Piecing together the Promises

Have you ever wished for a neon sign?  Or wanted God to just SPELL it OUT?

Yeah.  Me too.

So then He did.

Today I’ve been in the 3rd floor copy room working on this weekend’s K-1 lesson on how God Hears Me.  One of the tasks I am currently tackling is making 4 “promise” banners to replace the mysteriously missing “Promise Pictures” that came in the curriculum kit.  Nothing fancy, just print ’em up, trim ’em down, tape ’em together and Vi-Ola.  Promises of God.  You know, for the kids.

Only wait just a minute.  Oh yeah.  They’re for me too.

(And you).

So I’m trimming and taping, trimming & taping when it hits me.  The promises are there.  Always.  It’s me who has to piece them together and make it work.

So as I trim  & stew about overdue bills and untidy rooms and endless responsibilities, I am taping the banners and pairing each concern with a promise.  Just like David did in the Psalms and just as my Large Group Guidebook instructs me to do in the lesson:

Write four poems by taking a feeling (angry, scared, sad, happy) and allow the kids to match it with one of God’s promises….lead the kids in praying the poem to God.

So I get to the last of 28 sheets of paper and the word on the last sheet is “me.”  I’m attempting to finish trimming “me” and end up butchering “me” with an uncooperative blade.  So then I have to get the Work Room scissors to more delicately prune “me” without inflicting total destruction and I realize something.

Trimming and pruning and refining are not fun and sometimes don’t entirely produce the end result the first time around.  A change of scenery and/or another tool/situation may be called for.

But if “me” submits to necessary and productive refinement, “me” may become a small part of God’s promise for someone else  in the grand scheme.

It would have looked so dumb with just a butchered up “me” up there.

Thanks God.  For your promises and for your Self.  YOU are the best thing about me.

I promise.