A man named Fred inherited a huge land grant, but the will provided that he
could choose land in either Chile or Brazil. He chose Brazil. Unhappily, if had
he chosen Chile, he would have received his inheritance in land on which they
had recently discovered uranium, gold and silver. But he chose Brazil.
When he arrived in Brazil he had to choose between receiving his inheritance in a coffee plantation or land with Brazil nut trees. He chose the nut trees, and immediately the bottom fell out of the nut market, but coffee futures went up $2.00 a pound. The government took control of the nut farm for back taxes, and Fred was left destitute.
Fred pawned his Rolex watch for the money he needed to fly back to the United States. It seemed he had enough money for a ticket either to New York or Boston. He chose Boston. When the plane for New York taxied up, he noticed it was a brand new super Concorde with red carpets. After several hours delay, the plane for Boston arrived. It was a 1928 twin engine plane held together with bailing wire, and it was filled with cigar smokers and unattended crying babies.
Over the mountains one of the engines fell off, and Fred, frightened by his earlier bad choices and fearing for his life, asked for a parachute. He was given two parachutes, and he jumped. As he fell through the air, he tried to make up his mind which ripcord to pull. He pulled the cord on the left, but nothing happened. He pulled the cord on his right, but it broke.
In desperation the poor fellow cried out, "St. Francis, save me!" A great hand from heaven reached down and seized him by the wrist and left him dangling in mid-air, and then a gentle but inquisitive voice asked, "St. Francis Xavier or St. Francis of Assisi?"
Hundreds of Choices
Choices. We make them everyday. What to wear. What to eat. What to watch on TV or listen to on the radio. Where to park. Who gets our time and who doesn't. When to go to bed. When to wake up. We make hundreds of choices a day.
Some choices we regret. I regret never trying out for Little League baseball, and attending church committee meetings on my children's birthdays, and breaking a confidence, and not pursuing a career in sports journalism, and holding on to a grudge much too long, and not taking up golf earlier in life.
Other choices we celebrate. I love the choice I made at the age of 19 to give all I knew of myself to all I knew of Christ. I love the choice I made to marry Trudy Lee Castleman, and that we chose to have two children. I love the home we chose to buy two and a half years ago. It overlooks a small lake. It's incredibly peaceful beside that lake. I also celebrate the choice I made to attend UCLA (Go Blue!), and to take up golf, and to put a swimming pool in our backyard, and to buy a Mazda Miata sports car. I love making hospital calls now because it gives me another opportunity to put the top down on the car.
Choices in the New Millennium
As we head into the new millennium, I know I will be faced with more choices. One major choice will be the type of pastor I want to be. Listen to these words from Greg Ogden, Director of the Doctor of Ministries Program at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena. In a recent newsletter he wrote these words:
Dear Doctor of Ministry Students, Alumni and Faculty:
For any of us in Christian leadership today, it is easy to be overwhelmed by all that we don't know.
I am reminded almost daily that we are living in a time when there is a fundamental and rapidly accelerating shift in the paradigm of the church. Titles of books I have been reading recently leave me feeling as if a deluge is breaking over me. "Churchquakes" is Peter Wagner's latest with the subtitle "How the New Apostolic Reformation is Shaking the Church As We Know It." Leonard Sweet writes in "Soultsunami" that he underestimated the magnitude of change in his book "Faithquakes." The two books that have come out of The Church and Gospel Network, "The Church Between Gospel and Culture" and "Missional Church," describe the collapse of Christendom and the repositioning of the church as a missionary community in the Western world ... I am left with the message that I am sinking in a sea of change ...Who is fit for these things?
I have similar feelings. In the last five years we have added three different styles of worship services just to keep up with the changing needs of the people in our faith community. We have a "Golden Oldie" chapel service first thing Sunday morning, followed by a "Praise and Worship" service complete with praise singers, guitars and drums, which in turn is followed by a traditional worship service with choir and organ and clergy robes. Then on Thursday evenings we have a "multi-media" seeker service targeting twenty and thirty year olds. I know more change is in store in the years to come. In the past few years alone I have been introduced to the internet, e-mail, DVD players, and satellite navigation on automobiles. Who knows what's ahead?
Two things, however, give me hope. One source of hope comes from the Bible. "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever." (Hebrews 13:8) In the sea of change around me, I have a spiritual and emotional anchor -- Jesus Christ. The other source of hope is Christ's people. They put flesh on the face of Jesus. Their love, compassion, encouragement keep me going when I am tempted to give up.
I love change. I love the world in which we live. I love the challenges ahead of us. But most of all, I love the fact that Christ and Christ's people are there for me when the choices seem overwhelming and the pace becomes too extreme.
For Your Group
- If you had to do it over again, what one thing would you do differently?
- What change in the past five years has brought you great joy? Some pain?
- What change would you like to make in your life over the next five years?