A Map and A Mirror
December 2, 2008
Dear Friends,
I want you to imagine Abram being called out of Ur of the Chaldees and stopping at Haran. However, in this new scenario, Abram does not continue on to the Promised Land, but stays permanently in Haran. In this imaginary scenario, can you see Abraham becoming the Father of the Faithful that we admire and cherish today? Doubtful.
Have we stopped on our journey to the Promised Land and set up permanent camp in the land of addictions, apathy or some other pitfall? Have we set up camp in pornography or alcoholism or some other less than favorable place and are failing to move forward in faith? Have we settled in for a long respite in mediocrity? Have we pitched a tent in financial debt, ecclesial complacency or unhealthy habits and found ourselves staying there a lot longer than we originally intended?
The writer to the Hebrews urges us by saying "let us go on unto perfection." All of us have a ways to go to reach perfection and some of us a lot longer than others. Some are constantly moving forward little by little while others of us are not progressing at all.
I would like to share with you a few ideas to encourage you onward toward perfection. This can be applied both individually as well as ecclesially.
1. Know where you are going.
When it came time for me to upgrade my cell phone this time around, I opted for a Blackberry. My last phone was about as low-tech as you can get. My new Blackberry has way too many features for a Luddite like myself. It does have one feature that I "had" to have – a GPS. GPS, for my fellow Luddites, stands for Global Positioning System. It is dynamic electronic mapping software to help you navigate from one place to the other using satellites. In my job, I am always driving to little out of the way places and inevitably getting lost. I found myself always stopping in little hole-in-the-walls stores trying to buy local maps because the national map books I had were not sufficient. Now all I do is plug the address into my Blackberry and it takes me right there with a map and a voice command. The coolest thing of all is that when I need to detour for some reason – a traffic jam perhaps – the GPS will recalculate and give me an alternative route.
How many of us are going through life without a map or a vision of where we are going? How many of us could use a GPS for our lives? How many of our ecclesias are just stuck in the proverbial traffic jam making no progress with no goals, plans or strategies? As the author Lewis Carroll said "If you don't know where you are going, any road will get you there."
Proverbs 29:18 says "Where there is no vision, the people perish." We need to see where we are going. We need to have a plan on how to get there.
What I would recommend is for you to take some time and look way off into the future. See yourself in 20, 30 or even 50 years. In an ideal situation, what will you have accomplished in that time? Once you have accomplished ALL that you have set out to do, what will people say about you? What will be in your obituary? Cover all of the important bases in your life: spiritual, your character, health, interpersonal relationships, education, financial, career and other intangibles. Once you have that vision in your mind, plot out how you get from here to there. This is your roadmap.
This is the critical first step in the process. If you don't know where you are going, that is probably where you are headed – no where. Where are YOU going?
Have a great week,
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