Lulled?

Those who learn from the lessons of life will join the others who are wise. Those who disregard discipline sabotage themselves, but those who are open to correction gain understanding. Reverence for the Eternal is the first lesson of wisdom, and humility always precedes honor. (Proverbs 15:31-33)

"You were given this life because you were strong enough to live it." (Author Unknown)

We don't receive lessons in this life through osmosis, but because we walk through them and learn from them. Someone might think they were given the life they were given because only THEY could live up to the challenge. The challenge wasn't given to you because you had the strength, it was given to you to reveal the strength the Almighty would give you to walk through it. We call it life and it comes at us at extraordinary speeds on occasion. The lessons of life will lure us in like a slow, lazy river gives us the sense all will be peaceful as we launch out only to find it takes us straight into the roaring rapids of chaos! Most of us want the lazy river kind of lessons - the ones we learn by laying back, luxuriating in the beauty of the moments which pass, and the sounds of peaceful breezes coming through the trees. We might get a little curious when we begin to hear the rapids in the far-off distance, but we still don't connect those sounds with the river until our raft begins to rock a little, picking up speed, and we begin to wonder a little, but we are still not stirred enough to make course corrections. Yet, when the full-on rapids begin to jerk us back and forth, tossing all manner of cool spray into our faces, and the horror of the moment grips our emotions, we somehow begin to pay attention!

The wise don't avoid the river altogether - they learn to navigate it because they don't allow it to lull them into repose and stupor. They remain attentive to the sounds of the journey, for the subtle changes only catch a listening ear - they alert them to course corrections long before they become "necessary". They enjoy the journey not because it is without challenges, but because each challenge reveals a new opportunity to embrace life and learn what is revealed in the moment. There are those who regard discipline as "control" - either that which you exert in the moment, or that which is imposed upon you at the time. Did you know the word "discipline" can be translated "education". To learn is to live a disciplined life - a "discipled" life. The followers of Jesus were asked to do more than just "float the river" with him. They were asked to "learn of him" - to engage in life with him, actively participating in the journey. We learn the greatest lessons when we actually participate in them.

Disciples (disciplined individuals) actually exhibit two very important character traits: 1) development and 2) preparation. Preparation involves time - time spent "getting ready". A baby is in the womb for how many months? Nine, if they are full-term. What is happening during that time? The baby is developing - getting ready to be born. Born too early and it needs all manner of artificial support, because it wasn't intended to live outside the womb that early on its own. What happens to the parents during the time the baby is in the womb? They are preparing for that which is developing within! They are making adjustments to their lives in order to be ready for the new life about to become part of theirs for a long, long time. The room is set up, the seat is installed in the car which will ensure the baby is secure for whatever journey they will take together, and the clothes are amassed which will keep that infant warm as it slumbers through nap times galore. Sometimes they actually make life corrections, such as beginning to save money, knowing the time has come to change how much they spend on only themselves, as another is coming who will count on them to provide for their needs. They are learning - preparing and developing.

As we go through life, it isn't the challenge which actually prepares and develops us, but the one who walks us up to the challenge, then continues to walk with us throughout it! He prepares us in the quiet, lazy river moments, only if we are attentive to his lessons. He strengthens us and takes us into the "advanced lessons" of life in the rapids, but he never abandons us upon the waters - ever! Just sayin!

Tutor, Text, and Teacher

I know, my God, that you test people’s hearts. You are happy when people do what is right. (I Chronicles 29:17)

If you have ever bombed a test, you know that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach knowing how that 'bombed test' will affect your total 'grade'. Rarely do we get the opportunity for a 'retake' in life's 'tested moments'. There may be that rare opportunity when we do, but most of the time a 'bombed life test' is just that - bombed. It is so wonderful to serve a God who doesn't see a 'bombed test' as our 'final grade'. In fact, he made a way for us to 'redeem' that 'life grade' through the blood of his Son, Jesus! God doesn't 'grade on the curve' - he simply helps us repeat the lesson until we no longer fail the test!

Wouldn't it be nice to never have to 'retake' one of those 'life tests'? It would be like living in heaven! Most of us need those 'retakes' because most of us don't always do well learning the lesson the first time it is taught. We might want to refer to those retakes as 'grace lessons' - the repeated opportunity to learn the lesson regardless of how many times it takes us to grasp what God is teaching us. God is indeed pleased when we get the lesson the first time, but he knows our human nature challenges us to learn some of the most important life lessons.

