For one year, I chronicled seemingly small, but actually enormous moments of God’s beauty over at The [in]Significant Things. Things like the way steam from pasta feels on my face or carrying groceries in the rain or flipping a bag of jelly beans around.
I loved writing about the Lord’s goodness and presence in the mundane and everyday…so I’m going to carry on the tradition. Each Sunday will be Soul Food Sunday here at Blair Blogs, with a post inspired by God’s little nudges…enjoy & may this Sunday and every Sunday be a day of breathing and space, of reflection and finding your balance and foundation in this busy world.
Today, as with most Sundays, began with waking up, showering, and throwing on clothes and makeup before heading out the door to church. You see, I work in the nursery during the first service, and attend church during the second, so I have to get there early.
Upon arrival, I could tell immediately that it was going to be a busy morning. I had barely walked in the door…
“Blair! Can you help in the two-year-old room until the other volunteers get here? We have five toddlers already!”
I check my watch. It’s 8:50am. Church doesn’t even begin until nine. I have a feeling I’m going to be looking after a lot of kiddies this morning. Of course I can, I say with a smile, and head into what can only be described as mass chaos.
Dolls and plastic food and blocks and trucks cover the speckled carpet. There are three or four children in the room at the time, but over the next ten minutes, the tiny crowd swells to eight.
Someone bumps his head, squeals, yells for daddy, sets off the all too familiar domino effect of crying babies. The craziness continues. Finally (finally!) they’re all calmed down (for the most part), and I’ve begun building towers of blocks for these little people to demolish.
One little girl is watching me put the red, blue, yellow, and green cardboard blocks on top of each other and mimics me as I count.
“One, two, three, four…”
The biggest toddler of the bunch runs over and sends the blocks flying.
We do it again. And again. And again. I keep on building the tower, the kids keep knocking it down. But then I notice…
I never have to replace the first block, the one sitting on the carpet. That one stays put. The second, third, fourth…they fall every time they are body-slammed. The first one though, that one doesn’t move.
Until my little building helper decides to replace it. She absentmindedly chooses a block that’s dented, the cardboard crushed in on the sides. She places the bruised piece on the carpet and tries to build on top of it. She can balance one block, maybe two, but then the tower falls. No one pushes it, the boys aren’t running into it, it just falls.
The previous tower with the perfect block as the foundation was able to hold ten or eleven blocks before it fell. This one can barely hold two.
The Holy Spirit nudges me.
This tower is like your life. When you choose to build it on a perfect and strong foundation, when you allow the Lord to take control, you can handle more, you can love more, you can be more of the person I want you to be.
When you choose to use things of this world as your foundation–well, you’ll fail every time. You can only handle so much on your own. Then, you’ll fall.
I sit with a wee one in my lap, fighting back tears. Remembering that nothing can replace the awesome, never-shaken foundation that God alone can offer. Not money, an awesome job, a great boyfriend, the cutest clothes, a nice car…just God. Only Him.
On Christ, a solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand… “My Hope is Built,” Shane & Shane (beautiful song, take a moment to listen to it)
And so, as I walk through this day, as I walk through this week, as I walk through this life, I will try (and fail) and try again to choose the perfect, strong foundation. It’s okay if I fail. It’s okay if I loose my blocks to a strong wind or a body-slam. They’ll fall back into place as long as I continue to choose the perfect block and deny the bruised one any place in my tower. Christ as my foundation is a daily choice.
“The Lord is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.” Psalm 18:2 (NIV)
God bless you.
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