Legacy

My birthday was yesterday. “Do you remember the twenty-first night of September? Love was changing the minds of pretenders while chasing the clouds away! Our hearts were ringing in the key that our souls were singing; as we danced in the night, remember how the stars stole the night away!”

If your brain isn’t automatically providing the next “ba de ya,” you are either (a) a generation too early, or (b) just missing out on some of the best R&B music by the greatest soul band ever. (Shout-out to Earth, Wind & Fire!)

I love that one of my favorite songs ever is about my birthday. And it doesn’t hurt that it hit popularity during one of my favorite times in my life when I was surrounded by some of the best friends I would ever make in this lifetime: my college days at Trevecca Nazarene College.

In just about six weeks, we’ll be having Homecoming at Trevecca Nazarene University (yes, it’s a university now) and some of us will be celebrating our 35^th Reunion.

Seriously. Thirty-five. Three. Five. I don’t even feel thirty-five years old half the time. And it’s been that many years since we graduated. You would think some of us would start acting like grown-ups, right?

Actually, I’m very proud of my fellow 1980 graduates. Several of them have gone on to become attorneys, doctors, video and film producers, teachers / professors / school administrators, pastors, and many other important and valuable professions. Many of them are parents and even grandparents now. And most of them have made an impact in one way or another on their community in large or small ways but all for the better.

So this morning, I was reading Ecclesiastes 3. You all know the chapter…the one that starts out with the “a time to” verses:

a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,

a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace. (vv. 2-8)

I read through these familiar verses and then I read along into the not-as-familiar rest of the chapter. The rest of chapter 3 is about what happens in our lives that we consider “good.” The writer acknowledges that we all feel happy when we do good in our lives.

But the truth is that the only real and lasting good in the world is God…and he already did all the real good that there was to be done. All that humanity has done in the world is mess everything up. We’ve taken righteousness and turned it into evil. Where there should be justice and judgment, in its place there’s nothing but wickedness (v. 16). So what are we feeling so good about?

The writer concludes with this: “So I saw that there is nothing better for a person than to enjoy their work, because that is their lot. For who can bring them to see what will happen after them?” (v. 22).

These people are enjoying their “good” because they aren’t considering the lasting effects. When they die, they won’t see what their “happiness” will have done to those who come after them. No one will bring them back and say, “Look! Do you see what you left to your children and your grandchildren and their children to clean up after you? Are they happy?”

It’s been thirty-five years since I graduated from college. When I graduated in 1980, our society had an energy crisis with waning oil supplies; racism; drug addiction; starvation in many countries in Africa; suicide among teens because of drugs, LGBT identity and family rejection, or depression; issues with gay rights; and more conflicts within and between the churches than between the Church and the rest of the world.

How far have we come? Or perhaps I should ask, how close have we stayed?

For many of us, we are not at the beginning of our adult years but we have more behind us than before us. We need to decide now what we will do in this lifetime to make a difference for the world to come.

Maybe we should look back at those earlier verses and decide that it’s a time to plant…a time to heal…a time to build…a time to weep and a time to laugh…a time to mourn and a time to dance…a time to embrace…a time to search…a time to keep and a time to throw away…a time to mend…a time to be silent and a time to speak…a time to love…a time for peace.

 

My thoughts are with you
Holding hands with your heart to see you…
Only knew talk and love,
Remember how we knew love was here to stay. (EW&F)

Encourage One Another

I love the movie "Hancock." Will Smith plays the title role of an atypical, flying superhero who doesn't understand the rules of being a card-carrying, admirable, respectable hero that people will actually like. So Jason Bateman's character, Ray, takes on the task of educating him as to what that's all about.

The first step toward becoming a true superhero that Hancock needs to learn is how to tell the people around him when they have done a good thing. He literally can't say the words "Good job." So Ray works with him on just those two words..."Good." "Job." And eventually Hancock learns to incorporate the phrase into his life and begins to understand what a difference it makes in his entire world.

We don't have to be superheroes in our world, but we should all learn to be encouragers. Sometimes we dismiss that responsibility by saying it's not our particular "spiritual gift." To borrow a wonderful old Southern term...hogwash! We are all called to encourage the people around us.

In his first letter to the Thessalonians, Paul wrote, "Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing. Now we ask you, brothers and sisters, to acknowledge those who work hard among you, who care for you in the Lord and who admonish you. Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work. Live in peace with each other. And we urge you, brothers and sisters, warn those who are idle and disruptive, encourage the disheartened, help the weak, be patient with everyone" (5:11-14, emphasis added).

Notice that Paul didn't say, "If you're good at encouraging..." or "If it's your spiritual gift..." No, he was writing this to everyone in the church at Thessalonica. And he wasn't saying to just encourage the ones who were doing a great job, but also the ones who were worn out and feeling down...the "disheartened."

Look around you. Do you see anyone who could use some encouragement? Do you know someone who would benefit from a kind word or a reminder of how much they mean to you? 

Take a few moments this week to reach out to the people around you and lift up those who are needing some encouragement. Take a lesson from "Hancock" and actually tell the people around you "Good job!" when you see their efforts to do something right.

Who knows...you might just be the hero your world is needing right about now.