There isn’t any good way to start this. I think about “Last Third Living” and walking with discipline and my efforts to shove out the unnecessary things to focus better on the necessary things in my life… and then for a day I encounter the hard places. Places I have wanted to go to serve when I was younger and now places I want to help as I think about giving back.
Recently I had a day that wasn’t just about the “hard places.” It was about the hardest of places. The most desperate of situations. Places of very little hope and very few resources. Places I can drive to in less than 30 minutes. Places I spent time in to see how we can help and admiring people who dive into the work day after day and praying about partnerships that might have an impact.
These were places that left me in tears. Places and situations that have settled into my mind and spirit and now I can’t get them off my mind. Places that call out and I hear that call. If I am doing anything to give back in the last third of my life, I can ask the Lord what to do in these places less than 30 minutes from where I live. Places that stir me and disturb me, but in a way that leads me to prayer and hopefully more action.
It’s almost as if the Spirit is saying to me: Welcome home.
Apprentice 2 Jesus 