Epiphany

With a child now, it was getting harder and harder for me to do classes at Regent. I was torn. I still loved school but it was hard for me to work all day, go home for dinner and then leave my family for an evening  class or research at the library. I was also torn between the time I needed for school and involvement at church. As we grew, the church needed more Care Group leaders. I didn’t have enough time to do that and school so I considered dropping school. It’s good I didn’t because when, in later years, I did try to be a Care Group leader, it didn’t turn out so well. 

At the rate I was going, completing school was a mountainous hurdle. I didn’t really care about the degree as much as just wanting to learn and gain the skills to be able to make movies. At the time, Regent sponsored two summer productions each year and my goal was to eventually get a directing spot on one of those. But now I was questioning whether I should just give up the whole film dream altogether for new priorities.

Everybody wants his or her life to have significance. Many of us want to do something great. I wanted to be a successful filmmaker but I was starting to question if that was really ever going to happen. I began to question what greatness really was. And while I was pondering all this, a movie came out that really struck a cord. I didn’t care much for the way the movie was made. It was too schmaltzy. But it was the message of the film that got me.

The film was Mr. Holland’s Opus, about a musician and composer who wants to find greatness by writing a great symphony. But to pay the bills, Mr. Holland has to take what he thinks is a temporary job as a high school music teacher. He intends to keep working on his symphony and get back to music full time in several years. Life takes over, including having a child. And although he continues to pick away at his symphony through the years, the responsibilities of life take priority over his dream.

There was one line in the film that really struck me. It is a quote from a John Lennon song called “Beautiful Boy”. It goes, 

“Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans”. 

As I pondered that line and the message of the movie, I perceived two potentially life-changing lessons.

The first was that I had to be careful that I wasn’t so focused on the future, on what I wanted to accomplish, that I didn’t fully engage my life and responsibilities in the present. The second is a twist on the first. It’s that I might never accomplish my dreams, so I needed to make the most of life right now because it might very possibly be my life. This was the ultimate lesson from Mr. Holland’s Opus. 

For every story we hear about the ones who accomplish their dreams, there are thousands who don’t. Just like Mr. Holland, responsibilities get in the way. This is the reason I didn’t want to get married until I was older and had had a chance to go to school. This is the reason I didn’t want to have kids until I had “made” it.

True, I wasn’t getting anywhere towards my goal before I got married, although I was still hoping to get some modeling work to pay for school. But after I did get married, I was able to start going to school because Laura’s salary took care of our living expenses. It was having a child that slowed the momentum way down because I had to work full-time for Laura to be able to stay home. Then, in an epiphany, I came to the realization that this was actually going to be one of the greatest purposes of my life.

The more teaching we got at church about raising children, the more we saw how important it really was. Oftentimes, the seemingly mundane things of life can have the greatest significance. I came to the understanding that, as much I could contribute to it, if my children grew up to love Jesus, I would have done one of, if not the most important things I could do in life.

I say “as much as I could contribute” because, ultimately, children’s hearts are in God’s hands. Only He can truly draw them to Himself. Parents’ teaching, training and conduct play a very significant role in His purposes but we can’t take the final credit. Any good that comes from our flawed attempts is all by His grace.

All this was a growing understanding for me. I was slowly realizing what my true priorities needed to be. I did continue classes at Regent, however - slowly but surely.