Snowballs or Butterflies: (Audio)
Ever lived during a trial when it seems like problems keep multiplying? It’s like rolling a snowball down a hill. It starts off small, maybe nothing larger than a baseball, but it collects more snow along the way. Before you know it, a monster has developed! With its own momentum and power!
Ever lived during a trial when it seems like the problems keep multiplying? Click To TweetI have a theory. When there are scary little problems surrounding our campfire, we imagine them to be worse than they are. Before you know it, they multiply! We do nothing to manage them when they are small…even though they may be scary issues! They morph into bigger problems and attract other inconsequential problems to them like a magnet.
Now, think about where your problems come from. Ever heard of the “Butterfly Effect“? Hurricanes may be formed by something inconsequential, as small as a butterfly flapping it’s wings way across the ocean. That little swirl joins forces with other situations and before you know it, there’s a tropical depression formed that grows to hurricane force. Slam! There go the islands! Bam! There goes the mainland!
Before you play the Blame Game and put the responsibility for the creation of your problems onto someone else and feel satisfied that it’s “not my fault”… take a step back and ponder …
It may just be that most problems are our own fault.
The magnification of these problems left unattended is definitely our problem to deal with. Every single day.
Here’s my thought. We often take part in the issue when it should be left alone, ignored, or kicked to the corner. When you take the side of wrong, you are part of the problem. When you ignore it issue, then you perpetuate the problem.
Your power comes in trapping the problem and dealing with it before it can grow any bigger.
It was Solomon who said,
“If you take part in a crime you are your worst enemy, because even under oath you can’t tell the truth.” (Proverbs 29:24, CEV)
Until you take ownership, then the problem will haunt you day and night! It will find other problems and before you know it. Bam!! There goes life!
How do we fix the problem? Here are three thoughts, and they are probably better stated with your own voice than mine.
- Take ownership of the fault. It’s mine. I did it. I allowed it. I babied it into existence…
- Then identify and address the root of the problem so it has no future power to exist.
- Take responsibility for the problem and fix it yourself!
Fixing without addressing the root will only put it off for a season. Like a pesky dandelion, it will return again and again. You must handle the problem and the root of the problem.
A quick thought from Jesus. And an analysis from me….
“When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. Then he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes, he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with this wicked generation.” Matthew 12:43-45 NKJV
When a problem is addressed and fixed, you better find something else to fill the empty space…else the problem could return with a support system of its own!