Imagine all of the obstacles a person might have to overcome if he were to walk from New York City to San Francisco. One man who accomplished this rare achievement mentioned a rather surprising difficulty when asked to tell of his biggest hurdle. He said that the toughest part of the trip wasn’t traversing the steep slopes of the mountains or crossing hot, dry, barren stretches of desert. Instead, he said, “The thing that came the closest to defeating me was the sand in my shoes.”
When I read this comment, I was reminded of the Christian life. We triumph over major obstacles but too often are defeated by some insignificant little thing. Faced with a powerful and threatening spiritual foe, we rise up and become overcomers in the strength of the Lord and His might. But we let unkind word, some small setback, or a minor misunderstanding get us down. We begin to feel so sorry for ourselves that we yield to discouragement. In despair we give up the fight and fall short of our goal – just because a little “sand in our shoes.”
Sir Francis Drake, the 16th-century English explorer who had sailed around the world, was crossing the Thames River when a violent storm threatened to sink his ship. His cry was: “Shall I who have endured the storms of oceans be drowned in a ditch?”
We might well ask ourselves a similar question: “Shall I, who have come so far by faith, be downed by ‘sand in my shoes’?” The answer? A resolute “NO!” – Richard W. De Haan
Our life is too short to be little
And over the small things to fret;
It’s better to live and be happy
And learn to forgive and forget. – Anon.
We stumble over pebbles, not mountains.
- May 21, 1985, Our Daily Bread
For You 