Wise Saying #4

I was initially going to come from a completely different place than what I’m actually presenting to you as Wise Saying #4.  But, life happens and I felt compelled to share today’s words of wisdom.  The following quote came from a home Bible study that my Husband conducted for the family the other day.  As I sat there and listened to the words coming out of his mouth, his lesson instantly reminded me of someone… ME.  Here’s the scripture, Wise Saying #4, that he shared with the family:  “Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he” (Proverbs 29:18).

As my Husband continued on with his discourse, he stressed the importance of having goals, dreams, and things you desire to see come to pass.  He, then, went on to incorporate my youngest son, Little Man, into his discussion by relating his dream of becoming a construction worker to the subject matter at hand.  (If you knew how much time Little Man spends in putting together his Lego creations, you’d realize what a sensible match that aspiration truly is).  Husband then stated that Little Man’s visions and goals will undoubtedly change over time and that’s okay.  The important thing is to simply live life having some visions and goals in the first place.

Having a vision would be considered the more effortless part of the forward-thinking process.  On the other hand, the steps that must be followed in order to attain the goal in mind is what I would call “the grind”.  My Husband related this “grind” to a system that must be participated in before an individual can reach the “goal attainment” light at the end of the tunnel.  In the case of Little Man’s goal, Husband stated that he would need to complete third grade, go on to fourth grade, then fifth, and so on until he graduates from high school.  And then, there’s the knowledge and experience gained from post secondary education after getting his diploma.  It was noted that all of these steps would need to be worked through in order for Little Man to receive a credible job opportunity in the construction field.  Then, when I least expected such a profound statement to come from my Husband’s mouth, I heard the following words uttered…”I’m walking in the things I need to walk in today so that I can have a brighter future tomorrow.”  Absolutely love it, love it, love it.  I do believe this quote is a Hubby-original.  Guess I could have used his quote as Wise Saying #4; but when I think about it, God’s Word easily trumps anything that can come from the lips of any one of my family members or myself.  I have to admit, though, that my Husband’s words of wisdom were on point.

Now, if I thought that the Hubby-original was the icing on the cake, then I think the following statement was possibly the cherry on top of the icing on top of the cake.  After mentioning in the Bible study that the vision should be practical, goals should be set in order to reach the vision, and that the goals should be set with stages for completion of action items along the way to the overall goal achievement, he made the following statement.  “If you just have a vision with out trying to implement things, then you’re just spinning your wheels.”  He likened a vision without action to walking on a treadmill or riding a bike that’s sits off the ground.  You might be looking like you’re doing something; but in actuality, all your walking/jogging or pedaling is getting you nowhere.  And you realize this to be true when someone walks right past you as you’re putting all of your effort and energy into the walking/jogging on the treadmill and pedaling on the bike (but to no avail).

Well, I just couldn’t help but relate what Husband taught in Bible study to my personal experience with my vision for Degrees of Maternity.  With this Degrees of Maternity blog in mind, my new Degrees of Maternity YouTube channel, and the writing of my first book in full swing, I couldn’t help but to think that the wordy wisdom my Husband has  touted around the house has totally rubbed off on me in relation to goal setting and achievement; and undoubtedly, the Bible has directed both of us as well as the entire family to be visionaries, or else our lights will go out.  I just thought it was really special to hear something from my Husband that resonated so strongly with me in a spiritual as well as natural application.  By the way, I got permission from Hubby to talk about him in this blog post.  When I told him that I just had to include content from his Bible study into my Wise Sayings series, he jokingly replied, “my stuff is not copyrighted material, so you can use it.” 🙂