I was working at the school that day. This little one, who could be quite precocious, had earned some free time and spent it playing with thin multi-colored rubber bands and a pegboard. She had proudly hummed, and strummed a bit on her "rubber-band guitar," but now it was time to put it away and head back to class.
Dressed entirely in pink, she could be as charming as she was strong willed. Hesitantly, she put away her creation. It wasn't difficult to see the wheels turning. Her speed slowing. She was thinking.
"Leave the rubber bands here," I reminded her. And as she rose to go, I saw it. Her little hand was curled shut and kept oddly behind her. There she stood. All three feet of her. Her little hand tightfisted and hidden from my view. "Did you take a rubber band?" I inquired from the desk. "No." she said demurely, looking anywhere but at me.
I rose. Going to her I said, "May I see your hand please?" She opened it. There, as expected, was a little colored rubber band.
So why?
Why did she do it?
Why did she feel the need to curl her little fingers around it and hide it from my view.
I think what struck me the most was that her actions revealed what she truly believed about the rubber bands & about me. Of course she would try to sneak them, if she didn't believe I wanted what was best for her. If she didn't believe I was good and wanted what was best for her. She saw me, perhaps, as a dream or joy squasher. And so, because she just couldn't believe that it would ever be this good- she was refusing to let go?
I've done that with God. I have my dream, my little colored rubber band, and deep down I don't believe that God's is good or able. And so, I clench my fist emotional fist about it.
I remember a "rubber band" that I loved. It was a house. Our dream home. A new, two-story home, with an entry-way to die for. Fresh paint, new carpet, and a layout in my mind that could never be improved upon. During that time, a friend cautioned me, "hold on to it loosely." I knew I needed to, but it was difficult, and I reveled in all it had to offer. Sure there were many drawbacks financially. Sure we didn't have much of a family life with Kent working all the time just to make the payments.
Just like it was time for that precocious half-pint to go to class, it was less than 6 months later and it was time for us to move. We were moving to Park Rapids, MN. And with that, I had to let go of one of beautiful rubber band. My emotional fist tried to clench around that house. I wanted to take it with me. And then I remembered. "Hold on to it loosely" The house was good... but not the best. There was much better to come.
What are the little colored rubber bands that you hold in your hand? Is it a dream? an ideal? Or expectation?
you hold on so tightly? Our God is not a dream squasher- but an interpreter and full-filler of dreams. But like my friend so wisely said, "We must hold on to them loosely." Almost give them up, like she did that little band. Then, in His perfect timing- He brings about the best.
Perhaps Oswald Chambers says it better:
"Arise from the dead." — Ephesians 5:14
"All initiative is not inspired. A man may say to you – "Buck up, take your disinclination by the throat, throw it overboard, and walk out into the thing!" That is ordinary human initiative. But when the Spirit of God comes in and says, in effect, "Buck up," we find that the initiative is inspired.
We all have any number of visions and ideals when we are young, but sooner or later we find that we have no power to make them real. We cannot do the things we long to do, and we are apt to settle down to the visions and ideals as dead, and God has to come and say – "Arise from the dead." When the inspiration of God does come, it comes with such miraculous power that we are able to arise from the dead and do the impossible thing. The remarkable thing about spiritual initiative is that the life comes after we do the "bucking up." God does not give us overcoming life; He gives us life as we overcome. When the inspiration of God comes, and He says – "Arise from the dead," we have to get up; God does not lift us up. Our Lord said to the man with the withered hand – "Stretch forth thy hand," and as soon as the man did so, his hand was healed, but he had to take the initiative. If we will do the overcoming, we shall find we are inspired of God because He gives life immediately." My Utmost For His Highest 2/16
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