Breakfast For Your Soul

The “Mona Lisa” is priceless.  I’ve read that prior to its 1962-1963 tour, it was estimated for insurance purposes at $100 million.  According to an official at the Louvre, “it is kept in a special sealed box to protect it from vibrations, heat and humidity. It is protected by thick glass resistant to bullets and any other object hurled at it” (a lady threw a coffee mug at it not too earlier this month).  That is how we treat something of value.  Question.  What is more valuable than a person made in the image and after the likeness of our Almighty Creator?  Each person is unique.  No two people share the same fingerprints.  Two people may look identical, but they are different.  I know a lady who is a twin.  She and her sister look so much alike it is eerie.  They have the same style of dress, same smile, same height, same face, same hair, same facial expressions, same sense of humor.  I’ve never seen anything like it.  People call them the ‘double-mint’ twins. Even though they look alike, they are two different people.  Each one is unique in her own way.  We are not called to be ‘identical twin’ Christians.  Our goal is to be more like Christ, not more like brother/sister so-n-so.  We may admire the attributes, and character traits of an admirable person, but if I’m trying to be them, who is being me.  There will be a void and something will be left undone.  We all learn from one another, but then we take what we have learned and filter it through the gifts, talents and abilities that God has placed in our spirit and run with it.  On December 17, 1903 Orville Wright took flight in “The Flyer”.  It was the first successful, powered, piloted flight in history and it was air-born a grand total of 12-seconds.   Look at how far aviation has come.  What if no one ever tried to improve that first craft?  The Wright Brothers started taking passengers on ’flights’ with them May 14, 1908.  Here we are in the 21st century flying all over the world in a matter of hours without much thought (except how expensive it is becoming).  Know your true worth.  You are priceless.  A limited edition.  There has never been a ‘you’ in the whole history of mankind and there will never be another after you.  That is another reason why the enemy of our souls hates you.  He doesn’t know your purpose.  He doesn’t know the secret weapons that God has invested in your spirit.  Leonardo DiVinci is gone, but Mona is still here.  There were many artists alive during his time, but his work is head and shoulders above theirs.  His style is unique to him.  Dr. Martin Luther King, Billy & Ruth Graham, Katherine Kulman, Thomas Dorsey, Pop Winans, Timothy Wright, Mahalia Jackson, Roy Rogers, Dale Evans… Reginald Lee Hockaday (my father), Elnora Curry McCloud (my grandmother), among countless others have all gone on.  However, each and every one of these precious people left something special behind for us.  It is up to us to take what they left us and build on it for the generation that is following us.  In my case, it is music and words.  My father was a musician and even though I was very little, all of my memories of him were surrounded in music.  My grandmother was the greatest story-teller of all time.  She could spin a tale that would have you believing Bigfoot was not only real, but that he originated in southern Maryland!  Spielberg could have used my Grandma.  She had no formal education because she had to work to help take care of her family, yet words were very important to her and she taught herself to read and write.  Not only that, but she had wisdom and boldness.  In the body of Christ, we need everybody at their posts.  We need preachers, writers, musicians, artists, teachers, speakers, athletes, politicians(), dancers, inventors, scientists.. etc.. etc… etc.  We need folks in every industry, every field of study perfecting their craft and utilizing their skills.  The bible tells us that “every joint supplies”.  When we are doing what we do, we all fit together and much is accomplished.  Every skill set we have been given is for the up-building of the Kingdom of God… God calls them “gifts”.