This is my beloved, with whom I am well pleased
The sad thing is that these wonderfully noble motives often lead us down the wrong track…something I was reminded of again when reading the following from Donald Miller: “If you watched a movie about a guy who wanted a Volvo and worked for years to get it, you wouldn’t cry at the end when he drove off the lot, testing the windshield wipers. You wouldn’t tell your friends you saw a beautiful movie or go home and put a record on to think about the story you’d seen. The truth is, you wouldn’t remember that movie a week later, except you’d feel robbed and want your money back. Nobody cries at the end of a movie about a guy who wants a Volvo. But we spend years actually living those stories, and expect our lives to be meaningful. The truth is, if what we choose to do with our lives won’t make a story meaningful, it won’t make a life meaningful either”.
Now, it might not be a Volvo specifically, but we are more often than not trying to affirm our purpose and meaning through physical things. When actually, in those moments where we are faced with the reality of life and death, it isn’t those things that come to mind. Rather it is the things that make us ugly cry, those things that lift our spirits, that force us to breathe deeply and that confront us with the harsh beauty that life is that our thoughts keep returning to.
For those are the things that make our lives worthwhile…that make them feel fully lived in the dark of death’s shadow…and at the basis of all these things lies our desire to be loved! It is in the meaning our lives have for those around us – in the love that we are looked at, that we are hugged with – that we finally know that our being here has not been in vain. That knowing that one life has breathed easier because we have lived.
For those are the things that make our lives worthwhile…that make them feel fully lived in the dark of death’s shadow…and at the basis of all these things lies our desire to be loved! It is in the meaning our lives have for those around us – in the love that we are looked at, that we are hugged with – that we finally know that our being here has not been in vain. That knowing that one life has breathed easier because we have lived.
The most wonderful thing?! That, even before we start looking at the people around us – people who can be fickle and childish – we can be grounded in God’s overwhelming love! “The LORD your God is with you; his power gives you victory. The LORD will take delight in you, and in his love he will give you new life. He will sing and be joyful over you, as joyful as people at a festival.” – Zephaniah 3:17 The Lord DELIGHTS in the mere fact of our existence! He SINGS over the people He has created us to be! And that only because we exist – BEFORE we DO or SAY anything?!
My life has meaning because I am I, created by God to be the me I am, my only purpose being to stay true to the dream He dreamt when He made me. We just have to BE for our lives to have abundant meaning! So let’s stop chasing and striving and being so busy with what the world expects that we forget who we are…let’s refocus on God and his delight…let’s relax…for WE are his BELOVED, with whom He is well pleased!
My life has meaning because I am I, created by God to be the me I am, my only purpose being to stay true to the dream He dreamt when He made me. We just have to BE for our lives to have abundant meaning! So let’s stop chasing and striving and being so busy with what the world expects that we forget who we are…let’s refocus on God and his delight…let’s relax…for WE are his BELOVED, with whom He is well pleased!
No comments:
Post a Comment