Before We Learn to Live – Sunday, June 28, 1953
Sometimes we well may wonder why we have to live so long before we learn to live. There are many things we might wish we had learned sooner instead of later in life. There are many mistakes and misunderstandings along the way: mistakes of judgment, bad beginnings, lost time, journeys and ventures in the wrong direction, unprofitable and unpromising pursuits.
There are strained relationships between people who should be close to one another, between people who have every natural reason to keep close but who harbor differences and drift apart. There are errors of understanding, quarrels, prejudices, wrong actions, and unwise utterances. And then sometime, somewhere, perhaps far along the journey, we learn to misjudge less and to understand more; we learn to be more charitable, to live with less friction, with less resentment, with less quick judgment and condemnation. And well we may wish that we had learned these things sooner instead of later in life.
Of course, some do learn them sooner. Some seem to mellow and to mature in judgment and wisdom and understanding earlier than others. But many of us live a long time before we seem to learn some of the fairly simple things that could have eased the way and made life more meaningful for us and for others also. And as to living so long before we learn to live perhaps this is one of life’s chief purposes.
With an immortal future before us, life appears, as in fact it is, a period of preparation for endless eternal opportunities. And our failures and faltering may be in part the growing pains, which we can survive with faith in the plan and purpose of a loving Father, with faith that an understanding of it all will ultimately be ours, and that then we shall know, as now we believe, that the struggle and the journey, and the sometime groping, reaching, wondering will gloriously and everlastingly be immeasurably more than worth all the effort—and will justify the faith by which we now must live in many ways.
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June 28, 1953
Broadcast Number 1,245