Do you ever feel like you just wanna run and hide?
The world seems to be against you, your friends have lied to you, stolen from you. You just feel like there’s nowhere to go. You just wanna get away from it all. The world is so sick and disgusting; people you thought were your friends aren’t.
Things you thought were true haven’t been, and it just seems to get worse and worse as the days pass on with no hope in sight.
There’s no one there to comfort you, no one there to save you from your misery and pain, no one else seems to get it or maybe they don’t see it because they don’t care.
It only adds to your loneliness because you feel like these feelings you have inside are only felt by you. You walk through your home a stranger. Your family doesn’t see you, they don’t seem to care. No one takes even a second to genuinely look around. It’s all rush-rush-rush.
Hurry up and work our guts out so I can sit back and put my feet up and do nothing. My ex-husband used to have a saying and it rings so true in our world today.
He said, “They’re in a hurry to get nowhere fast.”
Maybe you’ve been there yourself. Maybe you feel like that today. Like you’re rushing around trying to get somewhere but just as you start to feel like you’re actually making progress, something happens and you move two steps backwards again.
My kids are into playing this racing video game right now, and it’s you competing with three other cars.
As you drive along racing, trying to get first place, the temptation is to always use your guns on your Disney car to shoot the cars ahead of you. If you shoot them, they explode and you get ahead of them.
The problem is that they can shoot back also. So even if you’re driving along, minding your own business, they shoot you and you go backwards. It seems like a game of chance hoping and praying they don’t shoot you while you try your best to obliterate them.
And here’s the deal, even if you DON’T shoot them, they STILL shoot you! It’s not even retaliation but always just “chance”.
Doesn’t it seem like how the world is? Constant temptation to destroy your neighbor at a chance to get ahead, to win the race. But even if you win the race, you’d know how you did it.
You cheated.
You destroyed.
You lied.
You stole to get there, and while this doesn’t bother the person apart from Christ, it SHOULD bother His children.
The Bible says, in principle, that even when they shoot at you, don’t shoot back (Deuteronomy 32:35; Romans 12:17-19).
Okay, no retaliation, I’m good, right?
Wrong!
The Bible also says, in principle, to consider your neighbor as more important than yourself (Mark 12:31).
So…what…I go through, don’t shoot anyone and drive slow in life so that everyone can pass me by so that I can treat them better than myself? How will I ever get ahead like that?
Here’s the answer…
You get out of the race, and you help everyone you meet to get out of the race, too!
Listen, if you constantly feel like you’re just getting ahead only to go backwards, it’s because you’re comparing yourself to others.
God set you out on a path, so magnificent, but you’re not seeing it because you’re too busy trying to compete or be like everyone else.
You think there’s some massive timetable in which you have to complete all these tasks by, but who controls time?
And who is absolutely sovereign?
God is!
So you’re not on the world’s timetable, and you’re not on your own timetable; you’re on God’s. And has not He created us to all be unique?!
Your journey won’t look like other people’s. You have very unique God-given skills and abilities, and you grow at exactly the pace He wants you to grow.
There have been times in my life where He’s given me an assignment or task to complete and I thought to myself, “Aha. I’ll get it done quickly and be able to move onto the next thing faster.”
But when I got done, He made me rest (Psalm 23:2). I didn’t get ahead at all like I thought I would. I was “just in a hurry to get nowhere fast.”
Listen, every day you make a contribution to the world – good or bad.
You say something on Facebook that is negative and destructive and others come along and see it, and it makes them stumble, too, or you do something good for your family, and they thank you for it.
If we add up all that good and bad daily, collectively for the whole world, that’s what the world IS.
You don’t have to change the entire world, but you should be diligent to do YOUR part.
Every good thing you do matters!
Every bad thing we do that we think no one sees, IS SEEN by a loving and fair God.
The truth is that you probably shot someone this week in the race.
We are all in the same boat; we’re not trying to pretend we’re perfect here (1 John 1:8).
You shot someone. You said something negative that affected others. You were in a rotten mood. You snapped at your kids. You stole the parking spot and justified yourself.
Whatever it is that you’ve done, repent. Tell God you’re sorry. Ask for forgiveness because you’re NOT alone.
God IS there!
He IS watching. Your children are watching. Your spouse is watching. Your friends are all watching, and it’s about time we stop blowing each other up, get out of the race completely and stand before the Maker of heaven and earth and ask Him what He would have us to do.
It’s as simple as that.
We need to show the watching world what GOODNESS looks like, because if we DON’T…how will they know?
