A waiting room is a great opportunity to people watch. I wonder things that I have no way of knowing. Some unique people. An interesting fellow in a 3-piece suit sitting next to a man in Carhartt coveralls, cap on backwards. So, I watch and wonder.

I took the book, Live Your Dream—Planning for Success, by Dr. Mark Chironna to read while waiting, watching and wondering. Chironna writes,

“There is encoded within you something powerful, something no one else has, and it is stirring within your heart. You are simmering with potential and it is poised to collide with opportunity. The energy released by that auspicious impact will create exciting new paradigms and propel you toward your destiny.

“Somewhere inside, you can already feel it.” (Destiny Image Publishers, ©2009, page 17.)

How about you? Do you believe that you are on the earth at this time for a specific, unique purpose? Are those words valid only at high school graduations or are they still operative for those of us in the Second Half?

Two of my high school classmates died last week. I was not close to either one, but they were in my larger “gang.” We had contact at a reunion and not much more than that since high school. I am grieving. Perhaps I am grieving part of my life that is diminishing? Odd! Their passing seemed to leave a hole in my world. I wasn’t going to mention this—just do it alone, but another classmate Facebooked me in case I hadn’t heard. The grieving is real.

I have been wondering if those two classmates felt as if they had fulfilled their purpose. Did they believe they were unique and alive for a specific reason? As I was thinking about them, I remembered the words of Dr. Laura Schlessinger who states her purpose: “I am my kid’s mom!”

Myles Munroe wrote:

“Authority is the Author’s permission for you to be what He designed you to be. You not only have permission, but also the commission and the power to fulfill your purpose.”  Myles Munroe

(p. 87 The Purpose and Power of Authority. Whitaker House, 2011)

“…permission and commission and the power to fulfill your purpose.”

I’m thinking that discussion of destiny and fulfilled purpose depends upon a belief that we are here at this time in history for a specific reason to accomplish a specific task and to be a specific person.

I’ve been wrestling for several months with the closing chapters of my book, Caught in the Tail Lights. I’m really fascinated with the story. Slowly, it has become clear to me that we need a purpose, calling, clearly defined destiny. One of the dynamic spots in the book is when Tim is walking across the prayer path on the crest of a hill sorting through the dilemma of his parents’ failing marriage and what has been revealed to him and what becomes obvious that God is trying to tell him. Tim comes to a conclusion about what he is to do with his life:

That’s It!

Near the end of the movie “Heaven is Real” the father of a little boy named Colton, who was given a view of Heaven, is looking at a CNN news report concerning a young girl in Europe who was given a similar experience and painted what she saw. CNN showed the first of her paintings. As the picture came on screen, Colton stepped up behind his dad, saw the picture, and said,

That’s Him!

It is the two requirements. To recognize and commit our self to the “It” God has given to us and to recognize Him.

So, I’m thinking about that waiting room of several dozen people. If a fulfilled life depends on those two elements, shouldn’t there be a time when I put my book down, stand up and say, “May I have your attention, please. I have something I must tell you.”

©2014 D. Dean Benton  http://www.bentonministries.com/

  Writer, Wonderer, Quester, Provoker