What was it, 50 years ago? I may or may not be remembering myold TV shows correctly, but it seems to me the old Kung Fu series, starring David Carradine (Grasshopper) is where I remember this from. It is the saying that has reverberated over the ages in various forms to come out something like this, “The Teacher has become the Student,” similar to “The Student has become the Teacher.” In our second FOCUS session in February, I did an amazing job of somehow steering the 24 people present down the path of understanding the point of the conversation, only to have the whole group go down another path. I’m still thankful to Rick for providing the words of wisdom at the very end that helped straighten out the mess I had created (even though everyone still had positive things to say about the session). You see, this was a session designed to wrap up the “What has God called us to BE” discussion and not start down the rabbit hole of what we DO. Well, although the entire gathering headed down the “do” path and what was supposed to be principles that defined our passions, we had an impressive list of things that we’re excited about doing. Just so you know, here are the words that we concluded with as the church’s passions: The love we receive and have for God, our love for one another, and how God provides giftedness to each and all of us.On the way home that day, I finally figured out the problem. I was using the wrong word the whole time. In the FOCUS program the way I had laid out the format, Iwent from identity to beliefs to passions to God’s calling to inspirations to actions. What resulted in the process for passions is that it was exactly what I had in mind for inspirations. The third part of our identity is not clearly defined by the word “passions.” There is a far better word that fits there, and I am so happy to have learned this: Motivation.We are a welcoming, caring gathering of Christians who believe in salvation in Christ and the need to grow in our faith. And the final part of the identity statement might sound something like this, “…and we are motivated by God’s love for us, how we share that with him and one another, and know that each of us has a purpose in kingdom work.” Something like that. I am more than happy to be leading this program here. It is, obviously, still a work in progress that has had great success so far. But as God reminds me from time to time, including last month, sometimes the teacher needs to become the student. I hope you join us on March 17 as we discuss God’s unique calling for Kilmarnock Baptist Church. Or at least that’s what I think we’ll call it. Dave