Back in Town

I am finally getting settled back into life after my pilgrimage to Disneyworld. Yes, a pilgrimage. You laugh, but I am half serious. You see, my favorite part of Disneyworld is EPCOT Center. Yeah, that’s the park everyone else hates. But I love it because it’s one of the places where I fell in love with science and technology. It’s the place where I decided, in the 7th grade, to study biological engineering in college.

It all began at The Land Pavilion, which most people consider the most boring part of the most boring park in Disney. For me, it was a land of limitless possibilities. In the Land Pavilion labs, they experiment with environmentally friendly biological systems, including sustainable agriculture, hydroponics and aeroponics, integrated pest management, biotechnology, and aquaculture. I'm getting excited just saying those words. At the back of the lab, there were a couple of experiments in particular that caught my attention. A Disney-USDA-NASA partnership was exloring options for life support systems in space. They were growing plants in lunar and martian simulated soil and in low gravity environments. I thought, "I don't know what this is called, but this is what I want to do!"

At that time, there were only a handful of colleges offering biological engineering as a degree option. And there were only a handful more by the time I reached college. I chose LSU.

Although I am no longer drawing my paycheck by doing that stuff, I still love it. And it’s part of the path that God led me down to get me to where I am and what I am doing today.

What does this post have to do with discipleship? Nothing, really. Except that we should expect the unexpected in our lives. We try so hard to lay out a path of spiritual growth for people that is linear and predictable. But God rarely works like that.

I think we try a lot of times to give people directions. Go to this class then that class and then plug into that small group then lead this ministry...

I don't know that directions help on these curvy paths God sets before us. Instead of trying to straighten out the path and artificially plant road signs, we need to understand the importance of relationship. What people really need in their discipleship journey is a guide. A friend that can go along the journey with them