Inspiration comes not from waiting but through work

Life Lessons

August 18, 2010

By David Key Lake Oconee Breeze Lake Oconee Breeze Wed Aug 18, 2010, 08:00 AM EDT

LAKE OCONEE — Ernest Newman reminds us that great composers do not set down to work because they are inspired, but become inspired because they are working. Beethoven, Wagner, Bach, and Mozart settled down day after day to the job in hand with as much regularity as an accountant settles down each day in his or her figures. They didn’t waste time waiting for inspiration.

How about you? Are you waiting for that inspiration from God? Don’t. Get to work. It will come. Wishing you much love and much light.

—The Rev. David W. Key, director of the Baptist Studies Program, is involved in recruitment, admissions, student life, counseling, placement, and development functions for Emory University’s Candler School of Theology. He teaches in the Contextual Education program. He is the founding pastor of the Lake Oconee Community Church at Reynolds Plantation. Contact him at (404) 727-6350 or dkey@emory.edu. His

column appears weekly in this space.

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Life Lessons

Pray for faithfulness in the midst of life’s challenges
Oswald Chambers, in his book “Run Today’s Race,” taught us that faith for my deliverance is not faith in God.

May 17, 2012
Don’t put off the most important thing
As Douglas MacArthur said, in war all tragedy can be summarized in two words, “too late.”

May 10, 2012
What are you delaying in your life?
In the early ‘90s, U.S. News and World Report told us that Chicago learned one price of neglecting the underpinnings of all its economic growth.

May 3, 2012
Find a community and become a part of it
Harry Emerson Fosdick reminds us that the Great Wall of China is a gigantic structure which cost an immense amount of money and labor.

April 26, 2012
Let God be your passion
A woman rushed up to famed violinist Fritz Kreisler after a concert and cried

April 5, 2012
Pray for God’s will and nothing else
At a meeting of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Bobby Richardson, former New York Yankee second baseman, offered a prayer that is a classic in brevity and poignancy: “Dear God, Your will, nothing more, nothing less, nothing else. Amen.”

March 22, 2012
Not too early to make Easter plans
Fritz Kreisler, the famous violinist, once said

March 15, 2012
God calls on you to overcome your obstacles
Do you have a lot to overcome in your life? David Livingstone, the pioneer missionary to Africa, walked over 29,000 miles during his ministry.

March 8, 2012
Are you coasting in life?
Bertoldo de Giovanni was the pupil of Donatello, the greatest sculptor of his time, and he was the teacher of Michelangelo, the greatest sculptor of all time.

February 23, 2012
Will your soul take the high road or low?
John Oxenham wrote the following poem:

February 16, 2012
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