A few weeks back, Karla Adolphe challenged us to burn for Christ. Then, this morning, I received an email update from Roy S. Williams of Wizard Academy – a resource I would recommend for good thoughts and inspiration.

Williams talks about living for SOMETHING, rather than nothing – as scary and sacrificial as that may be. I think it is worth quoting him in entirety …

Hunger of the Candle for the Flame

You are a column of wax.

Your purpose began as a spark, a flicker easily ignored. But you didn’t ignore it. You turned to face it and your head caught fire.

Grace Hansen admonishes, “Don’t be afraid your life will end; be afraid it will never begin.” In other words, be afraid you will never catch fire.

Lethargy. Apathy. Malaise. Aimlessness. Depression: Five different words for the absence of a flame.

What is it that burns in your soul and shines through your eyes?

Did you know that humans would rather be angry than bored? Anger is an ugly flame, but it feels better than no flame at all. This is why people who have no creative vision spend so much time being angry. Anger gives them purpose.

Try not to walk in their shadow.

Jorge Luis Borges, consumed by the tiger of time, is gone. But when he walked among us he looked directly into the lens of life’s camera and said, “Time is the substance of which I am made. Time is a river that sweeps me along, but I am the river; it is a tiger that tears me apart, but I am the tiger; it is a fire that consumes me, but I am the fire. The world, unfortunately, is real; I, unfortunately, am Borges.”

Time is the fire, the animator of us all. You step into it at birth. You step out of it at death and grow cold, a column of wax once more. Your candle is spent.

What did it light?

You’ve heard me say it many times… I repeat it again today, not because I can think of nothing else to say, but because it’s vitally important to your happiness:

“Lives, like money, are spent. What are you buying with yours?”

Roy H. Williams