When I started writing this blog, it was mostly just an exercise of documentation. I was carrying around a jumbled mess of paper, handwritten notes,  scribbles, tucked in a manilla folder. Trying not to forget any of the insights being shared with me along the way. It was growing harder and harder to read my own handwriting or to understand what I meant when I wrote it down in the first place. So, knowing that a blog would be a nice and easy way to organize my thoughts and track my progress, I started moving all those scattered thoughts into a new and improved online home.

The blog has also helped me organize my thoughts and connect some dots. Along the way, having separate thoughts and ideas merge and mingle with one another has created deeper understanding.

Today, the blog will begin to do an even more critical job: hold me accountable. I just pressed send on an email to a small but mighty group of acquaintances.   I’m not asking anyone to read this blog frequently. You don’t have to for it to do its job. Just knowing that you might check in here and there will hopefully be enough motivation to keep me logging on and continuing this path. And I know enough about myself to know that I need that accountability.

And finally, eventually, maybe someone out there will benefit from a simple lesson or two that I’ve learned along the way. Wouldn’t that be something?

Just as recently as last week, I was struggling with whether to push this blog out to people, go out on a limb, be vulnerable, or simply keep it to myself and continue my journey under the radar. I almost asked my wife what to do, but I’ve too often turned to her for answers to questions I should have aimed at God, so I fought the temptation. And I asked God instead. He responded during the church service I attended later in the morning.

We were dissecting the Lord’s Prayer and about halfway through the pastor referenced a passage in Isiah 58, starting in verse 6. It calls for us to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to serve those in need and we will be rewarded fully. He challenged the audience to ask the question,

“Do I have something in my soul worth offering, something that would bless someone in need?”

Good enough for me. I guess we’ll see what the answer is soon enough.