Sabbath Messages > Sabbath Message: February 26, 2005
Good Sabbath
February 26, 2005
February disappears, soon, for another year. Father Time and Madam Fate continue the mystery of life as we try to master them both. As one gains in age, loses in dexterity, but hopefully wisdom enters the mix.
"Who is the Wiseman? He who learns from all others." (Ethics of the Fathers).
"First a person should put his house together, then his town, then the world." (Salanter)
"Despise no man and consider nothing impossible. For there is no man who does not have his hour and there is nothing that does not have its place." (Babylonian Talmud)
This week I taught my annual leadership class at SDSU, and collaborated with my dear friend, the Director, Linda Guzzo, who wrote me a letter of thanks after that: "putting the human condition in context, you recognized that people are struggling to find their way and that is especially true with young people. You really came alive when one of our students asked you to talk about your personal life walk. Indeed, I believe that this question was a catalyst for revealing the heart of Sandy Goodkin! Even though you were reluctant, your vivid experiences and heartfelt insights about life, were especially compelling."
Linda reminds me of my Grandmother--though still a young lady. Grandmom Rose was small in physical stature but a giant of wisdom and understanding, filled with humor, family pride and insistent towards education and patriotism as it once was. Her youngest daughter, Betty, is still my marvelous Saturday morning telephone conversation.
Teaching is that one great instrument of tomorrow, the one where experience and perspective truly impart to the young, a better pathway through the problems they have, imagine or will have. Now that I am part of three universities, plus a school of architecture, I have found my life's passion and shall devote myself to it.
O God, You've been kind and generous
And I thank You so for that,
Now continue my energy and strength
And the companionship of my love
So that I may assist Your work
And your word,
As I resume my passage.
The rain abated and the sun re-appeared, as my morning walk traced early Spring's promise, along once brown hills and grass, now alive with the green of life renewed, for this is Spring's message. "Begin anew, puny human, for You are My only hope. The flowers decorate your place and the animals are for petting, but each year I send Spring for renewal, that after storm there is calm, after fire there is hope, after flood there is sadness and wisdom and a chance for charity. I do not control each raindrop or each flake of snow, though I have created them all; so much is under your control, so build wisely, choose place with care, be not a dunce but utilize common sense for it provides so many of the choices that will make you safer and
more joyful."
When there is so much rain, I think of Noah, but he had God's warning and prepared for it. Jonah tried to escape from God, to a ship from which he was flung overboard (at his urging), swallowed by a great fish, whom I always imagined was a prophet who spoke to Jonah and urged him to do God's bidding. Both are fables or truths, important to each of us in teaching our minds how to think out our problems. We who don't think of each connection to God must find our connection to our fellow humans; treat each with the Golden simplicity taught by the wise of all religions.
Our responsibility on earth is to locate the paths of righteousness so that they are illumined for the next generation, and thus there is no need for God to hunt for another Noah, for we will have found wisdom at last.
Take love by the hand and walk through a marvelous Sabbath.
sandy
