A few years ago while traveling on mission in Europe I had the opportunity to visit the orphanage where my friend’s son had been raised.  We were given access where it wasn’t usually granted and allowed a glimpse of what life had been like for their son.  This week I ran across some of my thoughts from that experience.  We’ll call their boy Jack.

“To have been able to see how these children are treated and to know what Jack’s life was like gave me such a wonderful perspective.  I heard stories of other orphanages, of how good this one is. Much like coming to Christ, some lives seem ‘better’ or ‘worse,’ more or less difficult.  For an orphan, Jack had great caretakers who genuinely seemed to care about him.  But nothing beats being part of a family.  God had this wonderful and grand design for him, something better, with greater benefits and hope.  What he had wasn’t half bad.  But what was offered him was priceless.  Often times we meet people whose lives don’t seem half bad.  Often times we ourselves settle for lives that aren’t half bad.  But what God actually has for us is so much more.  He offers us something better and lasting and rooted in Family.”  

We weren’t made for ‘good’ and God’s designs for our lives aren’t just ‘good.’

We were made for lives of resplendent wonder.

We weren’t made to settle for less, but to strive for more.  We weren’t made for mud pies or really good orphanages, we were made for feasts and homes and Family.  That orphanage was a really nice place, but it was no home, it had only a foretaste of family.  And to all who look around their lives and see less than the greatness of belonging, He says, “The Best is better than all the good you’ve ever known. Let’s go home, son.”

We were–every one of us–made for lives of greatness, wonder, belonging.  For most of us, the battle isn’t between being a good person or being a bad one, it is between being a good one and the best one.  Often times we look at our lives, our choices, our families, our marriages, our finances, our relationships and we think it’s all pretty good, not half bad.  I’m ok. We weren’t made for ok.  We were made for greatness and to settle for anything less is to leave priceless blessings on the table of our lives, unopened gifts on the calendar of our days.  

I don’t want ‘a good life’ and that means I can’t make decisions that lead to one. I want the best life God has to offer me and that means I must daily make decisions that lead to it.

May we never settle for mud pies in the slums because we can’t imagine the greatness of a feast by the ocean. (And, yes, that is a rather loose paraphrase from the impeccable C. S. Lewis.)