When a Little Thing Becomes a BIG Thing
On my last post I wrote about the Bigger and Better game and how a little thing can become a big thing. I’ve been thinking about that and had some thoughts I wanted to share. Many years ago when I was a single staff with The Navigators I had the privilege of having breakfast with Lorne Sanny who at that time served as president of the organization. Mr. Sanny was a godly ole grandfather type man with incredible wisdom. We talked about many things that morning in Myrtle Beach, SC but something significant happened in that 2 hour breakfast that was a defining moment for me. Toward the end of our meeting we spent just a couple minutes discussing ministry funding and he asked me if I was in debt. I immediately replied no and we went on to another subject. No sooner were the words out of my mouth that the Holy Spirit convicted me of my lie. The truth was I was in debt. I had a credit card that I did usually pay off monthly but the truth was I did have a debt at that moment. Mr. Sanny left to go the meeting room where he was the keynote speaker that morning and I sat in my chair debating the Lord on whether or not it was a real lie since it was a monthly card. After doing everything I could to justify my lie I confessed it to the Lord. Immediately the Holy Spirit convicted my heart that I should confess to Mr. Sanny asap. I was horrified. Oh, good grief. Why bother the man? He is so busy and in such demand at an event like this, etc. etc. There was a sense of urgency in my heart that I must do this so I hurried to the conference room, pulled him aside and confessed that I had lied to him about the debt. Mr Sanny responded…You did the right thing by quickly responding to the Holy Spirit. Always keep short accounts with the Lord. It is so important to respond to what may seem like a little thing before they turn into a big thing. Because it is usually the little things that will trip us up. His response to this situation impacted me more than anything else at the entire conference. Actually it was a life changing moment for me. Mr. Sanny spoke from Psalm 119:176 that morning and challenged those of us in Christian leadership to pray that we would not wander away from the Lord. The truth of the matter is a large number of us don’t finish the race well because we fall way from God. How does this happen? When we allow a little thing to grow into a BIG thing. Is there any “little thing” in your life that you need to deal with today? Any big thing? The longer we delay the larger it will grow until it eventually has control over us.