Ducktaped Shoes and Lemonade

This a picture of my sister Andrea's old tennis shoes and they've got quite a story behind them. Incase you haven't noticed (or read the title), that really is blue ducktape wrapped around them. She'd worn those shoes out awhile ago but we just hadn't gotten a chance to buy her new ones until recently, so for about a month she wore them like that with a bit of ducktape covering the holes. She would change the color of the ducktape every now and then (once it was purple), and she even decorated it with stickers.

Whenever someone would comment on her shoes, and most people did (usually not very nicely either) she would smile and say, "I'm starting a new fashion!" Then she would giggle and wiggle her feet before turning and skipping away. At this reaction, most of the girls would exchange "what-ever" looks, roll their eyes and simper down the hall, their new designer boots clicking loudly against the cement floor.

I'm daily learning old lessons I thought I'd had down, but ones God gently shows my I don't. Sometimes he shows them to me with through his Word, other times he speaks to my thoughts, and other times he uses people close to me to either speak out or live out the message he wants to send me. In my sister's case the message was the age old, told-by-every-mother-and-grandmother-on-the-planet-and-preached-by-every-pastor-behind-every-pulpit, message: In everything give thanks.

Now I KNOW I'm not the only one who gets a little tired at times of hearing the same message over and over and over and over and over and over (sigh) and OVER again right? Ever wonder WHY we hear those messages so often when we've had them committed to memory since the age of four? How about this: Ever dared to askGod why? The answer is simply that God knows ALL. And no matter what we think, or do, HE knows if we really have learned these simple lessons that are read, spoken and pointed out to us so many time. Usually we KNOW the lessons, but we haven't LEARNED them.

This was something he pointed out to me through my little sister's ducktaped shoes. Did Andrea want to go around with ducktape on her shoes? Nope. But did she complain? Whine? Scheme and plot a plan for getting what she wanted? No. Because my little sister had actually learned that age old mother-spoken-pulpit-preached verse. "In everything give thanks". She didn't just give God an empty, "Thanks for giving me some dirty, hole ridden, worn out shoes and for not leaving me barefoot." Instead she proved her thankfullness and her reliance on her Heavenly Father by creatively inventing a way to wait for him to intervene. And she did so with a smile.

You've heard the Proverb: When life gives you lemons make lemonade. I'd like to add to that: and drink it with a smile. Maybe you didn't want lemonade. Maybe you'd planned for something else. There's nothing wrong with that, but do you really want to waste weeks, months or years moping because you didn't get what you'd planned for? Even one day is too precious a thing to waste, for we'll never have that day to live again.

So the next time you're given lemons maybe you'll take the chance to finally learn that little lesson, that God has been reminding you of. Maybe you'll remember my little sister's ducktaped shoes, her willingness to wait, and to wait with a smile.