Reach Forward
A few summers ago, I noticed people wearing white jackets with jeans, and determined I needed to buy myself a casual white jacket, too. If I could find a bargain deal, all the better!
At the store, I began "hunting" the white jacket. As I stood before the mirror, trying on one jacket after another, as I put my arm into a nice velvet jacket, I had the feeling that this was "the one" as I buttoned it up. The body fit perfectly, but no matter how I adjusted it, the sleeves did not feel right.
This jacket had already been marked down several times from the original price; yes, it was brand-new, but because of the strange way the sleeves lay, no one had wanted it. Here it was, a cast-off, even though it had never been worn. I knew that I could remove the lining and that would probably fix the problem, so I showed it to the manager, and she marked the price down even more.
As a bargain-hunter, of course I was thrilled! I'd found my jacket, and gotten a better deal than I'd originally imagined! When I got home, I removed the sleeve lining, carefully finishing the seams by hand. I excitedly reached into the sleeve to see how lovely it would look on.... but much to my dismay, it was still twisted! What a frustrating experience! I had done everything right and it still didn't work out like it was supposed to!
Persistent, I stood before the mirror in my dining room, adjusting, twisting, and turning around and around. I had been so sure that I knew what to do. Intently, I moved my arms to see how the fabric would lay smoothly, and suddenly I saw it. The sleeves were reaching behind me instead of forward. When I reached my hands behind my back the fabric lay correctly!
Ah-ha! The sleeves were in backwards! I knew a simple way to fix that, and the jacket would be the way it had always been meant to be! Enthusiastically, I headed back for the tools to swap out the sleeves- and as I made the modifications, like a bolt of lightning, it hit me that everyone's life is like this jacket.
Sometimes things in our lives get twisted, and askew despite our best efforts. No matter what we do, things just don't work out like they are supposed to- and we despair of anything functional much less magnificent to come of our lives. It is in those times that we need to have the ability to critically assess our own thoughts and be honest about whether we are reaching behind or forward. Every one of us has felt like a cast-off, useless even before ever getting a chance to see what we may become.
This is the time to truly consider those hidden things that need rearranging so that we are Reaching Forward. Our destiny may depend on it!
“…But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize… “(Philippians 3:13-14)
What is behind you that is destroying your value, and ability to be what you were designed to be?
• What is it that just isn’t right that you have been settling for?
• What is in your past that you need to let go of?
• What will you be intent about?
• What did you give up on, because you thought you had done everything right?
• How can you use new skills to rearrange your life?
• What modifications can you make today?