Thanks For Your Time

For the past few days, the Summer Youth Institute at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary has been blessed by the presence of David Bailey. While here David played a concert for the scholars and led a workshop on faith and creative writing last night. He was energetic with the high school students, cracked jokes, and played the guitar beautifully picking with his long quick fingernails. David has recently released his 23 album and is leaving directly from the seminary to go to the New Wilmington Mission Conference.

David also had a brain tumor removed just 7 weeks ago. He is learning to balance himself again and was warned by loving family and friends to not come to the seminary to play, saying he was not fit for travel. David, however, wanted to be here and nothing was going to stop him, especially not an ailing body. You see, over 13 years ago David was diagnosed with brain cancer and was told he had six months to live. Ever since then, time has been something very important for him. He has written many songs about time and talks about how he spends his time with family, friends, and especially drinking coffee. David does not dwell on the fact that he has overcome cancer multiple times, but he definitely does not ignore it either. He is very aware of his limitations with vision, being partially blind on the left side, and his balance. These limitations, I believe have only made him more aware of the blessings of life.

Ironic, isn't it how we sometimes only see the blessing in our lives when they are threatened, hindered, or away for a certain amount of time. I hope the take David's life as a lesson, so that I do not need to wait for my freedoms and gifts to be threatened to appreciate what I have. I hope we can all take time to appreciate time. Take time for others, to truly talk to them. Take time for yourself, to sit quietly and listen to yourself and God. Take time to be in awe of the world around you. Time, like so many things in our lives is not a renewable resource, there is a limited time that we will be here. I am not trying to be morbid, but am attempting to spur myself and others to live life, to appreciate the small things, and to forget about the trivial and unimportant things in life.

So, David Bailey, a man who has such precious time, thank you very much for spending the time you do have with us.