Statistics
suggest I'm midway through this thing called life. Sure, I could live to be
100; then again, I could get hit by a car tomorrow. All things being equal, I'm
at half-time, and I've watched enough sports to know that there's a whole lot
of game left in the second half. Although my first half seemed dismal, my
outlook on the second half is miraculously bright.
Everyone
has a story. I've decided to tell a little bit about my story, not because it
may be any more interesting than anyone else's; rather, I'm compelled that my
having some hope for finding meaning in life might inspire someone who may have
gone through similar circumstances that their lives are still worth living,
too.
I say
"a little bit," because I'm not particularly proud of all of it,
especially the parts that highlight how stupid I've been. I've read
autobiographies and found it humorous that a person could write an entire book
in which he was always "the good guy" and everyone around him was
bad, wrong, etc., especially when in reading other historical works on people
surrounding that person, the "other side of the story" is quite in
contrast. I'm certainly not interested in subjecting anyone to a similar
treatment or convenient interpretation of my life, and those who know me know I'm not perfect, not by a long shot. Enough said.
I'm
working on my theological opus, The Gospel According to Duane, which doesn't
even have a chapter outline yet. My life story makes more sense as a component
of that work, because one of my key understandings is that the gospel is
powerful as it impacts real lives in a customized way - this is part of the
explanation for why there is no book in the Bible called "The Gospel
According to....Jesus." We might have thought, "if his words were so
important, why didn't he just write them down himself so we'd have no confusion
over what he was saying?" I say that the words are almost meaningless
until they impact a real life; thus, we have a guy named Matthew telling us
what the gospel meant to him in the gospel according to Matthew; and a guy
named Luke telling us what the gospel meant to him, in the gospel according to
Luke, etc. Tune in for the long form of this thought in the book.
Preamble done - thanks for getting this far. Now, let's talk about the bird. Why is the penguin my OughtThoughts.com mascot?
There are
a couple of versions of the parable of the talents, one in Matthew and one in
Luke. While there are differences worth penetrating, the gist of both are
similar - God gives us talents or "gifts", and with the gifts we are
given we are to make meaningful contributions that derive achievement - not
material acquisition, but that through the sharing of our gifts we make things
better. One of the issues in the gospel treatment for one particular fellow is
that he had fewer gifts than others around him. Feeling hard done by, he did
not invest his gifts in such a way that his master, upon returning, might
appropriate his "usury" (interest, growth). The master is not happy
with his servant's poor stewardship and holds him accountable for his lack of
production. That he had fewer gifts than others was no excuse, for indeed his
only responsibility was to grow what he had, with no comparison to what others
had; alas, he had been distracted from what was most important, and failed to
do what he could with what he had.
In analyzing this
parable, some might suggest that the poor fellow should not have seen his fewer
gifts as negative at all - he had less because he actually had more talent than
the others, and was capable of doing more with less; thus the few gifts were
actually a compliment to his immense talent. Others would posit that the gifts
were irrelevant, and that his responsibility was to do his best in faith that
miraculous help would amplify his sincere efforts, so that achievement would go
on record as that magical mingling of the human and the divine, like the
Jericho walls crumbling, not by jackhammers, but by the sound of trumpets.

And then I saw a penguin. Essentially, for the
first time.
A penguin is a bird that can't fly. What is a bird
that can't fly? Flying is what birds do. Fish swim. Bees sting. Dogs bark.
Birds fly.
I imagined a penguin, hanging out with his other
bird friends - the eagle, the albatross, the falcon...feeling left out (yes, I
know these birds do not occupy the same environments, and there are other birds
who also don't fly, but stick with me here, I'm getting somewhere with this...)
And I imagined him looking at his reflection in the
water and cursing his useless wings. "Why, oh why," he yells at the
sky, "would you give me wings if I can't fly?" A quiet, patient voice
replies, "I'm God, and yes, I gave you wings, and yes, you can't fly...think about it."

"Perhaps," he thinks, "if the sky is
not my realm and air is not my medium, then maybe the sea is the place to be,
and water is my element." So, with a big breath, he dives in. And soars.
Underwater.
The next day, while hanging out with his buddies -
the eagle, the albatross, the falcon... he chuckles to himself. They wonder "What's
with you today? Why so uncharacteristically chipper?" to which the
penguin replies "Y'all think you're special because you can fly. You're
birds, birds fly, big deal. You guys are all the same, but me? I can swim."

If the penguin can do it, so can I.
And so can you. Have you found your element? Are you soaring at being you?
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