when you're green...

well my dear ones,

A good long time ago, back when I was a teen,

I worked in my uncle's shop.

My uncle had been an auto mechanic,

who one day decided to start his own business

and open up a lawnmower repair place.

My aunt cried, and said they'd starve;

but eventually he expanded into tractors,

chain saws, and the like

and ran a pretty successful

power equipment business.

My uncle was a tough business man;

he worked really hard,

but he played hard, too.

And he tried to make the coffee breaks

at his shop a time of teachable moments

for his son and me and a crew of other

young guys in whom he tried to instill

some of the life lessons he'd learned.

Basically,

he was trying to do the Ben Franklin thing,

and get us to skip over a lot of our own

mistakes by learning from his.

I can't say it always worked out,

at least not in my own case,

yet I did learn a thing or two

that stuck with me over the years.

One thing he must have said 100 times was,

"When you're green you're growing;

 when you're ripe, you're rotting."

I've held onto that down through the years,

and I believe I see what he was saying.

I've seen plenty of people,

even the chronologically young,

become old and jaded

when they stagnate,

when they say to themselves,

"OK, this is it; this is all I will ever be."

It's very easy to fall into that trap,

that mindset,

and limit ourselves and our future possibilities.

Yet the God who created all things

is a God of infinite possibilities;

in the eyes of God,

we have infinite worth;

and we weren't made for mediocrity,

but to strive for excellence.

So if you feel like you're stagnating,

ask God to show you a bigger plan for your life.

The best way to stay green

is to realize that our best days

are yet to come.

Have a great week!

grace, peace, and love to you,


dave