked much like "Floyd the Barber" on the Andy Griffith show. And, like Floyd, he often rambled endlessly about nothing.

But Mr. Phifer was an easy teacher, and being the lazy student that I was, suffering through a little rambling was a small price to pay for a good grade, so I persevered.

You never know, where you will find a nugget of truth, and one day Mr. Phifer said something that penetrated my thick skull and has stayed there until this day. He said, "people are driven by their perception. To humans, perception is reality."

This is so true.

How we perceive a particular circumstance determines how we react to it. For instance, if you perceive that bringing your family to church adds value to your lives. . . you will bring your family to church. If this is not your perception, then wild horses couldn't drag you there. The priorities in our life are products of our individual perceptions.

The most interesting thing about this is that God has placed within our intellect the ability to choose our own perceptions.

Two people may look at the same circumstance, and because of the perceptions they have chosen, one will see the circumstance as a blessing and the other see it as a curse.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, "What is a weed? .. A plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered." The Travelers Insurance Company now sports a line of commercials aimed at changing the perception of its customers.

Solomon wrote, "For as a man thinks within himself, so he is"

(Prov. 23:7).

So if our perception controls our actions, maybe we need to take a new look at some things from a different perspective. . .

. . . It's not a church building; it is a building where the church (we Christians) assembles.

They're not visitors, but are friends and brethren that we haven't met yet.

It's not a worship service, it's an opportunity to assemble in the presence of God.

Christianity is not a duty, it's a privileged lifestyle.

They are not "rascally" children, they are the church of tomorrow.

The contribution is not paying for our sins, Jesus did that already.

They aren't elderly Christians, they are walking encyclopedias filled with experience in Godliness.

It's not our church, it's His! . . .

. . . And the list goes on! It would be good for all of us to sit and think of the negative perceptions that often rule our Christian walk. When you identify them. . . change' them!

• Teachers -May 18, 1997