I begin by relating my experience at Nature’s Catch, when close to a million dead fish died and the clean up that followed, which involved me, a shovel and rubber waders. You have a lot of time to think when you are shoveling dead, stinking fish into the back of a dump truck. Even all these years later, I distinctly remember two Bible verses coming to mind. With these verses, it was almost as if God had a sense of humor, or God was testing how I really felt about the wisdom and practicality of the Bible that I had grown up with. Would that wisdom sustain me and empower me. The first verse was from Philippians 4:8, “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” (Shovel , “dead fish while pondering that!). The second verse was from 1 Corinthians 10:31, “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” At the time, I must admit I found nothing in that job that I could deem excellent. Nor could I find it in myself to do it for the glory of God.” But that was not due to any lack of wisdom or value in those Scriptures, but because of my spiritual immaturity at age 22.
I did resolve to do something in those three awful weeks. I was going to pursue a life of excellence in ways that did not involve shoveling dead fish. Some twenty-five years later that sentiment is still with me, the sense of pursuing excellence. Most recently this sentiment has presented itself as a recurring question about making the most of the day, for they are short and they can be fraught with evil and temptation. Maybe it’s because I turned 50 this year, which naturally leads one to ask this question, or maybe because I feel the need to impress the question upon my young adult and teen children. But the question I keep entertaining is, “This is your one life, buster, what are doing with it?”
The particular answers to that question can be many, because there are a nearly unlimited good choices that you could make for your life, a multitude of directions you could take, and all of them the right direction. After all, how many of us become when we grew up what we wanted to be when we were preparing for life. I never became the nationally-syndicated radio talk show host that I dreamed of being, but there were other paths that were good for me. As they are for you. The particular answers are unlimited, but the general answer to that question, “You have one life, buster, what are you doing with it,” has one general answer. And that answer involves resoluteness.
When I was in seminary, I had an evangelism professor who was South Korean. His name was Sundo Kim, and he spoke with the calmness and authority of the Dali Llama, quietly but with much confidence. Now between the 15 years from when I graduated college to when I began my seminary studies, a new technology had come about: the laptop computer. Students, like myself, now had laptops in the classroom. The temptation was there for all of us to appear to be taking notes when in fact we were scrolling through sports, entertainment or news websites, anything other than listening to the professor. I one point a few lectures into my class with Dr. Kim, he stopped in the middle of his lecture and said, “I want to share a passage from James 1:7-8.” Quoting from that passage, he said, “That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord who is double-minded and unstable in all they do.” He added as he looked at each of us, “Some of you are taking notes on your laptops. Some of you are not. I can tell the difference. This is the only time I will mention it. But if I the end of the semester you receive an F for a grade and wonder why, it is because you were double-minded.” I did not open up my laptop in that class for the remainder of the semester. It was pen and notepad for me!
Here was the takeaway. It applies to seminary class, the office, the factory, the home and for you as a person. You have control over one thing in life: whether or not you will pursue excellence in all that you do, whatever your circumstance, wherever your starting point in life. The truly happy and full life is the excellent life, knowing that in each moment, no matter what the outcome, that you lived each moment contemplating and pursuing excellence. Notice, I did not say it is a life of great wealth, great success, great accomplishments. The truly happy and full life is the excellent life, living each moment contemplating and pursuing excellence. The pursue who is resolute in pursuing excellence is not concerned with outcomes or results. Excellence has its own reward.
So excellence will look like many things in the world, but I can tell you what excellence does not look like. Excellence is not endlessly scrolling down Facebook, the accumulation of one more gadget, watching ESPN 24/7 or binging on Netflix every night. It is not the next promotion, the biggest house, the fastest car, the last word in an argument. Happiness is not things. The excellent life is not acquiring things or money. It’s not what is called a hedonic tread mill. The desires for things never reaches an end. Once you make more money, or get a new possession, or reach a goal, it at first makes you happier, but then you adapt to the new circumstances (Quoted from Brett and Kate McKay).
Here is what the excellent life looks like: It looks like you living right now in an awareness of God’s presence in you and your response to the Divine impulse leading and guiding you to greatness. Greatness comes in many forms. I look back over my own life and see so many opportunities for greatness. For example, you wouldn’t think that cutting tobacco in the August sun would be an opportunity for personal excellence, but there were some country boys, young and old alike, who I worked alongside who were excellent tobacco cutters. For one man in particular, it was like an art form , the way he swung his knife with such grace and efficiency. Other opportunities for excellent presented themselves along the way. Sitting in the college classroom. Sitting many hours at Little League ball games and dance recitals. Learning my job and preparing for the next. Hiring and developing employees. Greatest form is giving myself over to God and becoming a vessel, a stream whose source is invisible. My parents and the most inspiring people in my life, taught me to do whatever I did as if for the glory of God. ““Whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). Was I always focusing on excellence? No. But that is to my detriment.
What we are talking about is self-culture. You becoming the best you that you can be. How much time we spend not doing that, but instead just letting the clock tick, waiting for the clock to run out. When the world is waiting for you to develop in such a wait that you might be more and more light in the darkness that is around you.
