He Naturally Knows Where He Is

The floor of the Princeton gym was being resurfaced, so Princeton basketball player (and later United States senator) Bill Bradley had to practice at Lawrenceville School. His first afternoon at Lawrenceville, he began by shooting fourteen-foot jump shots from the right side. He got off to a bad start, and he kept missing them. Six in a row hit the back rim of the basket and bounced out.

He stopped and seemed to make an adjustment in his mind. Then he went up for another jump shot from the same spot and hit it cleanly. Four more shots went in without a miss.  Then he paused and said, “You want to know something? That basket is about an inch and a half low.”

Some weeks later, I went back to Lawrenceville with a steel tape measure. I borrowed a stepladder and measured the height of the basket. It was nine feet, ten and seven-eighths inches above the floor, or one and one-eighth inches too low.

 — John McPhee, A Sense of Where You Are (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1965)

Temporary Goodbye

As he reflected on the death of his beloved wife, Margaret, Lyman Coleman wrote the following:

The most painful decision of my life was asking God to take her home. She had been suffering from repeated brain seizures and her body was wasted. I whispered in her ear: “Honey, I love you. I love you. Jesus wants you to come home. We are going to be all right. We give you permission to let go.” She closed her eyes and fell asleep. . . .

As I write this letter, I realize I am without my editor. My greatest critic. My teammate. Soul mate. Prayer mate. Partner in everything. We traveled the roads less traveled together in hard times and good times.

Honey, I miss you. I miss you. I miss you. I will keep the light on for the kids. I will be there for friends. And one day we are going to join you. All of us. Because Jesus promised it.

“Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints” (Psalm 116:15).

 — Bill Donahue and Russ Robinson, Building a Church of Small Groups (Zondervan, 2001)

Don't Miss the Beautiful Things Around

When Frank Lloyd Wright was nine, he went walking across a snow-covered field with his uncle. As the two of them reached the end of the field, his uncle stopped him. He pointed out his own tracks in the snow, straight and true as an arrow’s flight, then young Frank’s tracks meandering all over the field. “Notice how your tracks wander aimlessly from the fence to the cattle to the woods and back again,” his uncle said. “See how my tracks aim directly to my goal? There is an important lesson in that.”

Years later, the world-famous architect told how this experience had greatly contributed to his philosophy in life. “I determined right then not to miss most things in life, as my uncle had,” he said.

 — Jeff Arthurs, “Life Goals,” 
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