We’re all back in the city of angels for the first time since those nomadic years. First Girl and Little One take it all in, wandering the streets with wide-eyed fascination at all the characters, some even in costume.

This place, it has a pull. It calls to people with whispered promises of fame and immortality and legacies that will last. And if you’re not careful, you’ll pour out your one life at the wrong altar.

We walk across stars and names and the prints of a fleeting presence, and the irony can’t be missed: You think you’ve reached the top but really, you’re just another place for someone to stick their shoes.

Maybe you left a dent in the cement and set a few records, but when it all goes through holy fire at the end, will you be left with gold or a pile of ash?

First Girl and Little One, this life is full and rich and bursting with experiences and things in which to delight. But never for a minute think the thing or the experience IS the delight or you will cheapen both it and yourself.

They’re avenues and opportunities for delighting in Abba, to experience our Creator-King and catch a glimpse of Heaven this side of the veil.

See, you can spend your one life running after the dream or running after the Dream-Giver. Sweet girls, pick the later and you’ll never be disappointed. You will get bruised, and suffer and probably wind up looking crazy to the rest of this upside down world but you will have poured your life out for the only audience that matters. An audience of One.

And that, my littles, is a life well lived.