God's Glory

Wednesday, June 07, 2006

Graduation Day


I attended my daughter’s high school graduation last weekend. All the kids looked shiny and polished, adorned with caps and gowns and tassels that denoted their membership in the National Honor Society. Each one was smiling from ear to ear, quivering with nerves and anticipation. This was the moment they’d been working for, for the better part of their young lives. Now they would enter a brand new chapter, full of new promise and adventure.

But it was the brief remarks of one of the class officers, read in a stammering, almost whisper, that stuck with me. She said that all their “do-overs” were done. There were no more chances to make up a test, replay a badly lost football game or bring that grade up to a ‘B’. She admonished the graduates to be mindful of the time, that the summer was short, and that if they had unfinished business with their high school friends and sweethearts, they should do what needed to be done or say what needed to be said, without delay and procrastination. Friends would leave for college or the military or would marry or take a job far away and contacts would be lost and connections would be broken. All too soon, their closest friends would be relegated to the Christmas card list.

I was impressed by the wisdom of this “child”. With only 18 years of experience, she had learned a lesson that some of us never learn. Procrastination is the killer of promises. Good intentions are the killers of souls! The time is so short! How often do we justify a wasted day by saying to ourselves, “Well it isn’t so bad that I didn’t get to this today because I did more than ________.” (You may fill in the blank with whatever name you wish.) But that is not the question that we should be asking ourselves. Even in this society of moral relativism, it is not whether we outperformed someone else but the proper question is, “Did I do the best I could today with all that God has given me toward the goal that He has set before me?” If I could honestly answer that question in the affirmative at the end of each day, I would be a very tired but very contented person.

The sad truth is, though, that I go to bed many nights and toss and turn wondering why I can’t seem to get a handle on some area of my life. Then that area will preoccupy my thoughts and rob me of sleep until the night is gone. The next day, fatigue robs me of all productivity and the cycle starts again. If we could only break our lives down into neat little projects that we could successfully tackle sequentially, finish, and then move on. I have found, though that life doesn’t move like that. Just about the time you’re making inroads into that project you’ve been putting off, that will be the time that you forget that you put the water on for tea and boil all the water out of the kettle, or the cat will throw up on the rug, or the dog will tip over the trash! These are the times when the mundane pulls you away from the meaningful and it is only with determination and drive that we return to the task at hand. All too often, I’ve re-bagged the trash and never returned to the project that should be commanding my attention.

And so, I left the graduation a bit envious of those “new adults” who still had one more summer of fun and minimal responsibility. They are still free to lean on Mom and Dad for their room and board while they tackle the important task of welding connections and firming up meaningful contacts. They are still able to enjoy a last bit of fun without the pressures of the everyday mundane to steal that joy away. May God bless this class of 2006 and teach them the lesson that their speaker put so simply, “time is short”. And may He teach us ALL this important lesson!

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home