Logjam

           I was reading a story about logjams this week and I went to YouTube to watch a logjam be unjammed and I got to thinking about the stresses and strains we carry.

          How do logjams begin? I think it’s because a log turns sideways to the flow of the water and encounters an opening under a bridge or a narrow spot in the river.

          If that initial log that’s stuck can get back into the flow of the river and keep from getting crosswise to the limitations it faces (bridge opening size, river width), then all will be well… but we know that doesn’t happen. Logs get stuck and then increasingly smaller logs pile up behind it.

          Isn’t this just like our life and our thinking can be! Big things, big challenges, in our lives come along, get crosswise with our personal limitations, create pressure, and we don’t get busy doing whatever we need to do to loosen up these “big things” as they occur and get them back into the flow of God that caries all things safely along the river of life.

          Instead of identifying with “the flow,” we identify with the limitation and we feel the pressure being applied upon limitation and all too often we don’t do the kinds of things that will loosen that one big thing and get it back into the flow of the river of life. The next thing you know, increasingly smaller concerns pile up behind that “big thing” until even the tiniest things add to the mess; smaller things that, on their own would sail along the river of life completely unobstructed… too small to be held back by anything… there’s too much pressure, and we lose it.

          Have you ever seen anyone explode over “nothing” and you wonder to yourself, “I wonder what that’s all about?”

          Big logjams, in the outer sense, are attended to with big resolutions from blowing up some of the logs to bringing in heavy equipment to break it apart, or move it around, in small chunks trying to get the debris back into the flow of the river.

          The flow of the river is like the flow of God. What we want to do is get all those worries, cares, concerns, fears, etc., into the flow of God.  When things get cross-wise in our live we want to do whatever is necessary to move them into the flow of God and let them be “washed away.”

          Whenever anything gets “stuck” with you, give it to God sooner rather than later; not because it’s harder for God later, but because the longer you wait, the more and more pressure you feel.

          What pressures are you feeling in your life today? Whatever they are, call God in to “do the heavy lifting” and get that big thing, or things, back into the flow of life where they’ll be quickly be carried away.

          How do we do that? I suggest when we are pressured by something, BEGIN WITH GOD. Sometimes we end up with God as a last resort.  That’s the hard way of doing things, and we don’t have to do it that way; we can begin with God.

When we realize we can connect ourselves with God and prove what Jesus said in John 14:10, “The words I say I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works,” almightiness begins to appear and free-up the logjam.

          How can we connect ourselves with God? Prayer.

          During a summer-long drought, a newspaper in South Carolina carried this story: “About 100 people gathered on the Lexington County Courthouse

steps, Sunday afternoon, and prayed for rain. 'We had a very specific prayer,' said the Reverend Henry 'Hank' Moody, Jr., pastor of the Pisgah Lutheran Church, who gave the prayer during the twenty-minute service. 'We prayed for a gentle, soothing rain for the land, a rain without lightning and storm, a rain that will nourish the land and refill the ponds.'” The

article continued, “That's a tall order, and the one the National Weather Services says won't be filled anytime soon.”

          Isn't that the way of the world? The world seems to say, pray if you want, but don't expect anything to happen because of your prayers.

          But by the next weekend, the city had gotten more rain in that one week than in the previous three months combined!

Prayer is a kind of thought. There are two types of thought: God-thought and problem-thought. 

I suggest that what we need to do is look to God instead of identifying with our own problems.

Maybe you say, “Oh, but I don’t identify with my problems.” I think that we do so more than we realize. When we say things like, “I am

·        not smart enough

·        unhappy

·        not pretty

·        not handsome

·        sick, or

·        poor, etc.,

we are focusing on a limited perception of ourselves.  Those limitations are what you perceive you are.

You are not.

          Perceive something different, like the power and presence of God working in you, through you, and as you… that’s the key that will open new doors to a richer experience of life by unjaming that logjam.  Have faith in that.

          If you think you don’t have faith, or you have too little faith, just remember this; let’s call it rule number one: GOD IS CHANGELESS.

(There are only two rules to a happy life (1) God is changeless and (2) remember all rules)

          Please don’t let those words go in one ear and out the other; God is changeless.  Think about that. Contemplate this question, “If God is changeless, what does that actually mean to my life?”

What God gives in one moment God gives fully in every moment, eternally. What heals one thing heals everything.

When we “worry-talk” (problem-talk) to ourselves in the middle of the night or during the day; whether we do it verbally or silently; whether it’s about lack, or hard times, or our health… when we “worry-talk” we would do well to tell ourselves, “There is no place for these things in the mind of God.”

Did you ever notice this about Jesus? Before He performed a “miracle,” He blessed what He had and what He was about to do.

There was no place for trouble in His mind.

This week, if you’re willing, bless everything you have, whether you think of it as a lot, a little or a perceived void… and bless everything you do before you do it (or bless it after you do it if you forgot to bless it beforehand. Blessing is not limited by time or space).

Remember in times of doubt, worry, fear, or confusion, bless yourself with this reminder, “There is no place for these things in the mind of God”