Okay, I want to paint a scene for you. So, it's National Treasure 2 (for the record I'm not a huge fan of this movie...Nicolas Cage, you try, but to no avail...but they have already put into image what I want you to think of, so here goes). The group gets into trouble as they find themselves in a room where the floor shifts from side to side as they move around. It's got one support beam in the center of the floor that keeps it perfectly balanced, but if any weight is placed anywhere else then the whole floor moves, like a giant, I'm-not-messing-around-sized, teeter-totter.
Let's put you or me on this floor, we at first start at the middle, but as time goes on we begin to see things on the sides of this shifty floor that we desire. So we take a step towards it, at first we feel the ground shift a little bit under our weight, but not enough to freak us out, so we take another step and reach our hands out and pick it up. But then, we see something farther out on the floor that we want even more than the thing that we have. So, we begin to step out again, farther and farther on this floor until we feel the entire floor start to fall out from under us and in a frenzy, a panic, a mad sprint we dash to the other side of the floor to compensate for how much we overstepped on the other side and we feel the floor descend back into its normal position for a nanosecond, but then it too begins to plummet downwards into the dark abyss, so we sprint again to the other side and that continues until we are exhausted from running.
"The man who fears God will avoid all extremes." -Ecclesiastes 7:18b.
God is the one who stands at the middle of this treacherous floor and softly calls our name as we run past Him trying to overcorrect ourselves. "Child, if you would rest and stay here with me, your floor will settle out, you will find peace." "Oh God, You don't understand I've got to fix this, I've got to correct my mistake and this is the only way to do that. I have to make up for the bad that I've done!"
We think that we have the solution to the problems that are in our lives; we think that we can fix our mistakes, but we end up worrying, or sprinting, or panicking through life until we are so worn out we lay down and just let ourselves fall. It takes giving that up and listening to the words of our Father for our panicked sprints to cease and for us to settle into the peace and steadiness that our Lord gives us. That's not to say that our lives will be smooth sailing, that as we put our trust in God, our finances will be abundant and school will get easy and our relationships will be perfect, but that we will find peace in the fact that God has control and desires good things in our lives and we trust that He is Bigger than our problems!
What extremes do you resort to? How do you dismiss God's call to rest in the middle ground and dash from one falling floor to the other? Think about them, lay them down before the Lord, and discover the rest God extends to us, the middle ground and firm foundation He places underneath our feet.
