Have you ever stood next to a pond or a lake and skipped rocks across the surface? It has always been something I thoroughly enjoy doing, so much so that I’ve spent uncounted minutes lost in thought as rock after rock skid along the glossy facet of water. For those of us who enjoy such an activity, it can become a sort of meditation…a physical activity that requires a certain amount of hand and eye coordination, yet doesn’t require extensive focus or effort. As the rocks skip along, touching down with every pull of gravity, they leave neat ripples in their wake as they bounce back up in the momentum of their forward motion.

In many ways, we are all akin to rocks skipping across the giant pond of life. We are moving with a momentum we can’t control, touching down and leaving ripples in the world around us. When we sit back and allow God to be in control of our trajectory, we will undoubtedly leave a beautiful pattern of ripples in His perfect design. He chooses us, one by one, like choosing the perfect stone…smooth and flat, fitting ideally into the hand.

However, where we are left to work with whatever rocks we can find, often sorting through several before coming across one we deem worthy of a good toss across the pond, our Heavenly Father has a perfect use for every single rock on the shore. Every imperfect soul was created by Him, each one formed exactly as He intended, to be used successfully in the manner He has planned. Consider the notion that success is found in the rock’s lack of involvement in choosing it’s path. All it has to do is be a rock, understanding that the rest is up to the hand guiding it across the water.

“Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above; it comes down from the Father of lights [the Creator and Sustainer of the heavens], in whom there is no variation [no rising or setting] or shadow cast by His turning [for He is perfect and never changes].” James 1:17 AMP

Our flaws and issues are not in His way as we strive to serve Him in this life. Quite the opposite, actually. He sees every bump, crack, and scar, and He has a use for every single one of them. When we toss a rock that isn’t suited for skipping along the water’s surface, we end up with a clunk and a splash, the chosen rock sinking quickly to the bottom, never to be seen again. But we are choosing specific rocks for one specific reason. The Father, on the other hand, needs every single soul in motion, creating a wide variety of ripple designs that all work together in forming one massive picture that an individual soul can’t possibly comprehend. Just as the rock is unable to see the ripples created with each impact, we are unable to see the ripples we are creating because we are in the middle of them, one impact at a time.

I am striving with all my might to learn how to put God first in my life. I want to live in a way that pleases Him, trusting with absolute certainty that doing so is the way to live in true peace and joy. Something I’m finding very difficult to determine is whether or not I’m succeeding in my quest. How do we know when we are putting God first? What does that look like?? I would like to say I have an answer for that, but I’m still trying to figure it out. As far as I can see, I’m stuck on one major stumbling block. I keep picking up the same boulder, expecting it to skip across the surface, and continuing to feel frustrated when in drops to the bottom with a significant splash. I suppose the key is to stop picking up the stupid boulder. The key is to accept that God has a use for it, and when the time is right, He will pick it up and send it sailing across the surface in the way it is meant to go.

We have all been blessed with various gifts, strengths, and weaknesses. We need to relax and trust that the Lord will guide us in when and how to use our gifts, and those things will increase as a natural result of proper use. We also need to be aware that we have weaknesses and do our best to recognize and acknowledge them, relying on the Father to give us the strength we need in the face of those incessant attacks by the enemy, who is always ready and willing to use them against us. We must remember that the Spirit of Christ lives within each one of us, and if we give way to that spirit instead of our own humanity, we have unlimited power and strength to accomplish the will of God.

“For God did not give us a spirit of timidity or cowardice or fear, but [He has given us a spirit] of power and of love and of sound judgment and personal discipline [abilities that result in a calm, well-balanced mind and self-control].” Timothy 1:7 AMP

Take time today to sit back and see yourself as God sees you…as His child, perfectly made to be exactly who you are, each imperfection seen long before it ever came to exist, thus already taken into account for use in accomplishing the trajectory of our lives as designed by the Father who loves us.