LIVIN’ THE DREAM

After watching some of the PGA on TV this weekend, I realized how hard it is to repeat on a weekly basis to win tournaments. But what is even harder is to repeat the same tournament a number of times. Steve Stricker was the favorite this week at the John Deere Classic. He was looking at win number four of the same tournament and he realized how difficult it would be. It has only been done four times and Tiger Woods had done it twice. I was surprised that I didn’t see Jack Nicholas on that list. It seemed to be the “ol’ announcer curse”. Seems when the announcers start mentioning records, it usually doesn’t happen.

As I have practiced for many years now, I realize that I will never be good enough to play on the tour. Of course it was never my dream to play on the tour growing up, I wanted to be in the NFL, and once I became a teenager, my dream changed and I dreamed of being a professional motocross rider, but that never happened either. All of these things I loved, but didn’t have the “stuff”. I started golf in my late 30’s, so it gets even tougher.

The problem was that I knew what I was called to do, but I turned the opposite direction in college. I wanted to be a high school teacher and football coach. All though I wasn’t thrilled about going to school as a teenager, I always wanted to come back and teach. I know, odd, but that is sometimes how our lives work. I was influenced by the baseball coach that I played racquet ball with at Jr. College. He had taken an interest in me and asked me what I was at college for and I told him I wanted to teach and coach. He said, “Why do you want to do that…there’s no money in this job, start your own business”.  He was in his 50’s so I thought he should know, so I changed my thinking.

Knowing what you are called to do vocationally, or what you are shaped to do is an elusive reality for most of us. I knew what I wanted to do but let an outside influence change that. Now I am not blaming that coach for that, but it did have an effect on my decision to teach. I began my journey through different jobs and eventually started my own retail business. I had a passion for stereo equipment and in 1983 I started working for a large retail outlet and began learning the business. In 1992 I began my own business and by 1997 I decided how much I hated it. In 1996 I began volunteering at our church with the youth so I could spend time with my oldest daughter. The ironic thing that unfolded here was, I eventually began teaching and coaching high school students.

I have a question for you…what is your dream? I have totally shifted my thinking around to get in line with God’s will for my particular skill sets. And guess what, I’m 53 years young. There are numbers of people changing careers at even older ages than myself. I think that is exciting and scary at the same time. Many of the men in the bible started their ministry at late ages in their lives. Heck Moses was 80 when he started and that’s just one out of many. I am finding out at my age that it’s never too late, maybe just a little older.

I believe that God puts dreams in our hearts because He created us for things in advance ( Ephesians 2:10” For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do”) He has shaped us to do them. The most important thing we can do in our vocation is do what we were meant to do. It will bring joy to our lives and more importantly, others!