About edges

A few years ago the CEO of the company where I worked told me a little story to illustrate the conversation we had. He told me that his wife always cutted the edges of the ham when she was cooking. He told me that one day he asked her why she did this and that his wife replied that her mother always did that and that her mother made the best hams on earth. So they decided to call her mother to ask. Her mother said that her mother always did that. When they called her she said that she did that because her pan was too small so she had to cut the edges.

This story illustrated the fact that you develop a lot of habits in your life from which you do not know the origin. And that those habits can have all sorts of (negative?) influences in your life. That you can only really change your behaviour if you understand why you do the things the way you do them.

The funny thing was that the big tv-preacher Joel Osteen (which I was watching yesterday) told exactly the same story but then for a stadion full of people. It was so surprising to me that the non-christian CEO of the former company where I worked and Joel Osteen are related! Maybe that's hard to believe, but would they have spoken each other? Probably not... Would the both have gotten the story somewhere else? We will probably never know...

Anyway, Joel used it to tell us that we have to come loose of our past to become who we can be and not be limited to our heritage. He thinks that as long we hang on our past that God cannot create us into who he wants us to be. In my opinion he is right that we should try to loose burdens of our past in our life, and that God wants us to be well. But we should not be too overly focused on what God has planned for our greatness. It is good to strive, but at what cost? There's always to sides to the same coin. In this sermon this means that you can be so busy striving that God cannot touch your heart and show His greatness because you are looking for all the greatness God had planned for you. We should not forget that God has not made humans for greatness or to be served. That is why all the big stars in the world have so much problems maintaining themselves and that is why people who do not know God feel deep down disconnected in their life. God has made humans to be servants to God. That is where we really feel at home, in His presence, in relationship with Him, praising him and being in awe for His greatness.