I Want Some Impact
This past Saturday I was blessed enough to be able to spend the day out at Bethany Camp, which is a farm converted for conversion.
As the day was ending a couple of others and I drove out on a gravel road to watch the sunset. On the way back, however, you could see camp across a few valleys.
This is when I thought of everything that had been accomplished there that day. It was a lot, but at the same time was it anything at all?
So often I desire to have an impact in what I do. Who doesn't? Yet looking at what was only quarter-sized from this distance, the fact that what we do ourselves can never have much impact, really stood out. It is simply impossible to work hard enough. Sure, we accomplished some projects, and half started a pile more, but that was all on a patch of this earth only a few acres in size. What about the rest of the world?
It's not real hard to move that over there, clean some stuff up here, build something next to that or whatever. But impact and change only comes through God. Maybe I can see things happening around me, but it is naive to think that I am the orchestrator. Things may be happening, but it is only because God is making them happen, even if I'm not acknowledging that.
We can work. We can work hard. We can band together with sophisticated machines and techniques to shift stuff and things everywhere, but we can never hope to actually achieve anything without the help of our creator. Not-messed-with history easily shows the truth of this.
Yet when we do band with the designer....stuff happens. Most importantly people change, for the better. Aren't people's lives and hearts at the center of what impact is anyway?
My personal impact on people is generally negative, to say the least. How can I impact others when obviously I care for myself the most? Without God, I would use and manipulate others to my advantage, I would try to get the most out of the least, I would eat all the candy in the dish and leave none for others. I would do all of this while at least trying to give the impression that I care about others. I would believe that myself.
I want some good impact though. So I'm with the impact-er. Not only do I know a little about Him, but more importantly, He knows me.
Do you seek to make a difference? Do you feel your life pulling yourself and the people around you that you really try to care for down?
You already know my answer. Let the impact-er impact your life.
As the day was ending a couple of others and I drove out on a gravel road to watch the sunset. On the way back, however, you could see camp across a few valleys.
This is when I thought of everything that had been accomplished there that day. It was a lot, but at the same time was it anything at all?
So often I desire to have an impact in what I do. Who doesn't? Yet looking at what was only quarter-sized from this distance, the fact that what we do ourselves can never have much impact, really stood out. It is simply impossible to work hard enough. Sure, we accomplished some projects, and half started a pile more, but that was all on a patch of this earth only a few acres in size. What about the rest of the world?
It's not real hard to move that over there, clean some stuff up here, build something next to that or whatever. But impact and change only comes through God. Maybe I can see things happening around me, but it is naive to think that I am the orchestrator. Things may be happening, but it is only because God is making them happen, even if I'm not acknowledging that.
We can work. We can work hard. We can band together with sophisticated machines and techniques to shift stuff and things everywhere, but we can never hope to actually achieve anything without the help of our creator. Not-messed-with history easily shows the truth of this.
Yet when we do band with the designer....stuff happens. Most importantly people change, for the better. Aren't people's lives and hearts at the center of what impact is anyway?
My personal impact on people is generally negative, to say the least. How can I impact others when obviously I care for myself the most? Without God, I would use and manipulate others to my advantage, I would try to get the most out of the least, I would eat all the candy in the dish and leave none for others. I would do all of this while at least trying to give the impression that I care about others. I would believe that myself.
I want some good impact though. So I'm with the impact-er. Not only do I know a little about Him, but more importantly, He knows me.
Do you seek to make a difference? Do you feel your life pulling yourself and the people around you that you really try to care for down?
You already know my answer. Let the impact-er impact your life.
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