Flamingos

As most of my readers already know, Norwalk Alliance Church does a fundraiser for the youth that, quickly summed up, is a flock of flamingos showing up overnight in someone’s yard. You can buy insurance so if it happens the youth will pick them up, or you can put a hit out on someone else, or pay to have them removed if you didn’t want to do it yourself. It all started back when Andrew Berry was Pastor and, long story short, it’s come back a few times as a fundraiser.

This past weekend our house got hit with a flock for the second time. The first time I quickly had them fly off to another house; however this time they came too late at night and we didn’t find them until morning. Now, true to myself, I was bound and determined to make sure they found another place to play that evening. I planned out my hit and waited all day to finally send them off to their new location. That was the easy part, though, as when I got to the place I was going to leave them, I encountered a few issues.

Issue number one was that the lights were on at the house and it looked like people were moving around. Second was that the garage door was open and it was probable that someone would be leaving at some point and spot the flock. Though, despite all of that, decided to go on with the hit. I was walking towards the house to guide the flock to their home for the evening when I spotted a neighbor who had probably seen me way before that. Instead of turning and calling it all off, I instead went and talked to the neighbor, told them what I was up to and why, and everything was good with them. After that I finally was able to get the flock into location and then got out of there myself.

Now, why do I bring up this fundraiser on my blog this week? It’s because of a lesson that I learned while doing this, or should I say was reinforced. It’s always easy to find a reason to quit and not continue on with something. No matter the preparations that were put in place, there was probably going to be something that I didn’t think of, and it could have easily been the thing that threw off the entire event.

The same thing goes for the work that we are to do for God. The devil is out there trying to throw up road blocks for us that will cause us to turn away from God’s plan and give up. If you give up enough times you’ll be defeated as most don’t continue to try. Yet, if it’s really worth doing, you can find a way around the issues that come up and still complete your mission.

No, the task of placing the flamingos in someone’s yard isn’t a vital task for God, but it does have a part. Yes, I could have easily turned around after seeing the obstacles and gone to someone else’s house and gotten them instead. Yet – I found solutions for the issues I was presented with and completed the task. When I focused on the mission at hand instead of the problems I was presented with, the solutions became easy to find.

The next time that a road block is presented when you are trying to do God’s work, change your focus. Focus on the mission and the value that He places on you completing your tasks. The results of that completed task will be great, although you may never see them in your lifetime. The Kingdom will advance….and it’ll be because you did your part – despite the obstacles that presented themselves.