Maintenance

Church was good today. Despite my general feeling of insignificant futility lately, when I am at church I feel like I am at my most effective. I am provided an opportunity to raise my voice bringing glory to God. This action is central to who I am. I decided to do some maintenance on my truck today. Normally, I would take it somewhere, but I thought maybe I could save a few buck...(jury is out on that one)

Goal was to change the oil, replace air and oil filters, replace wiper blades and replace my aging battery. While I was working diligently couple of things happened..
1. I determined that doing this sort of thing gives me a strong connection to my memories of the person that I used to be... At least as a kid.. the smells, the oil and dirt.. even the sweat all brings back intense memories of time spent with my father and grandfather. Even washing my hands afterwards flashes scenes in my brain of my grandfather washing his hands in the sink with dish soap.
2. I determined, that while this is who I used to be... That identity is really in the past. I am not so good at it these days. I spilled oil all over the place.. spent more time cleaning up than I did working.. I had all sorts of trouble just getting the oil filter off. But.. the actions were therapeutic.. so maybe there is more value to the actions than to the outcome.

Identity is intricately and intensely tied to our past, but it should be just as intricately and intensely tied to our future. That future is bright.. not because of anticipated future "successes" but because I know that God will take care of me and my family. My future has to be about sharing my "faith" in a story...as it is written. The early chapters of my book are written, but the future is blank and I have a part to play in how those pages are filled.

Free will allows me to choose to focus either on me, or on others. Making music and sharing my faith through that music is the central theme. Focusing on family and my personal faith journey provides me the context and foundation for success.. The corporate world and technology provide the context for interactions out of my comfort zone and utilize my skill sets most effectively for evangelism.

Each of us has decisions to make about our future.

Who is it that you want to be?

The Robert Kennedy quote from Raylene's testimony this morning struck a powerful chord for me... I know where I am in terms of these perspectives: Do you?

"There are those who look at things the way they are, and ask why... I dream of things that never were, and ask why not?"

While I was writing this, these add'l quotes from RK struck me as important. Click here to see more.

"Progress is a nice word. But change is its motivator. And change has its enemies."

"It is not enough to understand, or to see clearly. The future will be shaped in the arena of human activity, by those willing to commit their minds and their bodies to the task."

"Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total; of all those acts will be written the history of this generation."


Quotes taken from brainyquote.com... Robert Kennedy

I know almost nothing about this man.. yet these few sentences impacted me profoundly. We should all be so focused on the future while learning from the past.