Chuck and I enjoy eating out. We have our favorite go-to spots and a list of got-to-try places. As we left Corner 16 the other night, we recalled this memory of eating there when the girls were little. Only then it was a Ruby Tuesday. We watched that Ruby Tuesday slowly die. Declining food quality, bad service. Every time we went in there you could tell the place was gasping for air. No one seemed to care. So no one was surprised it closed down.
It was, after all, a bad location. Nothing could ever really succeed there. Blah, blah, blah.
As we exited the packed parking lot of Corner 16, with a wait at the door to get in, I told Chuck it was amazing to see how new management with a fresh vision and creativity could turn something around.
Turns out it wasn’t such a bad location, after all.
This picture in the natural captures my spiritual attention. What areas of my life, or your life, are slowly dying, and all we throw at it is neglect, hopelessness, and resignation?
Do we have dreams or incredible ideas God has given us that at the moment are hard, declining, or frustrating? Sometimes, we would rather make excuses instead of asking for radical help.
I find often instead of going to Him for “new management with a fresh vision and creativity,” I am blaming and quitting. How about you?
Here’s the point. Jesus changes everything. Can you even imagine how the lame man felt when Jesus asked him, “Do you want to be well?” (John 5)
Imagine if I went to the Ruby Tuesday management, and I said, “Do you want to have a thriving, brand-new concept that will blow your mind? It’s going to cost you more than money. It’s going to cost your very belief system. You will have to rethink, reshape and re-order your whole life. You in?”
The lame man looked at the King Over All Impossibilities and — made excuses. No one to help me…While I am trying…Someone else gets ahead…
The crucial moment followed. Jesus gave the lame man specific instructions.
Get up.
Pick up your mat.
And Walk.
Or. Stay the same.
The last part Jesus didn’t audibly say. But the choice was crystal clear. Get up in faith and take radical action to go forward, or stay where you are in the same mess and hurt and sadness.
Look at your world and THE world. New Management is on the scene. It can’t help but change. Healing of every human wound and heartache and sin is on the scene.
Radical help and radical healing are ours. What can we do today to get up and walk?