Excerpt from Philippians 3:4b-14

" . . . forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead . . ."

Reflection by Christina Villa

Energy Maburutse, a 21-year old from Zimbabwe, has the greatest name for someone who has never been able to take one step on his own.  Born with a severely crippling bone disease in a rural Zimbabwean village where wheelchairs were unheard of and his mother carried him everywhere, Energy is now a college freshman in the U.S.  You can read the full story by New York Times columnist Frank Bruni here.  "His is a miserable story that became a miraculous one," says Bruni.

If ever there were a story to make you aware of how many blessings you take for granted, this is it.  But it's also a story about breaking free of the grip of the past and memories of deprivation and obstacles thrown your way. You are more than the sum of what's happened to you so far. You are also what could happen to you in the future, the sum of your hopes and aspirations.

Truly, the only way to “strain forward to what's ahead” is to "forget what lies behind."  Dwelling on the defeats and disappointments of the past guarantees you'll have a fine, discerning eye for disappointments to come—and partial blindness to anything else.

Few of us are ever going to experience anything like the misery to miracle transformation of our lives that Energy Maburutse has.  But that's only because we started out with a lot less misery and require a much smaller miracle. A small miracle is good enough, though.  Imagine being like Energy as Frank Bruni describes him at the end of his column.  "I asked him if anything about his new life disappointed him. He stared blankly at me. To him, the question made no sense whatsoever."

Prayer

Let us value life so much that disappointment makes no sense.  Amen.

About the Author Christina Villa is on the staff of the United Church of Christ in Cleveland, Ohio.

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