Friday Nights

I'm not good at being smart.

More than once in my life I have had people call me smart. I have even had people say that I am one of the smartest people they know. 

I don't feel smart. I don't even feel average. There are plenty of times when I feel dumb. I feel really dumb. I feel like I am failing at everything I do. 

This is not a "pity me, plea." I just know a little bit of how big the world actually is at the present time. I know how little I know right now. 

The world is a big place. I am a small person. I am small in my emotional responses. I am small in my ability to figure everything out. I am small in terms of my ability to respond to other people. I am small in terms of my impact. I wish I weren't. 

I wish I had a huge impact. I wish I had could speak on huge stages with huge online impact. I wish I could measure my market share and do things that made a difference in the world. 

I don't think I'm alone in feeling this way. I feel like I want to make a difference in the world.

It's not like I don't try. I know people from  a broad spectrum of beliefs and experiences. I have lived in urban and rural areas. I am not completely inarticulate or lazy. I like to speak. I like to share stories. But I am not having the type of impact I wish I could have. 

Life is not what we expect it to be. Everyone experiences different things and looks outside themselves for validation. I am not alone in this expectation. I am a social animal after all.

Tonight I enjoyed pizza and games with my boys and it was glorious. Really. I enjoyed it and didn't think about anything else. I read a quote this week about making disciples. For a second, I thought about how I wished I could be making tons of disciples. Then, I realized I was trying to share my faith in several venues. It wasn't as if I was being disobedient. The main place I can see growth and change is with my boys. This area is hard. My boys see the bad in me. They see my depression. They see my love for my wife. They see me struggle. And laugh. 

Friday night is a family night. Not religiously, but whenever possible. It's also a good chance to make disciples. Not of me, but of Jesus.

Tonight, after reading from the Psalms and Harry Potter, I prayed with my boys. They got it. I think. I'm not always sure they get it. But tonight, I think they got it. Love God, love people, trust God. God is so much bigger than what they think. It's also okay for God to be mysterious and different and completely other. It's okay to trust. And love. And just enjoy a family night. 

Friday nights at home are good. Seek good. Seek love. Seek the Lord. 

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