Once Upon a Time

Once upon a time in a land not so far away there lived a fairly ordinary man (replace with "woman" if you are female). He had never done much of anything to distinguish himself from his peer group. He was not rich or famous or particularly good looking and though he kept trying to convince people he was just not that smart, many who knew him did not believe it. If he did anything right in his life, it had been to answer the call of God. To his mind it did not much matter what the Lord said, he just did it. Of particular note in that obedience was that, though sometimes easily distracted, the overriding desire of his life was to find exactly where he fit, what his purpose was, in the kindgom of God. He firmly believed that every person is put upon this earth for some higher purpose than to just live and die. Some people are slow learners and it took him the best part of threescore years on earth to finally discover his calling. Even that discovery came about almost by accident.


It certainly would be nice if God sent us to earth knowing exactly what we were doing. In truth, some of us never find out. God has provided all the answers to all the mysteries of life within the greatest of all books, the Bible. The Bible tells us everything we need to know about living life on the earth. It is not about a cosmic struggle in the heavenly realms that makes good reading. It is not even about the history of one people group on the earth and their struggles to obtain and maintain an identity against all odds. Rather, it is the greatest story ever told. It is certainly the greatest because it tells us about Jesus, the Son of God who chose to endure the discomforts of earth for a little while rather than enjoy the comforts of the heavenly throne room while God's greatest creation self-destructed on a blue ball of carbon based materials spinning its way around one of ten septrillion stars in the universe (That is 10 with 21 zeros after it, and no, I did not count them. In fact, I doubt the accuracy of the number, but that is the number astronomers work with.)


To return to our story, one of the things this man did right was to find the right woman to be his partner, his companion, his helper exactly suited to him. God said, "It is not good that man should be alone..." (Genesis 2:18) He almost backed into that one too. Had God not insisted he propose, it is anyone's guess whether he would have gotten that one right. The end of that story has yet to be written, but so far, the four best children in the world have made it to adulthood and today the family totals ten with another on the way. The blessings of God are evident throughout the family. Lest that sound a little too idyllic, the whole group is eminently human with all the same struggles and challenges such as are common to mankind on this earth. Yet they have, and they will, overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony--Jesus is Lord!

Surely there must be a reason we are telling this particular story of this individual man of all the billions that have lived on this earth since its creation. Certainly there is. God always has a plan. We are the ones who miss it or lose sight of it. The book of Proverbs is generally attributed to King Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived. (Sorry Stephen Hawking, Carl Sagan, and all you others who have not even found the beginning of wisdom. Hint: check out Proverbs 9:10.) King Solomon said, "Where there is no revelation the people cast off restraint..." (Proverbs 29:18) The clear message here is that when we cannot see what God is doing, we do what we want to do. Many of us have spent many years doing what we wanted to do, what seemed right in our own eyes. Of course God warned us about that too. "There is a way that seems right to a man, But its end is the way of death." (Proverbs 16:25) When we do not listen to Him, we prove how right He is.


A friend had me watch a dumb, old movie a few years ago. Some of you might remember Meatballs. The message of that movie in one phrase is, "It just doesn't matter." It does not matter where your life has been or where it is right now. Jesus' message of redemption is that it can all change right now. If you have made bad decisions in the past, you can change that right now. If you do not know where you're headed, you can change that right now. The past is behind you. It just does not matter. If you want to be intentional about walking free from your past life, again, the Bible has some sage advice. "...forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." (Philippians 3:13-14) Maybe you have some to forgive. Do it! Perhaps you have some one you need to ask to forgive you. Do it! Leave the past in the past and focus on doing the right things, the right way, right now!

You probably guessed who the man is in the story. At least most of you know. He is you and he is me. Probably more me than you, but you get the idea. We all face the same things as we walk through this life. The challenges, tests, and trials come in different forms and versions, but they really are all the same. We have read the back of the book and we know we finally win. What happens to us in the meantime really does not matter all that much. It is all about getting there and doing the right things along the way. God bless you as you do.