Vacation

Everybody's probably seen National Lampoon's Vacation, right? If you haven't, you should. It's a classic. It's a movie about a stereotypical family on a stereotypical vacation doing stereotypical things. Probably a little far from reality but still, it hits home about all the things that can go wrong on a vacation.

My wife and I just returned from a one-week vacation to Asheville, NC. What a great trip! But there were a few things that went wrong. For example, you should have seen the look on my wife's face when she realized she had left her favorite pajamas back at the last hotel. I'm sure it matched the look on MY face when I realized the same thing about my phone charger.

Things always happen on vacations that we'd just as soon forget but as long as we can look back on them and laugh we're pretty much okay.

Another thing I have noticed about vacations is that we always look forward to taking them and we always enjoy coming back home to our comfortable beds and surroundings. I feel recharged today after my vacation . . . after returning home to MY comfy bed.

Another thing about vacations is we sometimes discover, upon our return, that we really need a different job. We never realized how much our current job is sucking the life out of us spiritually. That being said, vacations can suck the spiritual lives out of us as well. Always on the go, trying to get to somewhere else. And isn't that the problem?

Each of us has been designed for a purpose . . . a certain calling in life. Many of us miss that calling and end up doing something else to fill our time and our bank accounts. But is it what GOD wants us to be doing?

I am at the end of my career. Retirement is around the corner for me. Soon I WILL be doing something else. I look forward to that day. But I also must be cautious so my days do not become filled with things and activities that are not God-honoring. THAT, I think, is what we have been called to do - make God-honoring decisions, make God-honoring actions, in whatever we do, wherever we are. That is how we can please God and isn't that why we are here?

Each of us must answer the question, "How can I best serve God ?" no matter what we find ourselves doing. How will I answer? How will you?

"12 Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. 14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. 15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. 16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. 17 And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him." = Colossians 3:12-17

Holiday Road - Lindsey Buckingham