The wrong controller

            I was sitting in my son's room reading, when my grandson, then five years old, came in and sat down in front of the video games.

            "Can I play a video game Pop pop?" 

            "Sure Pal, you know how to turn it on."

            Out of the corner of my eye I could see him frantically hammering away on the controller, twisting his body in an effort to make the man on the screen move, but to no avail.  I kept hearing the "death music"... WHA WHa Wha wha. 

            "How's everything going, Pal?"

            "I can't get this guy to move!"

            Then I realized he was holding the wrong controller.  It was a one player game and he was holding the player two controller.  So I told him to put down the controller, go up to the box and work backwards to find the right one, the one that was connected.  At first he just tried to look for it but the wires were so tangled that he couldn't find it.  "Calm down a second Pal," I said, "Now put your fingers on the wire and move them down without letting go."  He did and it made all the difference.  Every man still died but it was because he had no clue how to play the game not because he was using the wrong controller.

            How many times in our lives have we done just what my grandson did?  We look at a situation and without first making sure that we have the right controller, we try with all our efforts to "fix it" or to "play the game" or to "handle it".  We hammer away at the fire buttons and rail our bodies about thinking it will make a difference.  And it isn't until we have either become so frustrated or someone puts their hand on our shoulder and says, "Are you sure you're using the right controller" that we sit back and start at the beginning. 

           

            And what should that beginning be?  Making sure you are connected to the source of all of the action, God. 

           

            Plug into His Word and hand the control over to Him, where it belongs.  And much like my grandson we may not be able to just look and figure out what we should be holding onto, we actually have to get back in touch with it.  The situation may be too confusing or difficult for us to observe from a distance.  We have to hold on and not let go as we move our hands down the wire.

SDG