“There are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last.” – Luke 13:30 

The season opener is fast approaching when my beloved alma mater Texas Longhorns will face last year’s national championship team, the Ohio State Buckeyes, forthcoming the end of this month.  I can already feel my competitive spirit rising, my heart beating a little faster, that renewed hope that this might be our year, our turn to be in first place, to finish as top dog.  And I love being top dog, don’t you?

Except, I’ve also always had a great heart for the underdog.  It is what I love so much about college football season, that on any given weekend there are inevitably upsets where the underdog team unexpectedly triumphs over a stronger rival.  We’re all like that I think, we love to cheer for the underdog, unless of course it is our team on the wrong end of the upset.  It’s the reason I have watched the movie Hoosiers dozens of times over the years since its release in 1986, the great story about a tiny farming town in Indiana whose high school basketball team defied all odds to win the state championship.

Which is more important, I sometimes wonder, top dog or underdog?  I’ve been observing my granddaughter’s school volleyball team the past few years rise from being rank beginners who were lucky to return a volley, much less win a game, to developing into a team to be reckoned with – from underdog to top dog.  Yet, they haven’t been top dog long enough to forget where they came from, maintaining some sense of humility – so far at least.

Jesus made a point of emphasizing to his disciples that “there are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last.”  That is, you may become top dog, but beware that you are never too big to fail.  As for the underdogs, keep working hard, doing the right things, caring for your neighbors and community, loving God and each other, while maintaining a spirit of hope and a sense of humility.  Who knows, the day may come when you move up from underdog to top dog.  Just don’t forget where you came from, and how you got there.

Life is like that I think.  We may be underdog one day and top dog the next.  Which one really doesn’t matter, rather it’s our attitude towards it that determines our place in line.

“But the meek will inherit the land.”  – Psalm 37:11 

True or false: the one who dies with the most toys wins.  Or how about the one who has the most money wins?  What about the one who is the most brilliant and has the most advanced degrees, or the one who has reached the highest level in his or her organization, the one who has traveled the most, has the most beautiful wife or debonair husband, the best athlete, the most talented artist or musician, has won the most awards, become the most famous or the most powerful?  In the end who wins?  It’s a trick question, as you have probably figured out already, and the answer, as you might expect, is none of the above.  The question remains, though, who does win in the end?

King Solomon himself, arguably the wisest and richest man who ever lived, wrestled with this great philosophical question centuries ago, a man who had everything and indulged in almost every sensual experience we can imagine.  Yet, toward the end of his life he came to the conclusion that nothing – I mean nothing – on this earth can fully satisfy a human’s desire for complete fulfillment.  “Meaningless! . . . Utterly meaningless!” he declared in his essay we know as the Book of Ecclesiastes.  “Everything is meaningless . . . a chasing after the wind.”

Alcoholics, it has been described, are not people who drink too much; rather people who can never drink enough because their thirst for alcohol – their addiction – can never be satisfied.  So it is with every earthly desire, as Solomon learned from experience, for no matter how much we have it is never enough.  Our thirst for fulfillment, as alcohol is for an alcoholic, is never satisfied no matter how much we gain, attain, or accomplish.

So, in the end who wins?  If it is not the one with the most toys or the most money, the most brilliant with the most degrees on the wall, the CEOs, star athletes, the rich and powerful, who is it then?  This may come as a shock, but scripture tells us it the meek.  “The meek will inherit the land,” the Psalmist wrote, which Jesus later affirmed when He said that “they [the meek] will inherit the earth.”  By meek, does he mean the weak who cower in the corner?  No, not the weak but the strong, the courageous ones with the heart and humility to love and serve others without regard for oneself.  Yes, it’s the meek, of all people, who wind up being the real winners.  Shocking, isn’t it?

“Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others.” – 1 Peter 4:10 

“A five-year-old piano prodigy from Los Angeles has made history by becoming one of the youngest to ever perform at Carnegie Hall in New York City,” reported ABC News recently on its evening news broadcast.  “Alec [Van Khajadourian],” they when on to say, “started to learn to play the piano when he was just learning to walk.”  Many a toddler has been known to bang on the piano keys from time to time, but to perform complex classical music at age five?  That, we must all agree, is a God-given gift.

Rare are those who are born with such natural talents, whether musical, artistic, athletic, academic, or something else.  Unfortunately, for many people with such extraordinary talents, they tend to believe they have the right to use them however they please, for their own pleasure and glorification.  Then there are those of us – that would be most of us I assume – who were not endowed with such grand abilities as young Alec.  And unfortunately for us, we either spend our lives believing we have no type of talent at all, or else we keep hoping to discover some hidden talent, thus sometimes wasting precious years searching for what it might be.

