One Life to Live

I especially have one particular flaw that surfaces from time to time - especially around birthdays and special occasions - that life just goes too fast and I do not deal well with that. I am not even very old and almost every birthday I have a midlife crisis! (After all, who knows when midlife is for each of us? I guess I just try to be on the safe side and freak out every year, just in case.)  Sometimes I just look around and realize everything is completely different than it was even a year ago.  I lost my uncle to a quick and terrible bout of cancer, 
I moved across the country, started an M. Div. at a new school, lost and made some new friends, am living away from my family for the first time, became ordained, have a new dog, and am finally doing better with my stomach problems. Most of that was unseen this time last year! I worry that I am going to list a life with impoverished experiences, that I will not be able to fulfill my goals and dreams, that I will live an average life, and that I will lose people I love to distance or death. (Some thoughts are more ridiculous than others are. I distinctly remember stressing out that I hadn't slept in the desserts of Morocco with Bedouins yet, climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro -which I don't even climb mountains, received my Ph. D, read every classic book, learned to play the piano, or revolutionized the world of women's ministry in the Christian Church by publishing Bible studies that are actually well-researched and not just craziness, and so on and so on.) 


My wonderful husband, however, once again reminded me how contrary this is to the faith I proclaim.  It is in fact only through the faith I possess that I am actually able to live fully and to live beyond the base ideas of what a "good" life are. It is only by living completely sold out on the idea of the God of Love and the Grace of Christ that I am able to live a life that means much of anything in the end.

I heard a great story today on the two men who started Alcoholics Anonymous in the 1930's. To this day the first Sunday of every June, hundreds and thousands of people gather at their gravesites to remember and thank these men who lived their lives completely sold out for God and have saved so many from alcoholism. One woman who they interviewed said that her son was in AA. She said she gave birth to him around 30 years ago, but that AA gave him life again last year. She began to weep uncontrollably (I was as well at this point). What a beautiful legacy to leave!