Pushing the Rock

I spoke of a class I took in the Navy concerning leadership training in a previous blog. One of the training sessions was centered on this huge rock in front of the training building. Our Instructor gave us a direct order one morning as a learning situation. Our task? Every morning we were to “push the rock”.

Sound silly? We thought so to but we did what we were ordered to. We had talked in length about this task. The consensus was, “we were trying to move the rock, however small a distance (it was a big rock!)”. We started measuring the rock from the steps of the building to see if we had moved it at all.

As we were getting near to the end of the course, the instructor asked us what we thought of the rock session. We told him we didn’t understand it one bit, the rock never moved and nothing positive came of the session. He simply stated, “I didn’t ask you to move the rock, I asked you to push it. I wanted you to work as a team but also realize, as a leader, you will give orders that may seem impossible but also may have another purpose behind them”.

God’s lesson in “pushing the rock” is he only gives us one small task at a time. Often we seek education, power, popularity, ambition, we long to see more than we see, and feel more than we can feel. We see people with the circular problems, always back to the same place, and we see very little real change.

Sometimes, God doesn’t want us to see the “Big Picture” because it may overwhelm us into thinking it’s impossible. Yet, in Luke it says, “What’s impossible for man is possible for God.” So what’s the plan?

God has a plan for your life and a plan for my life. We can abide by His plan or we can by-pass it and do what we want to do. The problem with doing our own thing or following our own plan is we will have to suffer the consequences.

If we are inpatient and choose to leave God out of our lives, we are headed for disaster. On the other hand, if we consult God concerning our issues, asking him to guide us according to his will, listening to his response, and then patiently waiting for his plan to kick into action, we will be in for a victory.

God always has a plan by which he works. That plan is not on the same timetable as ours. In other words, God puts his plan into action when it is the right time. We are aware of this because many times we have prayed and asked God to give us something or help us get something and it did not happen. It did not happen because it was not in God’s plan for us at that time.

During your lifetime recall the times you asked God to help you get that promotion or that particular job or position. How about the time you wanted to buy a certain house and the deal did not go through.
Remember your high school days and you had your eye on a certain young man or young lady, but a relationship never developed and you couldn’t understand why.

Sometimes, you just have to push the rock for a while. God is working as your pushing the rock, your muscles are developing, your stretching ligaments and tendons and your focusing on the task at hand. To be a spiritual warrior in God’s Kingdom you have to be in shape, you have to prepare yourself daily and you have to understand where you are to go to the next place.

Even as God gives you tasks or sessions in your life there may not be an apparent reason or result. God’s plan may be to develop and train you for the next task or session in your life. What you are doing now may have no rhyme or reason to you, but it does to God!

So don’t give up “pushing the rock!”