But the key is pursuing excellence in the present moment. Whatever you DO. Not whatever you plan to do. Most of us live our lives busy making other plans. We do not live into, soak it, experience and bath in the moment. Whatever you DO. At this very moment, in worship, are you present in this sanctuary in God’s presence, open and responding to the Divine impulse leading and guiding you to greatness? Or are you thinking about lunch, judging someone in your mind, regretting something you did recently, worried about a financial matter, forming an argument in your mind to win a debate with your wife that you had right before worship? Meanwhile, the still small voice, the gentle nudge of the Holy Spirit goes unnoticed and you miss out on some blessing some ecstasy that was meant for you in this moment.
Much of the time it is not busyness, but boredom that keeps us from living the excellent moment. In our very fortunate nation, more and more people say they are bored so many hours out of the day. Boredom is dangerous. An article in Scientific American says that studies show that in binge-eating, for example, boredom is one of the most frequent triggers, along with feelings of depression and anxiety. In a study of distractibility using a driving simulator, people prone to boredom typically drove at higher speeds than other participants, took longer to respond to unexpected hazards and drifted more frequently over the center line. And in a 2003 survey, US teenagers who said that they were often bored were 50% more likely than their less-frequently bored peers to later take up smoking, drinking and illegal drugs.
You might counter, well, I am bored, because my job is boring. It sucks the life and happiness out of me. I’m left empty from my work. Well, you create your life to a great extent. We live in a day and age where the freedom and resources to create our own life are more abundant than in any other time. You are bored, unhappy, unfulfilled, empty. What are you going to do about it? John Cowper Powys wrote, “This life in itself is not passively reflected, but is something that has been half-created, as well as half-discovered, by the creative mind.” In other words, don’t let life accidentally happen to you. Take charge, and it begins by thinking on excellent things now.
The world is so fascinating and such a mystery and so full of wonder and opportunities for learning, conversation, love, friendship and even mischief. The key is never to be alive from top to toe with curiosity. Retain a boyish or girlish sense of wonder about the world.
In Memories of a Sculptor’s Wife, the story is told of Chester French who found came across his neighbor Henry David Thoreau one day near Concord, Massachusetts.
Early, one morning I went out in my field across there to the river, and there, beside that little old mud pond, was standing Da-a-vid Henry, and he wasn’t doin’ nothin ‘ but just standin’ there — lookin’ at that pond, and when I came back at noon, there he waas standin’ with his hands behind him just lookin’ dowm into that pond,- and after dinner when I come back again if there weren’t Da-a-vid standin’ there just like as if he had been there all day, gazin’ down into that pond, and I stopped and looked at him and I says, ‘Da-a-vid Henry, what air you a-doin’?’ And he didn’t turn his head and he didn’t look at me. He kept on lookin’ dovm at that pond, and he said, as if he was thinkin’ about the stars in the heavens, ‘Mr. Piurray, I’m a-studyin’ — the habits — ‘ of the bullfrogs. And there that darned fool had been standin’ — the live-long day — a-studyin ‘ — the habits — of the bullfrog.”
Find a pond of bullfrogs to study in excellence. Sit on the back porch for a moment or take a walk down the street and just marvel for a moment at the mystery that is this world, this universe. Close your eyes and marvel at the mysterious universe within you (Incidentally, we’ll be doing that in a few weeks with Silent Tuesdays).
But you don’t understand, I am trapped in the current sense of my life’s circumstances. Are you? Maybe you are bound in the moment, but few of life’s chains are permanent. What are you doing to prepare for that moment when you will be free to break out and pursue your dream? Are you willing to put in the hours, the energy, the time and the mental and emotional strength in this moment and the next and the next until your door opens. Your door will open. And it often opens much faster if you put in the work now. If whatever you DO [now, in the moment] you do for the glory of God. Excellence is its own reward. Self-culture is its own prize. You find that there is an infinite subtlety to the world that is fascinating, and, better still, it is free to take in. Better still, in those observations and experiences we can discover more of God and grow in relationship with God. John Cowper Powys wrote, “The art of self-culture begins with a deeper awareness … of the marvel of our being alive at all; alive in a world as startling and mysterious, as lovely and horrible, as the one we live in.” Nathaniel Hawthorne called it “an intercourse with the world,” where one is constantly engaging and taking in the world with the soul, not just the analytical mind or the emotions.
The balance, it seems, is living in gratitude with a mind toward excellence in the present moment, fortifying oneself for the future, with the expectation that your efforts, a reward in and of themselves, will also prove fruitful in the future. But, regardless, the joy and the reward was in the moment. When the Apostle Paul said, “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus,” he wasn’t calling us to be naïve about our lives. Life is difficult and full of disappointments and pain. But the fact remains, “You have one life, buster, what are you doing with it?” Let the Lord, let others and let you find you being and becoming the best you that you can be. This drive to self-culture, to excellence, for the glory of the Lord, is in then end life’s greatest reward.
Email this post