The Seasons of Life
Remember the classic movie Footloose? Aside from the amazing music, incredible dancing, and the acting genius of Kevin Bacon (who played Ren McCormick), this film from the 80s had many powerful messages.
For those who did not see it, or can't remember if they did or not, the story is about a big city high school boy who moved to a small town to live with his aunt and uncle’s family. The town experienced a tragedy a few years before that resulted in the passing of a law outlawing loud music and dancing!!
When he found out about this law, Ren felt this small town – and his confining situation – becoming even more oppressive as the one thing in the world that he loved more than anything – dancing – was taken from him. But his love of dancing was so strong that he was compelled to launch a campaign to reverse the law and bring the gift of dancing back to the town.
In the pivotal scene in the move, Ren presented to the city council a proposal to allow the high school seniors to have a final class dance. The following was read to the members of the council . . .
1 There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:
2 a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, 3 a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, 4 a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, 5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, 6 a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, 7 a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, 8 a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.
Eccleasties 3:1-8
We all go through different seasons in our lives. This is the nature of things. And while we cannot change the seasons, there are keys to living with success through those seasons . . .
First, we can seek discernment to know the season that we are currently in and embrace all that season has to give and grow in us.
Second, we need to realize that we have the ability to choose how we will live each season of our lives. Third, we have choices to make as we are going through different seasons on how we will behave. Will we live in defeat or will be choose optimism for the future ahead?
One of the unique riches in life is that we are all at different points yet we share this same moment together. Our situations may be different, but we all have the ability to choose what we are going to do with this day. We all have 86,400 seconds in each day . . . What are you going to do with yours?
Live your Life of Purpose with Passion!
Dr. Jason