Where the road leads next

Last weekend we attended a "Christ Led Family" conference at our church put on by the Maxwell Family. There was so much good stuff, I hardly know where to start. The time we spent learning about this family and their life was short, but the results are going to be tremendous.

It has changed my life.

One of the first things I did when we got home Saturday night was to throw our TV out. We had been thinking about doing that for the last few years, but it was time. The kids actually agreed we should do this, so we are now even further out of the main stream.

We home school, we mill our own bread, we serve at church as a family, we are our kids best friends, we run 2 home based businesses, and we are actually quite happy to sit around and talk to each other. We are so far out of the main stream we are sitting on the banks.

You know what? I like the banks.

The stream can just rush right on by for all I care. I know where it is headed, and I for one want nothing to do with the waterfall at the end of the line.

The main reason we took the TV - or "The Beast" as Steven Maxwell calls it - out of our home is the appetite it feeds. Entertainment is all about fun and fun is directly tied to the amount of money you feed it. Fun is an ever changing idea, and seems to never come free.

You pay for fun, sometimes you pay dearly.

I am after joy. Joy is something that you can't buy, comes for free, and sneaks up on you when you least expect it. Fun is gone the minute it is over but joy lives on forever. You can't recall fun without experiencing it again, but joy can be recalled any place any time.

I was telling my son about this concept in relation to roller coaster rides. I asked him if he remembered the feeling he had riding the ride? He can't. He can remember how it made him feel, but he can't recall the actual feeling.

Joy, on the other hand is very real whenever you recall it. Without much effort, I can recall the feeling of seeing my son and daughter for the first time. Not only can I experience the same feeling, I can actually add to it when I see how much they have grown. I can still remember every detail of the moment I knew I had met my wife and now when I look over our life together that first moment, that promise of all to come, is just that much sweeter.

Even though some of these events are years old the joy is still there just waiting to be rekindled. Joy is like a smoldering ember waiting for a bit of memory to fire up the blessing all over again.

T.V. was fun but I don't have time for fun. There is a lifetime of joy to experience and I want it all.