Reminiscing

 As we get older, I think many of us begin to think more about times past and gone, and a little less about the future.  I think that’s normal, and is not in any way weird or out of the ordinary.  We especially think about events and times in our lives which at the time may have seemed like nothing, but in hindsight were pivotal in some way or another…a chance encounter with someone…our decision to go to work for this person or that company…our move to a certain neighborhood or city…the subjects we studied in school, or any number of other decisions and events that have come our way in life in times past.

More often than we’d like to think, those things that seemed trivial and of no importance ended up being of great importance in life.  Perhaps one day we decided to take an alternate route into work and something happened that would not have happened otherwise which gave us a new direction in life.  Maybe we made the decision to get some minor medical issue checked out, which turned into finding out about a serious condition that had just begun and could be easily treated.  Or we could have made a phone call, applied for a certain job, sent an email, or done one of any number of things which, although they seemed routine, in their own way caused a great shift in our trajectory in life.  And we tend as we get older, I think, to put some of these seemingly random and trivial events into some kind of story which results in our being who and what we are today.

As you’ve probably guessed by now, in my mind I’ve been doing that kind of “putting together” of those seemingly random events over the past few years.  I sometimes find myself awake at an odd hour of the night putting events and happenings together from my past that make sense now, but then were just random things that occurred.  It’s utterly amazing that if any one of thousands of decisions and events of past life had occurred differently, in all probability I would not be where I am today, and would not be with the woman who is my wife today.  I would have different friends.  My relationship with my family would be different.  I would have different children and grandchildren…or perhaps none at all.  I might well be living in a different place, doing something different, or perhaps would already be dead and gone.  It’s really mind-numbing to plumb through even one aspect of one’s past, connecting the dots of various events and decisions, and realizing the incredible significance of that decision or that certain event as it pertains to who and what I now am.

In looking at all of this, I am left with a question that countless people have asked before me and will continue to ask as time goes on.  Did all of these things happen randomly, and just happen to work out the way they did?  Or has there been some force or intelligence behind it all, encouraging, leading, and guiding these things?  Is there some grand scheme for my life, and for the lives of everyone else, or are we just playing with random chance in life?

I confess I don’t know with certainty that there is an answer to those questions…at least an answer that we can understand, comprehend, and prove.  It seems so unlikely that all of these events, situations, and decisions in my life could have been sheer chance; yet it is equally unfathomable that chance could possibly have brought me to the place where I am today.

Chance is just that…chance.  There is no intelligence in chance.  Chance has no mind…chance has no thoughts…chance has no motives.  There is no overriding purpose in chance.  There is no morality or sense of “oughtness” in chance.  Chance is incapable of being concerned with the individual, cannot validate the individual as something of value, or long for the good of an individual…or for the world for that matter.

Yet to consider a being…God, if you will…who orchestrates, nudges, encourages, plans, leads, and loves individuals to the extent that at least some of what occurs in life does so at His bidding, is equally unfathomable and unexplainable.

I would think, however, that the truth has to be one of those two situations…either sheer chance or a god-like being who operates within the universal order, but is not part of that universal order.

As a practicing Christian, I choose to believe in the God of Noah, Abraham, Jacob, David, Peter, Paul, and the others I find in the Holy Bible.  I don’t, in that belief, pretend to understand how He works in my life and in the lives of others.  Nor do I believe that literally every move I make is somehow orchestrated by Him and I am no more than a puppet on strings doing his bidding.  But I can’t even remotely begin to fathom the idea of chance bringing me to where I am now…that would, in my opinion, require much more faith on my part than believing in the God of the Universe.

I don’t know about you.  You may not do much “reminiscing,” about things of the past.  Or maybe you do.  Nor do I know whether you believe in chance or in a supreme being who is living and active in the world and in your life.  I would ask you, however, to carefully consider the evidence…consider your life…your history…and the role that chance may have played in it…or that God may have played in it.

I think if you’re thinking reasonably and rationally, you’ll come to much the same conclusion as I have…that there indeed is a God who is living, active, and works in the world and in the lives of his people, including me and you.

 

Blessings.