Memorable Scenes

          As I mentioned in a previous post, I am currently reading A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller.  Tonight I read a chapter in which he talked about how we need to live memorable scenes in our lives.  That our stories will not be memorable or exciting without memorable scenes.  He asked his readers to think back to movies that they loved and the scenes that they remember from those movies. Those scenes are memorable for a reason.
          One of my favorite movies is "Forest Gump".  It is full of memorable scenes.  Through that movie I become attached to Forest and find myself rooting for him in life.  He tells his life well sitting on a bench at a bus stop.  And the stories he tells are all memorable.  Teaching Elvis how to dance, getting shot in the butt in Vietnam, becoming a ping pong champion, an all American football player, and on and on.  He lived a great story but he went out and made it great.  He made it memorable.
       When I look back to memorable events in my life, both good and bad, they all stick out for reasons.  None of them happened while I was on my couch watching ESPN or while I was sleeping until noon.  They happened when I was back packing, chasing a girl, hanging out with friends on railroad tracks hobo hunting.  Those are memorable events.
        I am told by friends that I am a good story teller.  I can recount story after story from high school.  Those stories came about because I was doing something, I made those stories happen.  In the same way we need to create memorable moments.  Now I am not saying that we need to climb Everest every day but we should not be afraid to live an exciting story.  Do something out of the ordinary.  Sign up for a triathlon, go on a road trip with friends, go downtown and hang out with homeless people.  Go do something that creates a memorable scene.  I believe in my heart the God created us to live memorable lives.  And by that I do not mean that others necessarily remember them but that we remember moments.  That we can look back and say, yeah, I remember that, it was crazy, but great.
       I am currently living a few of those moments right now.  My story had been boring, dull, and pathetic for a while but I have decided to not allow that anymore.  I have handed God his pen back and am letting him write those scenes and I am enjoying them for what they are.
I encourage my friends to do the same.  Live a great story, have some memorable scenes.  Think back to the movie "The Notebook" We have all seen it.  We all know the most memorable scene of the movie, ask yourself why it is memorable.  Then make those moments happen in your lives.
Opher