Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Can You Be More Specific?




Mandy, my darling wife, was riding towards her sister’s house from the nursing home after a long day of sitting with her father.  Her sister lives in Downsville which is about 12 miles north of Interstate 20.  As she began driving on the country road leading to Downsville, she all of a sudden was confronted with a horse in the middle of the road.  A big red horse was standing in the middle of the road.    Deciding that this could be a road hazard for someone else behind her, she called 911.
911 operators have such interesting conversations.

Mandy gave her name and told of the horse standing in the middle of the road on the specific highway.  The operator asked her, “Could you be more specific?”  Whereupon Mandy answered, “Yes, it was a big red horse!!!”

Now some of you will get the funny part of the story about three to four hours later or when someone explains it to you.  Some of us realize the humor of the situation.    The operator was obviously asking for how many miles the horse was from Interstate or what mile marker could the horse be found.  Rather than focusing on the location of the horse, Mandy was focused on the color of the horse.  

There are times when we are out of focus with things which God is very specific.  Now sometimes we just want to play dumb.  But most of the time we know more than we realize.

For example, Jesus said to love your enemies and do good to those who curse you.  Pray for those who mistreat you.  Luke 6:27-28.  We understand every word in that sentence.  For some of us, the letters are in red meaning that Jesus said this!  However, we want to excuse ourselves from such nonsense.  We would rather talk about other things.    Jesus is quite specific about it.  Specific and clear.

So the task for us is to be more specific in our daily living.  Our daily living is to be love specific.  It is to be missional specific—helping those in need.  It is to be prayer specific—PRAY—don’t THINK! 
 
So where are you?  And don’t even talk to me about a big red horse!

Pray for me as I pray for you.

In the Master’s Name,

Rev. Dr. M. Jack O’Dell

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