LIVING AND WAITING TO LIVE
Most of us tend to think that happiness is just around the corner. JOY will come one of these days--when things get better...when we finally get out of school...or get a better job...or get married...or get our kids raised and out of the house...or after we get that surgery over with...or maybe when we finally win the lottery. We live with the allusion that joy will come someday when conditions change. But the truth is that if we are going to know joy it will be today.
Here's how John Ortberg put it:
"I tend to divide my minutes into two categories: living and waiting to live. Most of my life is spent in transit: trying to get somewhere, waiting to begin, driving someplace, standing in line, waiting for a meeting to end, trying to get a task completed, worrying about something bad that might happen, or being angry about something that did happen. These are all moments when I am not likely to be fully present, not to be aware of the voice and purpose of God." (p.60)
(From K. Edward Skidmore's Sermon "The Discipline of Celebration")