A Sunday Kind of Story

I’ve always liked this story.

“Take a look at this jar,” the teacher told his students, holding up an empty glass jar. Would you agree that the jar is empty?

The students agreed, nodding their heads in acknowledgement.

“Now, if I put these golf balls in the jar, would you agree that it’s full?” the teacher asked, filling the jar with golf balls.

Again, the students agreed … the jar looked full.

“But look, I can put little pebbles in the jar,” he said, adding pebbles that filled the spaces between the golf balls. “Would you say the jar is full now?”

The students once again agreed.

“Okay, but if I take this sand …” the teacher added, pouring sand into the jar, filling the spaces between the golf balls and the pebbles. “NOW would you say the jar is full?”

“It’s full!” the students cried out, wondering where all this was leading to.

“You think so?” he asked, producing two cups of coffee from behind the lectern. “Watch this.” The teacher poured the coffee into the jar, and of course the jar accommodated the added liquid.

“This is a lesson in life,” the teacher said.

“The jar represents your life. The golf balls are the really important things – family, faith, friends, work, charity. The pebbles represent other things that are important to you – your house, your television sets, your car, your clothes. Y’know, your worldly possessions. The sand is everything else, stuff you can do without.

"As long as you have the really important things, there’s always room for the other things. But if you fill your life with sand or pebbles, there’s no room for the golf balls. So make sure you take care of the golf balls first.”

“But what about the coffee?” a few students cried out.

“Ah … I’m glad you asked that. See, even if your life is full, you always have time for a couple of cups of coffee with your friends."

Care to join me in a cup of coffee?