POTENTIAL IN A BASKET OF BUILDING BLOCKS

Recently I had the privilege of being in our church nursery, as I do each month during service. For the last couple of months ZC my 10 year old has come along to help. She loves to play with the babies and I feel like it gives her a sense of being a servant and an opportunity to be a blessing to the little ones and their mamas. She was exceptionally helpful this time and really really enjoyed playing with the babies. I had the joy of watching her and as she emptied the basket of building blocks the Lord reminded me that the basket of blocks held great potential in her hands. She could choose to take each block and build a tower tall in strength and stature or a strip mall long and stretched out across the floor. The builder has the power to create what he/she can use each block to create. Everyone of those blocks represents a life experience. 1 block may represent a family member leaving while another may represent graduation another may represent the birth of a child and still another the death of a parent. Each block separate and yet when they are placed together they offer one another strong support, a foundation on which the next one is built and supported. So much like our own lives, we don't choose the experiences. God gives us those. He builds, shapes and creates each block and it's up to each one of us to build the structure. We use the foundation, the strength of each previous block to build on to create the life we are meant to have. We can choose to build it tall, overlooking the many structures around us or we can choose to build it wide.

As ZC built her tower one of the younger children came by and with the swipe of a hand the tower tumbled to the ground and the blocks went everywhere and she rebuilt it over and over again. Quite honestly there are just going to be days when our tower gets knocked down, days when our blocks get scattered and again we are afforded an opportunity to rebuild or let them lay where they fell. There are times when we let them lay for a bit, catch our breath and begin to rebuild and more often than not we never rebuild quite the same. Many times our towers will never  look quite the same after its been knocked down but it is always OUR tower.

There are times in my life I have sat and thought how did I get here? When did my life take this turn or that turn and that is it. My life took that turn when someone knocked down my tower and I got here and there by how I chose to rebuild it. So often we take on a victim stance pouting because our tower has tumbled to the ground. We get caught up in the moment of what someone has done to us but knocking it down and neglect to see the opportunity that is before us. It is an opportunity to make things different. Rebuilding our tower is the chance to do something new, make a different turn, use a different set up in our life. The knocking down of our tower is really more of a gift than a set back. Rebuilding is a time to reevaluate how we have built the structure in the past and how we can make it better for the future. Rebuilding is a time to take that "safe" strip mall with a side foundational base and build a dangerously high tower or to add a shaded area or bridge. It is the opportunity to reshape what we once thought was permanent just by rearranging a few blocks here and there. So the next time your tower gets knocked down take a breath, take a minute to reevaluate and start rebuilding. You probably be pleasantly surprised by the next structure you erect!