Musings from the Wizard’s Desk — March 18, 2026
There’s something quietly unsettling about realizing how much of your life has been shaped by assumptions you never questioned.
I recently finished reading my grandfather’s autobiography—something I had read before, but this time it landed differently.
To the outside world, his life might not appear remarkable. He wasn’t famous. He didn’t shape history on a global scale. But within his world—his community, his family, his work—he built something meaningful, steady, and lasting. And the more I read, the more I found myself not just admiring him, but re-examining myself.
One of the things that stood out most was his focus. He committed himself to a narrow path and stayed there. He understood his strengths and weaknesses, developed first principles, and built his life around them. He didn’t chase every new opportunity or shift direction constantly—he stayed, worked, and eventually mastered what was in front of him.
That kind of life is becoming rare.
It forced me to confront my own tendency to move between interests, industries, and ideas. There’s a cost to that kind of movement. When you never stay long enough, you never fully become excellent at anything. My grandfather’s life was a quiet argument for the opposite: find your place, commit to it, and build something real over time.
But what affected me even more was something deeper—something I didn’t expect.
I grew up with a certain framework for understanding my family. My grandfather had been deeply involved in a Mennonite university that, over time, became more theologically liberal. My immediate family moved away from that world and into a Reformed Baptist system that emphasized doctrinal precision and “truth.”
And somewhere along the way, I absorbed the idea—without really examining it—that this made us better.
Not explicitly. Not consciously. But it was there.
Reading his autobiography challenged that in a way I wasn’t prepared for.
What I saw in his writing wasn’t carelessness with faith. It wasn’t compromise. It was seriousness. It was conviction. It was a lived-out belief that God was active, present, and involved in daily life. He wrote about prayer being answered in tangible ways. He wrote about moments—like dreams or impressions—that he understood as God’s guidance. And he didn’t treat those things as symbolic or metaphorical. He believed them.
And I realized something uncomfortable: I’ve carried a prejudice against that kind of faith.
Part of that comes from my own background. The Reformed tradition, especially in its more rigid forms, tends to be deeply skeptical of anything that resembles the charismatic. It prioritizes order, clarity, and control—and in doing so, it can also close itself off from categories of experience that earlier generations simply accepted as part of walking with God.
Reading his life forced me to confront that bias.
It gave me a new respect for where I come from—for a side of my family I didn’t fully understand, and, if I’m being honest, didn’t fully value. There were theological differences, yes. There were real issues over time. But in those earlier years, what I saw was a people deeply committed to their faith, their church, and each other.
And that community stood out.
Their church wasn’t something they attended once a week. It was woven into their lives. These were the same people they worked with, lived near, went to school with, and depended on. That kind of shared life built something we struggle to replicate today: trust, accountability, and genuine care for one another.
It’s hard not to feel that we’ve lost something in that.
The other thing that stayed with me was perspective.
My grandfather was influential in his world. He made decisions, led institutions, shaped people. And yet, he’s been gone for years—and the world has continued on without pause.
That realization has a way of cutting through a lot of noise.
It reminds you that no matter how important you feel in the moment, your life is still just one thread in a much larger story. That’s not a depressing thought—it’s a clarifying one. It strips away some of the ego and replaces it with something better: humility.
Closing Reflection
I came away from reading his autobiography with a little more humility, a clearer sense of where I come from, and a deeper understanding of my own identity within my family.
I also came away with a sense of pride in my grandfather—pride in the life he built and the way he lived it.
And alongside that, a quiet sorrow.
A recognition that I’ve spent much of my life carrying a sense of superiority and prejudice toward people I didn’t fully understand—people I might have been better for knowing more deeply.