I am not just shadowboxing

“What do you want to be when you grow up?” Why do adults always ask this question to little kids who are clearly going to change their minds plenty of times throughout their lives? Is it because we want little kids to plan out their entire lives? Or because we want them to build dreams? Why would we want them to have dreams?

I think asking kids this question is an empowering thing. It allows them to think about living a life with purpose. As kids get older, most of their answers to that question become more realistic. I know mine did. I once had dreams of being an astronaut (I despise math and am not good at science). I once had dreams of being a famous ballerina (I did ballet for 7 years and still have terrible balance). And now I am pursuing a business degree.

Here’s the thing though. It’s not what you do. It’s why you do what you do.

I’ll never forget Ron Quigley. When I was growing up, there were some Saturdays my siblings and I spent folding and stuffing church bulletins for Sunday services (Part of the territory that comes with being a pastor’s kid). I loved those Saturdays because my brother and sister and I would take little breaks and run around the church as if we owned it. We’d pretend it was our house and figure out what every room should be. My brother would always take the best spot of course, but we found some other pretty cool places…anyways…Ron Quigley. Part of spending Saturday at the church included running into Ron. He was an older guy. He was the church janitor. There was a part of me that always felt a little bad for him for cleaning up other people’s messes. I knew he technically got paid for his work, but it was gross. I wouldn’t want to clean up the stuff he did. I always thought he was the church janitor because he couldn’t find a better job. That was probably it. He had this caring heart that I could see and I just always wondered why he would clean a church. Surly he could have a better job if he wanted. Maybe he didn’t want…One Saturday I asked him why he cleaned the church and he said “I work for the Lord”. It wasn’t what he was doing. His diligence and servant heart came from God. It was how he did what he did.

Ron cleaned the church because it was his mission field.

In the same way, I am a business student because I believe my mission field is in the business world. I enjoy the management systems, human theories, and marketing techniques I get to study. I enjoy learning about ethics (and I hate it because of all the unethical stuff I have to hear about). Studying ethics has really shaped me as a person. I’m a business student because I like the “boring stuff” (boring stuff- accounting) that many people don’t enjoy. I’m a business student because I like people. I’m a business student because I live in a world that needs God and I, imperfectly, want to reflect Him in a place that people are challenged to be ethical. I aspire to be honest and to speak kindly and be quick to listen. That’s the person I ask God to help me be.

It bothered me one day when a student discovered that I have these desires to reflect God in my life. He was excited about a couple discussions we had about God and asked me why I wasn’t a ministry major. I asked him why he thought I should be a ministry major. He said that I thought on a deeper level than some people. I didn’t like that, at all. I didn’t like that because that is not how God created us to be. He made us ALL to be in relationship with Him. He made us to seek Him. We all should be aspiring to walk closer with the Lord. No matter where we are serving.

Mumford and Sons wrote a song, “Awake my Soul”. My favorite line from the song says “The way we invest our love, we invest our life”. That’s a profound statement.

I don’t want to go through life shadowboxing. Shadowboxing is a preparation sport where the person throws punches at no one in particular to exercise the muscles. Shadowboxing is meant for training, not an end result.

I don’t want to spend my life wasting, waiting, fearing. I want to live right here, right now. I want to run with purpose in every step.

Having a relationship with God means surrendering myself to Him and asking Him to establish me and make my life purposeful, even in the little things.

Living a purposeful life does include setting goals and working through difficult things. One thing I really love is running. When I run, I have to run with goals or else I won’t become a better runner. Recently I have been experimenting with different speed cycles. I started a routine of walking/running/jogging to try to improve my distances and just experience exercising in a different way. I’ll do two minutes walking, three jogging, two running, thirty seconds walking, five jogging, four running, thirty seconds walking, five jogging, ten running…Over the course of the workout this improves my running time. Some mornings five minutes jogging hurts, but I keep at it until I reach my goal. My purpose is to improve my distance and stretch my body to endure more. When I run without setting goals, I run shorter distances. I give up sooner. I get more discouraged. When I meet goals, I feel like I have achieved something great. Looking back, my goal could have sounded ridiculous “Make it to that stop sign at the top of the hill, Anna…Yeah Anna! You beat that hill! You hit that ground running! You rock” Sometimes I do that and then I just laugh and then I picture God laughing at me for encouraging myself to run .4 miles further than the spot I wanted to give up at.

Set goals. Strive to reach them. Keep looking up when you miss the goal. Live with purpose.

“Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize” 1 Corinthians 9:24-27