Tick, tick, tick, the clock continues to tick - for some of us it probably seems that it’s ticking down faster than for others. I guess sooner than later time will reach its destination and come to a sudden halt. Sorry to break the news to you Skippy, but someday there simply will be no more “ticking.”
A bleak beginning to a journal entry, huh?
Life is short is what we’ve been told – Life is hard most of us have come to believe, and most certainly Life is full of surprises. Heck, we’ve even been told Life is like a box of chocolates, of all things. Life can be broken down where we come to understand that we are blessed each day with 1,440 minutes just as was Albert Einstein, Aristotle, Abraham Lincoln, Moses, Mother Teresa, and even Thomas Edison.
1,440 minutes per day – yet we declare so often that there just isn’t enough time to get done all the things we say that we want to get accomplished. I don’t know, but maybe some of us are just looking for an excuse sometimes.
Have you ever awakened in the morning and asked yourself – How in the world am I going to get done all of the things that I need to do today? Do you ever feel run down, and exhausted from all of the busyness that your life has taken on? Are you simply trying to hang in there some days when your energy level has all but diminished? Maybe I’m wrong, but I suspect that we’ve all had those times. No, I’m not trying to pitch you a new vitamin, or energy drink - I’m simply making a point here.
Tick, tick, tick - it’s still ticking at a pace of 86,400 ticks per day.
If pressed to, could you answer the following questions right here - right now? What is your immediate set of goals for your life? What are you mid-range goals? What are your long-term goals?
I’m not just talking about your financial situation, your education plans, or your career path – I’m talking about your purpose in life. To ask the question more precise “What is your game-plan to position yourself better so that your life more closely mirrors the life that Jesus lived?”
Now that’s a tough question simply because many of us live each day by the seat of our pants. We face each situation and circumstance as if it was an unexpected occurrence, and we wonder where all of our time and energy goes each day. We have absolutely no game-plan in place - merely a destination in mind.
Pastor Ron Stewart www.GraceBC.org (at a missionary conference) one weekend stated “For the salt to be effective it must first leave the saltshaker.” Simple truth! He went on to point out a sad, but a very truthful fact that, its easy for people to get caught up in their own particular ‘ministry’ or in this function, or in that church program, yet never actively get involved with true evangelism.
Speaking of Thomas Edison, I read somewhere years ago that it took him years before he came up with a successful version of the light bulb. When Thomas Edison was interviewed by a young reporter during the process who boldly asked Mr. Edison if he felt like a failure and if he thought he should just give up by now. Perplexed, Edison replied, "Young man, why would I feel like a failure? And why would I ever give up? I now know definitively over 9,000 ways that an electric light bulb will not work. Success is almost in my grasp." And shortly after that, and over 10,000 attempts, Edison invented the light bulb. Talk about perseverance! Can you imagine the frustration level he must have experienced after, let’s say 9,950 failures? All too often we find ourselves subject to giving up after a time or two of getting knocked to the ground – much less after 7,268 times.
Here’s my definition of “perseverance”: to use all of the 1,440 minutes per day in one fashion or another in a manner in which to achieve our objectives regardless of the obstacles, and then tomorrow get out of bed and do it all over again.
I sat in on a leadership class a few years ago where the main focus of the final exercise was designed to help us recognize various qualities of a true leader. The last half-hour of the class was spent this way. The session leader drew a center line down the blank page sitting on the easel and at the top he wrote LION on one side and LAMB on the other. Then the instructor began showing photographs of well known leaders and asked the class to vocally respond with their opinion as to which category each leader fit in. President Bush (the dad one) immediately went into the Lamb column and Bill Gates under the Lion heading. Hitler was an obvious choice, as well as was Gandhi. This went on for about fifteen minutes and then the final photo was offered up - that of Mother Teresa, and without objection she was placed along side the names of those that had been seen as having a “Lamb’s” approach to getting others to follow their lead.
The teacher concluded his comments and then began to dismiss the class, yet he stopped just short of saying good-bye. He turned to the board again (scratched his head) and asked the class, “Are you sure that Mother Teresa is in the right category?” Many of us stared at the photograph of this wrinkled and worn out slice of human frailty which had been on the projection screen for nearly twenty minutes now, and we stood firm with our conclusion that she was indeed a “Lamb”- styled leader. Then the instructor pulled out a piece of folded paper from his pocket and started listing all of her accomplishments.
He explained to us at the time of her death she held a seat on more than a hundred Board of Directors committees for some of the largest organizations in the world. He told us how she either met with or conversed with the highest ranking leaders of the world on a weekly basis and that she never let them wrangle their way away from her presence until they heard her opinion on a vast array of issues such as abortion, world hunger, etc.. It seems that they greatly respected her opinion of how “things” should be done since apparently she had a very forceful and fearless way of expressing her expectations for each of them.
He then gave us the statistics that showed her Missionaries of Charity had over 600 sites throughout the world. How she took in more than ($100,000,000.00) One hundred million dollars in donations per year from the wealthiest and the most influential people of the world just to feed and clothe the poor and outcast of our societies. He also told us how she orchestrated a work force of over 300,000 volunteers to help her meet her objectives in 123 countries. He finished up by explaining that she had worked and prayed tirelessly (for more than fifty years) 16-20 hours a day right up until her death - all because of her fierce determination to make a difference in the lives of those around her, as she believed God had called her to do. She was relentless – hard working, a force to be reckoned with by all level of dignitaries and world leaders. But all that was disguised quite nicely in her wrinkled face, blue dress, and nun’s habit.
He paused (as the class was in absolute silence) and then asked a show of hands of how many of us now believed that she should be moved over to the list of Lions - it was unanimous. This was an important lesson for all of us, not only in misperceptions but also in personal performance, perseverance, as well as objectives, and game-planning.
1,440 minutes a day - just like it was when Jesus walked among us while he healed the sick, raised the dead, taught through the use of parables, and putting into place the plan for our salvation – all in 1,440 minutes a day. Yet we say that there just isn’t enough time in a day.
Mother Teresa and Thomas Edison – what a pair huh? Both very successful through hard work and perseverance, and we all benefit greatly from each of their respective efforts, but here’s the bottom line in all of this. The Bible teaches us that faith without any works is an unmeasured faith, but I also take that to mean that works without any evidence of faith is less than acceptable as well.
Thomas Edison lived a life consumed of great works for the betterment of mankind, but he died not believing in God or the power of the cross. Mother Teresa simply did everything she did to demonstrate that the saving grace of Jesus Christ was available to all. Faith plus works leads to a true and life changing evangelism that Christ called each of us to.
My favorite quote by Mother Teresa comes from an item that she supposedly hung in her office herself, and it reads;
“Tell them we are not here for work, we are here for Jesus.”
