Goals
This is what a basketball goal has always looked like to me. As an adult. As a teenager.
I remember watching friends compete to see who could reach the highest on the net, or even touch the rim. I was glad to be able to get my feet a few inches off the ground.
A few lucky guys could actually leap with a ball and dunk it. That goal always seemed so out of reach.
It would have been nice, when I was younger, to be able to jump and reach the rim. But really, it didn't matter then and it doesn't matter now. To be able to touch the goal was never a goal for me.
I think a goal must reach at least three criteria to be worthy of our efforts.
One, it must stretch us to be better people. A goal to clean up our speech, relate better to people, and read the Bible through in a year are such goals.
Two, it must require some serious effort. The work to achieve the goal is often as important and transforming as the goal itself.
Three, it must meet with God's approval. The things God approves are eternal in nature, so they really matter!
There is nothing wrong with being able to leap and touch a basketball rim. But, at 5' 10", I knew it wasn't a likely goal for me. It certainly isn't now.
But learning God's word, relating better to my wife and kids, and mentoring a fatherless ten-year old, now those goals stretch me, take serious effort, and pay eternal benefits. Those are three goals I'm working on this year.
How about you? What goals have you set that meet these three important criteria?
Warren Baldwin
Note: Thanks to Karli Photography for these great pictures.
