e's wEekly brain dump

I never would have bothered otherwise, because I am loathe to like or appreciate anything Oprah Winfrey promotes-- this has nothing to do with skin color --but it was on the Disney Channel this morning and I had nothing else to do, so I watched Akeelah and the Bee. Laurence Fishburne and Angela Bassett? amazing actors both, so I was sure I could get something out of it. And that I did.

In my previous post I spoke of fear... of moving on... of fleeing in spite of the guns that awaited. Fear will keep a man in a situation he would otherwise flee the moment his situation is truly grasped. I know fear. So did Akeelah. And her instructor, Mr. Fishburne, told her to read a quote that was framed upon the wall of his office...

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you NOT to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightening about shrinking so that other people won't feel unsure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone. As we let our own Light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

--Marianne Williamson

I can find nothing wrong with this statement, but I can find something to add.

Like the three servants, each given differing amounts of talents by their master, we are charged to use what we are given to not only enrich the Lord who bestowed to us our talents, and to demonstrate our faithfulness to his command, but to also show his glory through the gifts he has given that others might be drawn to him. We can choose to bury our talents, but then our Lord is not enriched, we are become unfaithful, and our light does not shine.

Were we all given candles and we chose not to light them, what light then would shine to draw others to shelter? God gives us our gifts for a reason. To not light that candle, is to tell God he is wrong about you... that you couldn't possibly do what he already knows you can. It is fear that keeps the candle unlit, that buries our talents that none can be thereby edified. We fear the kind of success HE asks of us.

* * *

I have come to realize that as much as you might want something, that something may not want you. Sometimes you have to let it go, and set your sights on something else. Only pain can result from chasing what does not wish to be caught.