All Comments (4)

hager Henry

hager Henry

Dear Pastor Dr Schuller

I find your essay inspiring. Thank you for sharing your personal story. It is so powerfully meaningful in the present stage of my life when I am desperately looking for the shoes God created me to fill!

Personally I do not like the idea of parents trying to live out their unlived lives/dreams through their children, although the temptation to do that is so understandable. Psalm 139 is for me a constant reminder that first and foremost we are willed by God and He has a unique purpose. Kahlil Gibran's thoughts on children to parents who try to fit their children into the shoes of their making without asking themselves if God might, just might have a different plan for their children, are worth pondering over.

The idea of filling the shoes God created for us is a great one as is your reminder that mature people must have a lifelong conversation with God about finding their God made shoes to fill.

I find particulary meaningful your lines:

"Finding your own shoes to walk in is a lifelong conversation mature people have with themselves and God. Personally, I have not yet put a period at the end of that conversation in my own life, and I don’t anticipate doing so. Life is a journey that continues to unfold as long as we live and believe that God created and equipped us to be unique and significant."

Thank you.

Soja John Thaikattil
Sydney, Australia

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Dr. R.A. Schuller,

I respect the path you tread, which is the way of your forebears. (And I was amazed when first I saw the Crystal Cathedral. It looked to me like a vision settling firmly on earth, a crystallization of prayer.)

Filling one's own shoes and walking in them. A metaphor for being accepting of and gladly complying with God's plan for us, isn't it? But... in that case, shouldn't it be walking in the shoes--of Jesus? Isn't it "filling the shoes of the fisherman" (that is, "a fisher of men")? At least, for those who would be such as pastors, priests, ministers. (Altho, if I remember correctly, the bible also refers to all who believe in Jesus and so believing must take as their task missioning--the spreading of the Word.)

God bless.
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