Passion

Yesterday at church, Andrew Smith did a great job of explaining the importance of passion in our lives. This is a subject that is near and dear to my heart. I love to see people passionate about what they do. I love to see people chasing their passions.

Andrew had a large, ordinary looking flower pot sitting on the table next to him. Throughout the service, I kept wondering what he was going to do with it.

He finally went over to the pot and explained that the pot was just like us. Sometimes we can feel like we are going through the motions and we can feel just like an empty pot sitting on a table.

He then pulled out some flowers and some potting soil and began to transfer the flowers to the pot, transforming this plain, ordinary pot into a beautiful thing.

As soon as the flowers found their new home in the pot, Andrew explained that the pot was fulfilling its purpose. Cool stuff.

He concluded the service by challenging us to chase down our passions, even if it meant being impractical. That hit me hard. I realized that I had not been encouraging my daughter Molly to chase her dreams.

She dreams of working in the music industry somewhere because she really is passionate about music. I haven’t discouraged her from this but I haven’t been overly enthusiastic about it either. You see, I’m a pretty practical kind of guy and working in the music industry sounds anything but practical.

When we got home, I told Molly that I really want her to chase her dreams and her passions. I told her I want her to continue pursuing the music thing but I want her to look for ways to do something for God while doing it. I apologized for not supporting her more. I think she was appreciative of this. Hopefully, this will be a lesson I can hang onto.