Previous Challenge Entry (Level 4 – Masters)
Topic: SHIFT (05/27/21)
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TITLE: A Sticky Situation | Previous Challenge Entry
By Donna Powers
06/01/21 -
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My Dad tried to teach me, but I just couldn’t get the hang of it. I was so overwhelmed by the magnitude of driving a motor vehicle that each step in the process loomed huge:
1) Adjust the mirror (I turned it every which way but loose before I was satisfied)
2) Look both ways in my rear-view mirror (I’ve never been so fascinated by the view from my cul-de-sac; in my life.)
3) Shift it to reverse (Ok? Where do my feet go? There? Ok.(I've got this - for now )
4) Turn the key. (Oh my gosh; oh, my gosh, I’m driving the car!)
4) Take your foot off the break and shift to reverse (I think I can. I think I can. I think I can... yay! I’m in the road!)
It was as scary as unanesthetized root canal, but I galumphed the car out of the driveway.
My father - who must have asked God for a quadruple portion of patience on those days, just clenched his teeth and prayed I would soon get it right
But when the car started going forward? That’s where things got really confusing for me. I wanted to pay complete attention to what I was doing but the accelerator and the clutch both needed my undivided attention; at the same time. And I just couldn’t give 100% to both. So my father and I eventually agreed I would stick to cars with automatic transmissions.
That was 50 years ago, and nothing has changed. I’m still buying cars with automatic transmissions. But life sometimes brings me into situations where I have to divide my mental efforts into multiple focus areas.
Like when my teenager tells me her life is over; because Alvin Culligan asked “that airhead” Mimi Loman to the dance; while I am also going through the monthly bills for the fourth time in order to figure out how we can afford a new air conditioner.
Or listening to my husband griping about how unreasonable his boss is; while I am also saddened by a prayer request our for one of the ladies in our prayer circle who is going for a biopsy tomorrow.
I want to pay close attention to all these pressing things in my life. I want to give simultaneous focus to all
the people I love.
But, just as I couldn’t give 100% of my focus to two important areas when learning to drive, I also can’t give 100% focus to four different problems.
But unlike stick shift driving, which required me to focus on both aspects of the car at once, I've learned life doesn't necessarily require me to mentally multitask. I've learned even though I couldn’t learn to shift, back then, my spiritual survival at times like this requires me to shift.
It’s a different kind of shift, of course.
I’ve learned to shift control of all those things - and of all the other things which inevitably follow - to God. When I give Him back the reigns of my life, the Spirit can show me the way to give each crisis it’s proper focus - and to do each next right action -the solutions becomes abundantly clear.
As long as I remember to always shift the burden of all my imploding crises to God - and as long as I follow His wise and loving lead, I find it easy to avoid “popping the clutch” of my life.
He’s a much better Driver than I will ever be.
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Proverbs 3:6 "In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths."
1 Peter 5:7 "Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you."
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