Experiences: Past, Present and Future

   On Wednesday of this week we experienced the glories of the Interstate Highway system as we drove to Charlotte, NC.

   On Thursday we experienced the graduation of our grand daughter.

   On Friday we got to experience the backroads of South Carolina as we drove home down Highway 321 going through Norway, Denmark and Sweden, all on one stretch of road, a story for another time.

   Is there a common thread? Sure, it is the experiences.

   I found a quote in an article about a professor at UT Knoxville (my Alma Mater) where he refers to something his dad often told him. "God does not waste any experiences. Every experience is useful; everything connects".

   We may waste the wisdom that comes from the experiences of our lives, but they are there for us, placed there by a God who cares.

   An Aside: I have been going through the Sermon on the Mount, reading and writing about various passages included in Matthew 5,6 and 7 and the word most used in the first of these chapters is "Blessed". When I think of being blessed, I think of my experiences over the past 56 years of marriage to a great lady. Today is our anniversary, and I salute her for her perseverance and faithful forgiveness. Our experiences together make my life.

   But, I digress. I thought Thursday, at the graduation, of all the experiences that had come into the life of this girl who was graduating, and her brother who had done the same thing 3 years before. Not only was she leaving the school that her parents founded some years back, but so much of her life was bound up in the experiences she had at that place.

   Now she moves on, and, if her life runs a "normal" course, she will have way more experiences in the future than she has had up to this point. Experiences placed there by a loving God who wants the best for her. Experiences not to just have been lived through, but looked back on at some point as guideposts to Life with the realization of what they meant and continue to mean for her.

   So I salute Sydney and pray for her as her experiences take a new turn.

   And I salute her parents who have raised a beautiful young woman.

   Ane her brother, a rising senior at his college, who is not too busy to sit and talk with his Granny Lou.

   And I wonder if they are talking about the past, present or future, or all three.