My Third Half

Math was always one of my favorite subjects, so I know there is no such thing as a third half in life. Or is there?

Recently, while listening to a fellow Christ-follower, he mentioned the insights that come in one's third half. He of course was referencing his age, now at 83, well passed the "three-score and ten" mentioned in the Psalms.

I thought of that conversation again last night as I lay on my pillow.

Dad turns 100 on December 20th of this year, so I have genetic possibilities and am praying for such. As well, hopeful of being of sound mind, Dad certainly is!

If I examine my first seventy years and the two halves of 35, I have been more blessed than I could have imagined. Though not without pain!

BTW, pain shapes one's purpose (let that sink in).

I literally recall the moment at or near age 35, when I first asked my wife if she too was feeling the same weight of leadership as I was?

We were both teachers at the time, walking alongside each other on the sidewalk heading from our public school classroom to the parking lot.

That moment has always stayed with me. I kid you not!

By then we were proud parents, even prouder parents now, with our amazing public school principal, Summer.

Both of us were engaged in a small growing church, myself a bi-vocational associate pastor, by then, deeply involved in the community, even state and national denominational leadership.

I would later enroll in two consecutive degree pursuits, end up in administration for five years, then take early retirement at twenty years to become an executive pastor in a near mega-church in my home town.

By 2000, at age 52 we had launched our own company, Master Counsel, Inc., sharing my learnings by way of a new leadership genre known as Coaching.

My wife would set up a DBA known as "Concepts By LaDonna" employing her skills and lifelong dream as an interior decorator.

Several small startups later and a real estate license would carry us until today. Oh, and in my spare time, three terms as a small town mayor!

Now well into our "third half" after 52 years of marriage, with both of us nearing completion of year 77, six books now online (www.johnthecatalyst.com/books), I have just returned from Africa. Yes, an amazing Safari with my daughter and grandson!

Here's the hitch, my heart was so stirred by all that I experienced, along with amazing new acquaintances, that I now find myself in the process of framing a collaborative ecosystem that connects the scores of relationships framed over my lifetime for a high impact within the Villages.

I had for years wondered, after abrief time in Ethiopia some years back, if I might ever return?

NOW, in this Third Half, Jesus give me the strength, wisdom and favor needed for the future challenges that surely lay ahead.

Hopefully this "half" will serve to preserve a legacy upon which the next generation, even my grandkids' children can serve, prosper and know similar blessings.