What is it within our nature that keeps us from learning the first time? If you are anything like me, you have emotions that get in the way at times. I rely upon my feelings a bit too much on occasion, 'feeling' like one choice is better than another, then pursuing the 'feeling'. While that isn't always the case, it happens more than I'd like. Then there is this thing called 'rational thought' that somehow gets in the way of 'faith' in our lives. We put too much of our own 'thinking' into something God is asking us to do and we find ourselves helplessly making wrong choices.

Life lessons come at us from all sides, but when we rely upon the 'tutor' we are given to help us learn them well the first time, we are less likely to have to repeat them. The tutor? The Holy Spirit. The text? The Word of God. The teacher? God himself. The right answer? Following the leading of the Spirit and not the leading of our feelings. We might need a whole lot of retakes in life, but we might just need a few less if we used the text, learned from our tutor, and listened to our teacher! Just sayin!

Pebbles in the path

One of Toby Mac's Facebook posts from January 9th was quite simple, yet profound: "Forget the past. But do remember the lesson." I think this is where the rubber meets the road for most of us - we remember the past and focus less on the lesson - if we even see the lesson in the past in the first place!  By definition, a lesson is a useful piece of practical wisdom acquired by experience or study.  If we go through things and never "acquire" anything by the experience of the event, we just might find ourselves repeating the "event" until we find the "lesson" in it!

Those who learn from the lessons of life will join the others who are wise. (Proverbs 15:31 VOICE)

A lesson is more than advice - we can take or leave advice, but to actually learn a lesson, we have to participate in it.  Heaven knows there were a few lectures during my years and years of schooling where my mind drifted into pleasanter places!  It wasn't unusual for me to have to look over at someone else to figure out where we were in the textbook at that moment when I re-entered reality!  Many times we try to go through life in much the same way - only half paying attention, but expecting to get 100% out of life along the way!

We might not think there is much to learn from the failures of our lives - but if we look close enough, those are the exact places opportunities exist.  It is in the moment of failing that we perhaps recognize there was another opportunity we might have explored.  In order to see the opportunity, we have to look for the lesson in the moment.  This doesn't come naturally for us because we'd rather gravitate to all the reasons something didn't work, or shift the blame to another just to get the focus off of our failure. 

I once heard someone say it isn't the mountains we trip over in life - it is the pebbles and stones which litter the highway which takes us to the mountain.  We see the mountain, but ignore the little things which tripped us up all along the way. When we step back a ways from the mountain, we might just see what we had been tripping on along the way!  It is those smaller things God wants us to see - not just the "big issue" in our path.  Those smaller "issues" may not have caused us to fail to make progress forward like the mountain does, but they impacted our journey and there is something to learn about their presence in our path and our response to them.

Pebbles might be kicked out of the way - ridding the path of their influence and making the journey for another a little easier to take.  This is one way we learn the lessons of our past - by preparing a way for another's future steps.  Pebbles might have become the things which dug into our feet as we trod along the path, giving us a little pain along the way. One thing is for sure - the process of pain can either be cursed, or embraced.  Embraced and it becomes a place of learning - cursed and it becomes a place of impeded progress.

Pebbles might have been scooped up, tossed in the air over and over again as we walked along, and then eventually tossed into the wind never to be seen or appreciated again. Life experiences can be treated in much the same way - they give us some moments of reflection and then they are gone from our sight in just a moment of time.  They can be remembered, but there is no "memorial" of their presence in our lives.  In time, we even forget the memory of the pebble, for there are other things in our path which require our focus and acquire our attention.  

Some of the stuff we deal with in life will be memorable. They will not be as easy to forget.  Over the years, there have been a few pebbles along the path which I have taken up, considered, and even admired the beauty of the pebble a little.  Those may have been placed in my pocket to be considered over and over again later on in life.  What made those pebbles different?  There was an appreciated beauty in them!  What we come to appreciate in life may not be the most "beautiful" or significantly "profound", but when we appreciate the beauty in those "pebbles" along the way, we take a lesson from our past even when we have moved on. Just sayin!