Experts

If someone has done something for a really long time – like being an electrician for 43 years, we would consider them an expert. We would trust their expertise when making an important decision in regard to making our home safer or updating our appliances so that they met safety standards. We would ask them all the questions we could think of in regard to their area of knowledge so that we would know how to proceed to success in that area as well. It is 2011, and this month I will have been alive for 43 years, but I do not consider myself an expert in living. In fact, the older I get the more I feel like I don’t know what is going on! This morning I read this, “If people want to follow me, they must give up the things they want. They must be willing even to give up their lives to follow me. Those who want to save their lives will give up true life. But those who give up their lives for me and for the Good News will have true life.” Mark 8:34-35.
I’ve heard that since I was a child – it still doesn’t make since to my flesh. But my spiritual man understands every year even more that the things we grow up thinking we have to have or have to be are not nearly as important as our inner man being what God wants it to be. That the high cost of being a disciple of Jesus is worth the price. That said, I’d rather be turning 43 this month than 23! The life lessons I’ve learned and the perspective change that God has given with age is far more valuable than youth. I would rather be a novice at living than an expert at youth because then every day is a surprise.