REALLY LIVING
by Pastor Rick
Sams
Ask 100 people what "really living is and you�ll get
100 different answers. Tuesday March 25th is the day my mother experienced
real living in exponential terms, the kind of "real life Paul describes in
2 Corinthians 4:16-5:5 "Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly
we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our
light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far
outweighs them all…Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed,
we have a building from God…we do not wish to be unclothed, but to be clothed
with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by [real]
life. The younger we are, the more we define "really living by
activities that take lots of money or energy. But as we mature we define
it differently.
It�s then we see living involves loving relationships
and enduring values. God�s goal for us is that we also begin to define
real life in terms of "eternal values, like in the Scripture
above.
As of last Tuesday my mother doesn�t have to drag around a body
that diminishes her life. No longer does she have the anxieties that
plagued her soul. Now she�s really living.
For reasons that the
best medical experts still can�t explain, my mother stopped enjoying life five
years ago. Before that she really knew how to live. Simple pleasures
made her do a little jig of joy that made us laugh. Her children,
grandchildren and friends lit up her life. Her energy level was off the
charts. She often finished a day�s work before I was out of bed.
(And no teasing about how late ministers get up!). She helped shingle my
roof when she was 77. Cooking and feeding people was not work, but
play.
Robert Fulghum wrote that everything he learned was in
kindergarten. Not me. Most of the valuable things about really
living I learned from my mother.
She didn�t write that "The man who
enjoys his work has never worked a day in his life, but she could
have. She taught me the pleasures work and simple things like home, family
and friends. She, along with dad, taught me about Jesus.
Surely she
had her idiosyncrasies, and the last five years have not been good. But
now, thank God, that has all "been swallowed up by what is truly
life.