Early in my career I dreamed of vast vistas, beautiful waterfalls, and clear aqua water, now I get excited about rusting old trucks and cars. Later today I will arrive in Reno and plan to drive down to the Old Ghost town, Bodie, more old building, gas pumps ,and old rusted trucks. What\u2019s the deal here? Actually I think I know. The older I get the more security I find in seeing things that date back to the year of my birth, and before. There is something comforting about anything made that long ago, (like me), that is still around. Rust will get us all eventually, but these old things are still a round to tell us stories about our past. In college, one of my minors was history, and one of the greatest lessons is that if we don\u2019t learn from the past, we are doomed to repeat it. That has certainly been true in my life. Maturing is learning from the past, and doing it better in the future.<\/p>\n
The one thing I can\u2019t do is become
\na perfect man, maybe better
\nbut not perfect. The Word teaches
\nus that \u201call have fallen short of
\nthe glory of God.\u201d I think that
\nmeans that we are all sinners,
\nwe\u2019ve all fallen short of what
\nGod wants for us. We can\u2019t
\nbecome what He desires with
\nour own efforts alone. We
\nmust lean on Him and use the
\nstrength and power that comes
\nfrom HIm. Does that mean we
\ncan reach perfection through
\nHIm? We can be forgiven for
\nall our sins and become saints
\nin His eyes, but we still live in a
\nbroken body, that will sin again,
\nwe do however, have forgiveness
\nin Him.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not about being \u201cgood\u201d, it\u2019s
\nabout living moment to moment
\nin Him. True victory in life is
\nonly attained when we give up
\ntrying to do it alone and ask Him
\nto become the director and
\nproducer of our lives.<\/p>\n
Then and only then can we find real peace and joy, victory and purpose in our lives. Does this mean we can stop trying? No, God expects us to give our best effort in anything we do, but we have to learn that our efforts can only take us so far. I\u2019ve often heard the old saying, \u201cHe pulled himself up by his own bootstraps.\u201d I think if you arrive anywhere and still have your integrity,
\ncharacter, peace and joy. You worked hard, and God filled in for all your inadequacies. I don\u2019t have to believe I can do anything, I do believe that anything is possible with Him……<\/p>\n
In His love and power, I am,<\/p>\n
the pilgrim<\/p>\n
\u2028<\/p>\n
*Photo Note: All images D7000, 24–120, 70-300, 12-24. HDR, Nik Color Efex 3.0, and Topaz Filters.
\n<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Early in my career I dreamed of vast vistas, beautiful waterfalls, and clear aqua water, now I get excited about rusting old trucks and cars. Later today I will arrive in Reno and plan to drive down to the Old Ghost town, Bodie, more old building, gas pumps ,and old rusted trucks. What\u2019s the deal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-83","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chronicles","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=83"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2795,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83\/revisions\/2795"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=83"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=83"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=83"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}