The Ripple Effect

On a rather emotion filled ride home from getting my wife's children, God placed a rather powerful realization on my heart. My wife had went through a divorce several years ago. Her husband had made her and her kids the victims of adultery. The children do not know the events that took place of course, but none the less feel the effects. They were missing their daddy, and it made for a heart breaking hour trip home.

About halfway through the trip my wife leaned over to me and said, "This may sound bad, but I don't think it is fair that me and the kids should have to suffer for him (their dad) choosing to leave."

I saw the tears well up in her eyes again, and my heart sank. It was in that moment that God spoke to my heart. He flooded my mind with an image of a pond. A smooth and heavy stone being tossed forcefully into it. The grand splash and the endless ripples that followed. Each ring going farther and farther out. Anything and everything in it's path being moved, changed and altered.

Not only did he speak to my heart, but he spoke through me. I began by explaining my own failings. See, I myself am no better than her ex husband. I too chose to leave my first wife. No matter what happened between us, no matter my or her transgressions, in the end, it was me who left. I threw the stone into the pond.

I explained that it all goes back to the idea of why God allows bad things to happen to good people. First of all, we are so narrow in our focus. We see only one, two or maybe three steps beyond our own personal lives when it comes to our actions. We see a suffering child, the death of a friend, or the mistreatment by others, and see them as unfair, or sent upon us by an unloving God. The truth is, in the end, this very thought is a selfish one. Even if not intentional. Many times we see these unfailr events and feel guilty or bad for what has happened. This is a normal feeling, just as it is normal to not want to feel that way. So what is the easiest way to not feel that way, wish it had never happened. We look at our own little world, maybe the world of that child or the parents, but never look beyond that.

Well know speaker Bill Ingram described it best. If you look at the story of the young boy on the bridge who gets stuck. His father is at the station and must choose between saving those on the train and his son. Bill goes on and states that the conventional view is God is the father, we are the people on the train, and Christ is the child who dies for the sake of the others. However, he says, if you look at the story as a whole, who of us could make the call the father made? Would we spare the child? What if someone on that train would someday cure cancer? Well then, save the train. But what if that child would someday be the next Billy Graham? Or maybe the father through the tragedy of losing his son would commit his life to help others, yet not do so if he let the train wreck. ONLY God is omniscient. This means he not only knows the future, but he knows every direction, every avenue that our choices will take us. Since we believe that God is perfect, and his plan is perfect, would we not want to make sure our decisions go the direction of perfection and right? God also takes the blows of life and turn them into his will and what is best for not just the person, but the world. The reality is, death and suffering is inevitable, and how or when we die or feel pain is based on the ripples we create, rather through our interactions or even the foods and lifestyle we live. No matter how fair or unfair it is.

Second, we are all given a choice. We are given the FREE choice to either follow God, or not. To live our life seeking to do his will or living daily focused on our own selfish desires. When we choose to walk away from God, allow sin in our hearts, and make selfish, self gratifying decisions, we send ripples that we never see, or do not feel for weeks, years or never at all. What God showed me this day was just how far reaching those ripples can be. I told my wife about how my decision affected my son and my ex wife. Those were easy ripples. I went on to point out the ripples that were not so obvious. It affected my friends, who I lost when I left. It affected my church, and the view they had of me and my wife. It changed my extended family. I then also pointed out that it keeps going beyond that. That in the end, it affects her, it affects her kids. Cause they are apart of my son's life now. It affects her parents who love my son. It changed things for my ex wife's boyfriend and his son. And the ripples go on, and on, and on. Some ripples I will never see, but even the ones that God put in front of my face were hard hitting enough.

I told her, that no matter how close I now get to God, no matter what my walk is when I die, my life and the lives of many have been forever changed by that one event. It is in that moment that I turned to her and said, "Isn't it amazing that we choose to do anything that isn't God's will when you think about the ripples you cause others around you?" I have been a changed man for a while now, but one thing that God made clear to me was that what I wanted as a man was NEVER what was best for me. So daily, I pray to my God, NOT MY WILL, BUT THY WILL. That simple prayer that has been so strong in my heart the past year or more, became even more passionately clear to me now. How could I EVER want to do something that isn't God's will ever again, especially knowing how I can directly and even indirectly affect those around me. It is said so well in 1 Peter 4:1-3 "Therefore, since Christ suffered in his body, arm yourselves also with the same attitude, because he who has suffered in his body is done with sin. As a result, he does not live the rest of his earthly life for evil human desires, but rather for the will of God. 3For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do—living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry."

As many Christians will tell you, suffering causes you to draw nearer to God. In fact, society as a whole is evidence to this. It has been shown that as the prosperity and perceived value of a society increases, the morality and need for God decreases. We become naive and selfish, thinking we can do it all on our own. That nothing can reach us. On the Sunday, and many Sundays after 9/11, people were so humbled by the tragedy and the reality of how fragile life is, churches filled up. Many returned to Christ. We had become complacent and were rattled back into reality. A well known speaker once said that in order for God to bless and lift a man up, he must first crush him. This isnt to hurt him, but all men have this natural desire to be in charge of our own lives. We want control. Breaking us, is a humbling experience. One that I myself have, and HAD to go through to TRULY find God.

So in the end my prayer has become stronger, and even more fervent....NOT MY WILL, BUT THY WILL BE DONE! AMEN...