Life to the fullest

There is a recurring theme in my thinking about the many choices life presents. I can best express it with a parable of sorts:

A very hungry man enters a large cafeteria. The cafeteria is filled with many foods of numerous varieties. The man has limited resources, but enough to purchase a good meal for himself. He greatly desires to make the most of his funds, so he is anxious about making the right choices. He has a big problem. He is unfamiliar with all the foods he sees. To his eye, some foods look better than others, but he is in no way sure of what to choose. There is no opportunity to taste before he pays. The man needs a guide, someone who identifies with his dilemma and knows the food. One who would advise him with regards to the choices he must make.

Just as the man in this story, I carry with me a significant portion of anxiety. I struggle with decision-making. The hardest time of my life was the period approaching high school graduation. I felt overwhelmed by the magnitude and consequences of the choices before me.

I am inspired by people who began with little, yet accomplish much. I admire people who have the courage to take great chances in an effort to reach high goals. I, too easily, relate to a particular character in one of Jesus' parables. The man who took the one talent given him and went and buried it. He was afraid of loss. He was focused on what he might lose of his master's, rather than what he might gain for the master. I know that feeling--I am that guy.

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I want to live by faith. I want to be at peace- all the time, knowing that my thinking is saturated with godly wisdom. I want to be at peace, knowing that the odds are with me, in that God is guarding my back. There will be pain and suffering. I want mine to serve some purpose, to accomplish some greater good. I want to be confident that my life is running exactly along the lines God intended when He knit me in my mother's womb.

The disciple of Christ is not simply an obedient rule-follower. The disciple should be different from all other people. It seems that knowing God should give us an edge, an inside track to unlocking our own potential (or having it unlocked for us). This difference should bare-out not just in matters such as church attendance and communion observance; but even more so in the pragmatic matters of life- in matters of finance, time, and planning.

We ought to be the bravest of people, for we already know that all things are going to end well. We should be living life to the fullest. That is what Jesus said He came to give us.

I believe my earlier post and comments about eroticism are consistent with this quest. Anxiety is closely linked to much of human limitation. To defeat anxiety's hold on us in one area of life is to make great strides towards its defeat in other areas as well. And conversely, to cower from anxiety in one area of life is to weaken one's position in others areas.

By God's grace, may we all live life to its fullest.