Water Flowing Over A Rock

What is your life’s ambition? Do you have high and lofty goals? Are you planning to change the world? Do you want to have a positive impact in your community? Are you willing to be like water rolling over a rock?

When we are young, and sometimes not so young, we have big aspirations to change the world. We may even play the game of, “if I were in charge for a day…” Sometimes we fantasize about how we will make changes as we gain in power and influence.

For many of us, we never realize our dreams of making the changes we dream of. This doesn’t mean we can’t have a positive influence on the world around us. What it does mean is we must change our approach. We need to be like water flowing over a rock. What do I mean by this?

As water flows over a rock, it slow eats away at it. It eats away at the minerals making up the rock, cutting small grooves that change its shape. What was once a large, non-descript rock becomes a beautiful piece of art. Haven’t we all seen a rock that has been carved like that?

Unfortunately, making an impact like that takes time. In fact, it takes a lifetime. There are no shortcuts, no easy way around it, nor do most of us have the ability to make a major impact like a chisel and hammer carving the rock. Yet, we know people who make an impact in just this way. We don’t recognize it until we look back over their life of seventy or eighty or ninety years.

Jesus tells us that making this type of impact is exactly the work He wants us to do. As we serve others, the least of our brothers and sisters, we are serving God. As we feed, clothe, care for, visit, listen to, or give a cool cup of water to them, we are doing it for God. It is the small things that add up to big changes.

As you read the complete parable in Matthew 25:31-46, you will notice one thing missing from the list Jesus provides—preaching. This is not to say we should not have preachers or pastors or priests in our churches. It is to say that our general approach is not to preach to those we are trying to reach. It is also to say we cannot rely on one person to do all the reaching out to our communities. As the old saying goes, it takes a community…,meaning we all need to be like the water flowing over the rock to make our communities into beautiful places.

I pray we all determine to do the little things for someone in need. I pray we all decide to serve the least of our brothers and sisters. I pray each one of us will take up the challenge of having a positive impact one minute, one hour, one day at a time. Serve one another. Serve those in need. Be the hands of God. Make a positive impact.

Matthew 25:40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’”