There once was a young farm boy whose father raised chickens in the mountains of Colorado. One day this adventurous lad climbed one of the nearby mountains and happened upon an unattended eagle’s nest with eggs. He took an egg out of the nest and brought it back to the farm, putting it under a setting hen to see what would happen. The hen didn’t know the difference, and when the eggs hatched, a little eaglet became part of the hen’s brood. The eaglet didn’t know it looked different from the chickens and for the time being was content to be a chicken. But as the eaglet grew, it felt a stirring in its heart that there was something more to life than being a chicken.
Then one day an eagle flew over the chicken yard and the now grown eagle quickly realized it was like the passing eagle. Knowing the chicken yard was no place for eagles, and knowing he had never flown before, the instinct to take to the air allowed it to spread its wings and flap them with great power. Within moments, the eagle realized its potential, discovered its calling, and soared high into the heavens never to return to the chicken yard. Potential: having the capacity to become or develop into future success and usefulness. This is true for any individual, group, organization, or entity. Once potential is realized, the only barrier to future success and usefulness is a failure to seize it and give one’s all to achieve it.
Someone has noted that the greatest waste of energy in our world today is not electricity or fuel, but the unused potential within the lives of people. It could also be identified as the greatest sin because unused potential causes people to become less than God intended them to be.
This past month we began hearing from our 2020 Vision Team. They are excited about the future of Belmont and know that we haven’t reached our full potential. There is a world around us that doesn’t know the love of God and the offer of a saving relationship through Jesus Christ. God has sovereignly placed us where we are and blessed us with abilities to build his kingdom. But it takes everyone realizing that potential and giving their all for Belmont to realize it. My constant prayer and hope for Belmont is that we would recognize our purpose, realize our potential, and reach the goals which God has set before us.
Ephesians 2:10, “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
There is an old proverbial saying that seems appropriate here: anyone can count the seeds in an apple but only God can count the apples in a seed. All he needs is a seed yielded to him
With
Great Expectations,
Pastor
Bill