In 1997 we were starting a new company and trying out different names. At one point the name Paradigm Communications was being considered and as we showed it around we learned that many people don’t know what the word paradigm means much less how to pronounce it. So, we scrapped that idea and ended up with Flagship Communications. While many may not know what a flagship is, they often said it sounded like a company that has been around for a while and they clearly new how to pronounce it.
The funny thing is, I just looked up the word paradigm and the definitions I read didn’t match up with how I would define the word. I guess I need a paradigm shift. A paradigm shift, in my mind, means to move from the mold of thinking I’ve been using and embrace an alternate view. At least, that’s the way I understand the concept as described in Stephen Covey’s “Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”.
The pattern set by the life of Jesus is one that requires moving away from the old and embracing the new. It’s beyond my natural way of thinking to consider God being so loving towards us that He’d come to earth, pay a brutal penalty for sin, call us His children and make His home in us so that we’d be like Him (if we would only place our faith in Him). This paradigm shift is one way of describing repentance. The emphasis of repentance is to feel sorrow over what we’ve done or how we’ve lived and to change our thinking and living in response the sorrow.
God offers life in abundance to all that turn to Him. Taste and see that the LORD is good.
2 Corinthians 5:17 If anyone belongs to Christ, there is a new creation. The old things have gone; everything is made new!
First Love - The Way of Jesus 