This week Pastor Neli encourages us to be empowered to influence the world around us rather than conforming to its pressure. We need to stop acting like a thermometer, which simply reflects the surrounding cultural temperature, and start living as a thermostat, actively determining and transforming our environment from the inside out. Don't just reflect the culture—change it.   Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable.  So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified. - 1 Corinthians 9:24-27 (ESV)