I have had a couple of separate experiences that have reinforced the same idea, that we need to keep an eye on our history because it helps us see the big picture.
The release of part one of our conversation with Jocelyn reminded me of one the life lessons, which you won’t get until next week. I’m going to drop a spoiler here though (don’t worry, it will still be worth listening to part 2 of the interview). One of the things we have learned doing these interviews is that most people do not take the time to reflect on their life story. They just go about their merry way, always moving forward. It usually takes a big life event to make us stop and look back…or some random guy with a microphone asking for your life story (I’m that guy). When we step through our life story, it allows us to see connections that we didn’t realize were there. There is probably a psychological process where we stream line our memories, but regardless, its incredibly interesting to see people realize there is a thread, a through-line in their story that goes from the beginning all the way to the end. Jocelyn said it really well when she said, “looking back I can see now how God was drawing me in the whole time.” It was like, God was holding that thread and just pulling the anchor of your life up from the bottom of the sea to be with Him.
I am also working on a class I hope to lead for my local church discussing the early church. One of the things I’ve seen while reviewing my information is the pendulum swing of over correction, which is a very human thing to do. With a pendulum though, we know it is an over correction, because there is a center point in which it blew right past in order to get where it is. Reading through the history of the church we can see how the swing of the pendulum got smaller and smaller as we got closer to the center, closer to the truth.
Both of these examples provide me great comfort because it shows that I don’t have to be perfect on the first try. The reality of the situation is not about getting it right, but about pursing it. We have to be in motion, moving towards God. We humans, since we are not the creator, are all discover…ers… We are built for discovery. That means we try something, fail, course correct, fail, correct again, fail again, and again and again ad nauseam. We don’t have to be afraid of the failure, because when we stop and look back on our story, we will see that the author was plotting it all along. We will see the through-line, the thread that God has been pulling to draw us near as we we swing wildly back and forth. As we move, the swings will get smaller as we grow closer to the center, closer to the truth, closer to Christ.
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