Saturday, April 19, 2008

Convergence Comes Too Late For Some

I hope it's not me.

Talking with a good friend in Ministry yesterday he talked about the phenomena called convergence. It's what happens when after years of life and learning and frankly growing up a person comes to a point where everything comes together. Unfortunately that happens for most people right about retirement age.
It's the time when:
  • Our Gifts,
  • Our Passion,
  • Our Skills,
  • Our Life Experience,
  • Our Spiritual Maturity begins to peak.
Not that we "Arrive" as such but we reach a point where we no longer wonder If we can or can not, we just do.

That is a feeling of afterglow. Mostly, it's a sense of the end coming and all at once we find ourselves needing to hurry but we are well able. Things we can or should do no longer are pursued, we are pursued by them. Particularly in Ministry. If I were in direct leadership of a Church I would be looking for people who's lives represented this convergence and make sure they were in the places that would best allow them to serve the people around them.

I noticed this about 3 years ago. I knew somehow deep inside, I was no longer almost qualified. I was now the one who had to carry that torch for the next leg of life's relay race. I also know that sooner than I think I will hand it off again. I just want to run my leg well enough so that when I hand it off we are ahead of the game.

This has to do also with hiring a president of the USA. Does he or she have the
  • Giftedness
  • Passion
  • Skill
  • Life Experience
  • Spiritual Maturity
converged well enough to carry out the mission we would hand him or her as POTUS? I think we need to consider carefully. I'm not convinced all of them do.

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