Last Saturday we spent the day in Manhattan, in part to have some fun because my daughter Ashley was home from college, and also to show her roommate from Southeastern the city that never sleeps for the first time. The Dad tour... started on the 100+ year old Staten Island Ferry system, past the Statue Of Liberty, Ellis Island and on to Battery Park to walk thru the fort that defended NY in 1812...walk up to Ground Zero to see what happens if there is no fort to protect...then hopped on the subway to head to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. After that it was on to Times Square.
What hit me Saturday...was the lasting effect of what we create. And the question...are we building/creating something that will last? Do we have in mind that our present efforts can last...4,500 years and beyond? After all the church that Jesus built is already 2,000 years old, manuscripts in the Bible are 3,000 years old...and there is this head-mask in the Met dated 2400 bc. Did that particular artisan shaping a warriors head-mask ever think...that his creation would be around 4,500 years? After all...he was probably making hundreds of them...just another day with the boss yelling faster.Sure...our human lives will last a mere 70-90 years, and possibly not even that long if your name was Tutankhamen, he died around 17-18 years old. So it seems that the actual life we live is not so much of the point as the effect of the life we live is. Meaning... we should be thinking in terms of leaving a legacy instead of just reacting to the moments. Our children can certainly be a legacy, our work can be also...including what we create with our hands. What I am thinking is...our lives matter. Our contribution to mankind is significant...to the point that it carries beyond the length of our breath.
Each room of the Metropolitan Museum of Art brought a new collection of items created by someone at sometime. Each item is proof that whatever we attempt, even taking a picture can be a source of inspiration that has the opportunity to stand the test of time. But...I think I am more interested in leaving a legacy of lives instead of art. But where is the museum housing the collection of lives? Heaven? In my life as others have shaped and molded me?I know there is abundant source of teaching in the Bible as it relates to a life well lived. I want m life to matter…for a longer time than the amount time I take breaths.
