“There’s just one invitation it would kill me to refuse, yet I’m tempted to turn it down all the time. I get the invitation every morning when I wake up to actually live a life of complete engagement, a life of whimsy, a life where love does. It doesn’t come in an envelope. It’s ushered in by a sunrise, the sound of a bird, or the smell of coffee drifting lazily from the kitchen. It’s the invitation to actually live, to fully participate in this amazing life for one more day. Nobody turns down an invitation to the White House, but I’ve seen plenty of people turn down an invitation to fully live.” – Love Does
Lately God has been teaching me a lot about truly living life and fully participating in the world that is swiftly moving around me. It seems as if it was just yesterday that I arrived here in Malawi, and yet in only a little over a week I will be leaving this beautiful place that is home to even more beautiful people. The people here, they understand what it means to truly live and to worship their creator. They have so little and yet, every morning they choose to accept the invitation to sing and dance and worship with all the joy that the have within them. I’m sure that they are tempted to turn it down, but they don’t. Despite their circumstances, they chose to live a life of complete engagement.
I’ve turned down this invitation more times than I care to think about, especially within the past month. Instead of focusing on the present, I was so focused on the future and what I was going to do after the Race. I was going through the motions of every day life, but I wasn’t fully participating in the life that I’ve been so blessed with. It’s so easy to sit out for a day and think, “It’s okay, I’ll participate in life tomorrow.” But that isn’t the life that God has called us to. He has called us to be engaged and ready to participate in the life that he has planned for us. Each day is a new day to get up and worship him for the things he has done for us.
So live life to the fullest, taking each day as it comes. Embrace the ups and downs, the good times with the bad. Each new day dawns full of promises, hopes, and dreams, and when the day passes it will never again return. When you refuse the invitation to embrace life, even for just one day, you are turning down a chance to make a difference in this world. You are passing up a chance to let someone know that somebody cares about them. Each day holds new adventures that God wants to take you on, and when you take an adventures with God, you will find an extraordinary life in an ordinary world.
Today I’m not going to let another opportunity pass me by. I’m going to live fearlessly and love with a reckless abandon. I will embrace the day as it comes with all it’s surprises. Today I’m choosing to truly live and to fully participate in the world around me.
I’m accepting the invitation. Will you?
“I will sing to the Lord as long as I live. I will praise my God to my last breath!”
Psalm 104:33