Call me guilty as charged on all counts, as I suppose I’ve committed them all in one way or another.  While it was obvious at an early age that I was no child prodigy, to the point I have questioned whether I had any sorts of gifts or talents whatsoever.  Yet, I have also experienced enough successes during my life journey to cause me to become a little too full of myself, believing I had the right to indulge myself however I pleased, that I had earned it by the sweat of my brow giving no credit to any God-given talents.  I am sure I am not the only one who has suffered self-doubts at times, and at other times over-indulging in self-gratification.

Who among us has not dreamed of having some great talent, to run fast or jump high, to solve complex math problems in our head, to transform a blank canvas into a masterpiece, or perform music perfectly and effortlessly?  Oh, but we do, each of us in our own unique ways, maybe not as obvious as that of a great musician, athlete, or artist, but God-given nonetheless.  But for what, young Alec must one day ask himself – as do we all?  “Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others.”

“Simply let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes’, and your ‘No’, ‘No’.”  – Matthew 5:37 

The word “dedication” has been on my mind recently, which reminded me of my late brother-in-law Chuck who worked for IBM for I don’t know how many years – forty maybe? – before he retired.  To give you an idea, he went to work there after serving in the Navy back when IBM’s hottest selling consumer product was electric typewriters.  Anyone old enough to remember those contraptions?  Obviously, to have been there that long Chuck grew beyond the electric typewriters’ obsolescence, learning new products and gaining bigger promotions.  The one thing about Chuck that didn’t change, though, was his dedication to IBM.  In fact, the way he spoke so fondly of his employer, even after his retirement, caused me to suspect the blood in his veins must be IBM blue.

That is not to say Chuck’s dedication came from some sort of blind loyalty.  I doubt he would have been nearly as dedicated had IBM not been equally as dedicated to taking care of its own – works both ways.  Yet, I also know that dedication to keeping one’s commitments was one of Chuck’s core values.  It came through in other ways he lived his life, his dedication to his family, his marriage to my sister-in-law, his community, and work he took on after retirement whether paid or volunteer.

Dedication has to do with keeping our commitments, doing what we say we’re going to do when we say we’re going to do it.  It is about our word being our bond.  We live in an age of written contracts, often containing pages of fine print covering minute details.  Yet, how many contracts still wind up in dispute, leading to lawsuits, broken relationships, broken dreams, and sometimes broken hearts?  Such would not be the case if more were dedicated to keeping their commitments.

Jesus breaks it down this way, “Simply let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes’, and your ‘No’, ‘No’.”  Imagine if that were a deeper core value in our society, how lawsuit liabilities would be reduced, divorce rates decline, the economic impact it would have on such things as insurance rates, and the price of goods and services, and ultimately more trusting relationships with our fellow human beings.  What if we could all be more dedicated, keeping our commitments in our jobs, with our spouses and families and communities?  It’s up to us to get the ball rolling.  “Simply let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes’, and your ‘No’, ‘No’.”

“Seek good, not evil, that you may live.”  – Amos 5:14 

During a recent routine checkup my long-time physician after glancing at my chart looked up and jokingly remarked that I had reached the exact age of average life expectancy for men in America.  (Oh, gee, thanks Doc, just what I wanted to be reminded of!)  I suppose that means in just a few short months, on my next birthday – assuming I make it – I will have beaten the odds.  (Whoopee!)  Simultaneously, I find myself wrestling with my emotions over the fact that our two oldest granddaughters who are entering their senior years of high school, will in just a few short months, this coming spring, be graduating, that great right-of-passage into adulthood.

Seems we are sort of bookends on the timeline of life, my granddaughters and me.  And if that sounds a bit melancholy on my part nothing could be further from the truth.  Yes, I miss that they will not be little girls anymore, but they’ve long outgrown that anyway.  Neither is aging of particular concern to me as I have found this in many ways to be the most fulfilling season of life so far.  Yes, in my case some of that can be attributed to good fortune – reasonably good health, financial comfort, a long happy marriage, and the fine family we have blessed with, including our five beautiful granddaughters.  But true fulfillment has little to do with good fortune, I have learned, otherwise why do so many who have attained good fortune, much greater than mine, seem unfulfilled, while others who have suffered misfortunes of all sorts seem extraordinarily fulfilled?

It is the secret to life, it seems to me, that God is trying to get across to us throughout the scriptures.  “Seek good, not evil,” wrote the prophet Amos, “that you may live.”  I don’t think the Prophet was warning about Santa Claus coming to town, that if we are good little girls and boys we get presents, but if we are bad we are apt to get zapped.  I think what he really means is by seeking out the good we will discover a truly fulfilling life, something Jesus was crystal clear about when He said, “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”  And I don’t think he meant life filled with good fortune as we think of it from a worldly perspective, rather a life filled with an indescribable joy.

If I can somehow convey that one lesson to my grandchildren as I live out my days, then my life will have been lived to the “full”, that one day – someday – so may theirs be.