This post may be a little off from my normal posts, but it's something I've thought about off and on for a very long time. If you're looking for my usual sharp wit and devilish charm, then maybe you'll be surprised by what you get instead.
I've had something of an epiphany. It occurs to me--as it may already have for you, some time ago even--that maybe there's something to that old saying that "God loves you and has a plan for your life." I understand that, and I suppose that I've always assumed that God's plan for my life was something that maybe I'd end up doing one day: some pivotal event that would change the course of humanity (maybe I imagine my life to be more important than it is?). I guess I thought that up until that one defining moment, my life would fade into the background, and then go back to join that hum-drum background noise after my pivotal role in the existence of mankind had been played. I was--as I have many times--wondering what exactly my role in life was, what God's plan for me was, since He has one for me. The realization came to me--or perhaps was given to me--that God's plan for my life isn't just one moment or one decision. God's plan for my life is my life.
Our lives are about experience. I believe that our God is a sovereign God who orchestrates every experience of all our lives. Everything we see, hear, say and do; every person that comes into or leaves our lives; all the things that happen to us or for us or even around us; all these things shape who we are and who we will become on our final day on this earth. I believe that is God's plan for us. Who we are in life leaves a legacy for those who follow. The wisdom imparted to us from past generations lays a foundation for the things we learn in our lives. God has our lives planned as networks of experience: whether we're affecting someone's life, or ours is the life affected, God knows--has known since before time--the who, what, where, when, why and how of every moment.
Maybe my life won't mean much in the grander scheme of things, maybe I won't be instrumental in shaping the existence of mankind in the future, and maybe I won't be in history books. The impression that I leave, however, will be just as important to my children. Most importantly, I want to know that the life I live is the life that God intended for me. That's why I pray for God to bring to me what he will so that I become the man He created me to be.
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ReplyDeleteSomeone recently gave JR a page from their daily calendar that had a sweet picture of a man holding a child. The quote said, "Fatherhood is not a sprint, it's a marathon." If no one else in the world besides your child ever hears your name or acknowledges your work, there is one person whose life you are shaping daily in ways beyond what you will ever know. Generations after you are gone, your legacy will live on in the ways your children parent their children, in the kinds of people those people grow up to be. You are a good dad. That you think about these things is just more proof. Like JM recently learned to say, "Hi Fibe!"
ReplyDelete(Edited to add a skipped word.)