Shifting Sand, Shifting Perspective
I saw a sand moving art also called a sandscape sensory toy tip over. The blue sand poured down, saturating the white sand, making swirls and drifts downward. At the bottom of the sensory toy, were bumps that diverted the sand drifts into different swirling patterns. As each drift poured into another, it affected the next one, altering its course. The entire process was quite beautiful and mesmerizing.
“But what did this have to do with me?” I asked the Lord.
“Each shift in the sand is a shift in perspective. Each grain interacting with another is a relationship. Two or more people relying on and doing life with each other.”
“How can we humans calculate all these changes this shifting sand to determine what we should do next?” I asked.
The answer is, of course we can’t. But He had a deeper understanding for me.
“The most important thing is not so much what you do but who you interact with. Your relationships and obedience are more important than any task or job you could complete in My name. I cannot stress enough the importance of obedience to listen to where you are supposed to be located because of its link to who you will have near you to interact with. Every time you meet or speak with another person it is an opportunity for a divine connection. One word spoken into someone’s heart can have a profound impact on the trajectory of their life.”
“Focusing on the task or assignment at hand is always secondary to the love I want displayed in your everyday interactions. It is never a waste of time or effort to prioritize loving interactions instead of task completion. I have created you to be in a relationship relying on, helping, and encouraging each other. It is a delight to Me, to see you reaching out to help someone I have put in your life to love and minister to.”
***
Have I been prioritizing action over relationship?
I’m a type A personality and am one that will work myself to the bone. I’m learning how foolish this is. What had I been trying to do? Impress God?
I have been soul searching after coming out of a time when I served the Lord to the point of exhaustion and emotional breakdown, I realized I wasn’t serving according to His desires but my own. I was willing to sacrifice relationship with myself and others to do the job. To feel that sense of accomplishment.
I had put my priority on the job instead of loving others while serving. Which of course is the emphasis that those in the world advocate is best——work first, people second.
***
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.” (Isaiah 55:8-11, ESV)
Prayer for you and me: Lord Jesus, we ask for Your eyes to see who you have put right in front of us. Who needs Your loving touch today? Break our hearts for what breaks Yours. Shift our perspective like shifting sand. We want to put first things first according to Your priorities. We don’t have Your so we relinquish our will and control to You. In Jesus name.
Comments