The following was taken from a copy of Leaves of Gold, given to my father-in-law in 1963.
Verbs-”No one really knows what it is to live until he can truly say these eleven great verbs of life: I am, I think, I know, I feel, I wonder, I see, I believe, I can, I ought, I will, I serve. Life is but the process of learning through daily experience the meaning of these eleven wonderful little verbs of life and acquiring the personal power of each:
I AM: the power of self-knowledge,
I THINK: the power to investigate.
I KNOW: the power to master facts.
I FEEL: the power to appreciate, to value, and to love.
I WONDER: the power of reverence, curiosity, worship.
I SEE: the power of insight, imagination, vision.
I BELIEVE: the power of adventurous faith.
I CAN: power to act and skill to accomplish.
I OUGHT: the power of conscience, the moral imperative.
I WILL: will power, loyalty to duty, consecration.
I SERVE: power to be useful, devotion to a cause.”
-George Walter Fiske
These verbs are quite powerful in nature, and as you think about how each one impacts your life, you become rather amazed that you are what you say you are. For instance, if you say, “I can,” that opens up a wide range of opportunities. You believe enough in yourself to acknowledge that you can, in fact, do wonderful things. “I can” because I have the power to accomplish great things. When was the last time you thought, “I can”? Perhaps today is when you acknowledge that you can do hard things. Never doubt that you have been placed on earth at this particular time in order for God to work through you to do His will.
As I read through the list of verbs, I wondered who Mr. Fiske was and how he had the insight to write this interesting list. Here is what I discovered, “George Walter Fiske was a Congregational minister for some years in Maine and Massachusetts before taking a position in 1907 as a theology professor (later dean) in the School of Theology at Oberlin College, where he stayed until retirement in the nineteen thirties. He was educated at Hartford Theological Seminary and Amherst College and graduated in 1898 with a BD from Hartford and an MA from Amherst. He later got a PhD from Boston University in 1925.”
I can’t help but think that Mr. Fiske wrote these words to encourage, inspire, or perhaps challenge some of his colleagues or even personal friends. We are all learning about ourselves each day, and if we take the time to truly consider what we have learned, perhaps we will realize that we have the power to be an action verb..
This week, I want to challenge you to consider one of these eleven verbs and concentrate on just one. Consider the power you have to make a life adjustment and then see how your life has changed at the end of the week. Hopefully you can say that you have made a difference in someone’s life, even your own.
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