Golden Moments
By Chaplain J. David Atwater

Once upon a time, there was a little boy from the wrong side of the tracks who grew up admiring a beautiful house high on the hill overlooking his town. Fortunately, he never lacked for any of the necessities of life. But he hated being poor. He noticed that people treated him differently. And it pained him to see his parents work so hard just to make ends meet. It just didn’t seem right that some should be so favored and others should have so little. But his parents had instilled some rather clear core values in their son so that he grew up honest, persistent and a hard worker.

All the while, the boy kept looking up at that big old house on the hill. He noticed that, when the sun came up each morning, the windows seemed to turn to gold. And after a while, that house came to symbolize all that he had missed by growing up, as a school counselor once described him, a “disadvantaged child.” So, year after year, he grew more and more determined. Someday, he resolved, he would own that house with windows of shining gold! And life would be good.

After a while people began to take notice that the young man worked hard, learned quickly, and could be trusted with responsibility. They nodded their heads in approval, and reckoned that he would go far. Meanwhile, he just kept working... and looking up the hill.

Years passed. The boy grew to be a man. And those painful lessons of his youth, learned through years of sacrifice and self-denial, served him well. He developed a keen sense for business, and a heart of compassion for those less fortunate. He seized each new opportunity for advancement, saved his profits, and invested wisely.

Before long, his ventures began to succeed beyond even his wildest imagination. And so it was that he finally realized his dream. He bought that house high on the hill. The one with the windows of shining gold he had admired so long.

But a strange thing happened as he walked through his new home that first time. Oh, he wasn’t disappointed. It was a beautiful house. Perhaps even more than he had realized. The rooms were large, the furnishings he had chosen were magnificent, and the view was spectacular. But as he looked down the hill toward the town, it was late afternoon, and the sun had begun to set in the west. Suddenly he spotted his boyhood home. And every window was gleaming like the brightest gold!

Can the destination be reached without the journey? Could this man have fully appreciated his status without the struggle? Or was that struggle really a gift in disguise, as much as health or opportunity or natural ability? Were there blessings he could have enjoyed all along? You decide.

And what about our journeys - yours and mine? What struggles have stimulated our growth and development? How has pain and hardship been part of a process to make us stronger or better or more open to God? Could that be part of the reason the Bible tells us to “give thanks in all things?”

In his book, “Invisible Lines of Connection,” Rabbi Lawrence Kushner, the Emanu-El scholar at Congregation Emanu-El, writes, “The closer we are to what is happening, the more we believe we are in complete control. The farther away we get, the more we are willing to acknowledge the participation of something greater.” Kushner has served as rabbi-in-residence at Hebrew Union College in New York City where he taught spirituality and mentored rabbinic students.

May God guide us as we ponder and discover his leading in our lives, and give thanks.