I double checked my list and decided I had everything I needed from Costco. I pushed my cart to the front of the store where I usually use the self-checkout line. But, this time I noticed a couple of checkers had no one in their line so I pushed my cart up to one and started unload my 10# bags of carrots onto the conveyor belt. I saw a man breeze on by me with a bouquet of flowers. My mind registered that he was going to check out ahead of me! I was just a little flabbergasted at his rudeness, but I chose not to say anything since he only had one bunch of flowers. He clumsily pulled a single rose from his bouquet of a dozen and gave it to the clerk. I listened as he droned on about why his wife had requested that he never give her a bouquet with a dozen roses and how every time he buys her roses he gives one to the clerk who checks him out. He appeared to be in his fifties and I was a little amazed that he had managed to stay married to the same woman for so many years. The clerk appreciated her flower as she was a middle-aged woman who was not in a relationship and would not be receiving flowers from anyone this Valentines Day. When the man heard her story he said, “See, there is a God.” The clerk agreed, “Yes, there is a God.”
In the meantime, while I had no real issue with letting the man go ahead of me as he only had one item, (even though he spent enough time talking to have checked through a half cart full of items,) I did wonder where the God in this man’s life went as he rudely blew past me without acknowledging my presence to check out ahead of me.
It did remind me though how many times I have left God behind as I do what I want to do at the moment. Just like the man with the bouquet of flowers obviously felt he had good reasons for cutting in line in front of me, I breeze right past God as He tries His best to get my attention and tell me not to fall for the sin that I am so single mindedly pursuing.
It’s so easy to explain away my many small indulges in sin and feel pretty good about not committing any really big, bad sins. But, in the end it’s all sin, big or small. Seen or not. Every time I give into my selfish desires over the desires God has for me it’s like piling up one small shovel full of dirt at a time. Eventually all my little sins create a bigger pile of dirt than one or two big shovelfuls of dirt.
“Let the Holy Spirit direct your lives, and you won’t care about satisfying the desires of your sinful nature. The desires of our human nature and the desires of the Holy Spirit are in conflict with each other. They’re like two powerful forces pulling in opposite directions, so you can’t always depend on what you feel as being the right thing to do.” ( Galatians 5:16,17 The Clear Word)
