Proms and parties, announcements and matriculation, caps and gowns, nervous valedictory addresses and self-erasing commencement speeches, and some old guy handing out diplomas to our kids as Pomp And Circumstance plays over and over in their minds--a song they now hope never to hear again. It happens every year about this time and it always takes us by surprise that our kids are old enough and experienced enough to be graduating from high school and beginning their personal assault on the world as independent adults...in a manner of speaking. Most of them still have fairly strong family ties, particularly to Mom and Dad's checkbook.
Still it's a good reminder that life has a unique way of beginning again for us over and over and over. And that's good. We all need a chance to re-up and start all over. I think we need a lot of chances to rejoin some things we've let slide, to re-examine some passions we've ignored for one reason or another, and to re-enlist in some areas of life that are so important but somehow got lost in the shuffle of living every day; and we need those chances more often than on that single occasion when we're eighteen and graduating from high school.
But it's a great reminder that we're never finished. Every conclusion is, in its own way, a new beginning. High school is finished means college or career development is just beginning. College ends and it's time for grad school, or time to get a job, or get married, and following marriage, it's time to start a family; and that, well that opens a whole new can of worms.
There are a thousand different ways to tell that story. Some will involve college and some won't. Some will choose the military, some will opt for the work place, and others will get married, and not necessarily in that order.
Life is never through with us as long as we're still living. It's going to continue to challenge us and change us. And we're going to have the opportunity each time it does to either sit on the sidelines or stay in the game.
Such was the message that I gleaned from our worship time this past Sunday. Maybe I can say it this way; the past is prologue. It's not so much about what I've already done, and it's really never about what anyone else gets to do; it's about what I decide to do with the opportunities God has placed in front of me. Jesus reminder to, "follow me," comes to mind as I start all over today and begin again.
(Ed Saucier)
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