RABBONI...which is to say, Master

I went to my oldest grand son’s football game last Saturday. His parents and there other two children, Kaleb and Irisa were there also. As the game progressed my attention turned to the other two grand children not on the field. They were playing in front of the bleachers with other children their age. They were in a world of their own with little or no concern for the ball game that was playing out on the field. They were not concerned with the time, the weather, the next place they would be going, they we alive in the moment.

I can remember being like that as a child playing in the backyard with toy cars and dirt roads. I built cities and roads. My mind was alive in that very moment and not some future event. Time flew by without a concern for schedules and appointments. Jesus, when asked about the greatest in the Kingdom said this, "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Matt. 18:3.

From time to time I need to stop and ask myself, “Am I experiencing the abundant life that Jesus promised. I know I am saved. Heaven is a steadfast and confident expectation when I die, but is what I am experiencing now the abundant life? Some how we need to learn to see the activity of God in our lives on a moment to moment basis. Let me give you an example of what I am talking about. I walk two miles each morning. Most of the times I am thinking about a million things that I have to do when I get through, the deadlines that loom ahead…you know the routine. But this morning I tried to focus on the walk. The “ Green Way” where I walk goes through the woods and open fields. The fall leaves are at peak here now and the colors are so beautiful. Hickory trees with those bright yellow clusters of leaves were everywhere. The squirrels were busily preparing for winter. It was a cool crisp frosty morn and the sun was shining bright and warm. God was so alive and in my walk this morning.

So much of our lives are focused on the past or the future, but seldom the here and now. Thoreau said, “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could learn what it had to teach, and not, when I come to die, discover that I had not lived.” The abundant life is promised for today, don’t let it pass you buy on your way to somewhere else. Live in the moment…with the Father.