Back when
she was a little girl, Charlaine Dalpe could not have predicted the end result
of her spontaneous act, but she is glad for the way it turned out.
In 2004,
when she was 12 years old, Dalpe and friend Claudia Garneau tossed a plastic
bottle, with a message inside, into the Gulf of the St. Lawrence to see if
anyone would find it. The bottle was found, 8 years later, on the shores of a
small village in Ireland.
A couple of
weeks ago, nine year old Oisin Millea found the bottle and contacted
Dalpe. Somehow the story got the
attention of Tourism Ireland and they offered the two women a free trip to
Ireland to meet Oisin and to see the place where their bottle ended end
up.
The
interesting thing about this story is there that is no way those girls could
have predicted or engineered this result.
Once they threw the bottle in the river, they gave up all control. The events, as they unfolded, really had
nothing to do with them. All they did was initiate the process.
Thinking
about my life and spiritual things, I often need that reminder. I need to remember that control is an
illusion. I like to think I have a
handle on things and I run my life, but the reality is that I control very
little. All it takes is a sickness or a
bad circumstance to remind me there is much beyond the realm of my power. At best, I can be an initiator. At best, I can get things started. All I can do is “toss the bottle in the river”
and wait to see how things turn out.
Now, that
is not a bad thing. In fact, it is very
freeing. If I do not have to “make
things happen”, it takes a lot of pressure off of me. The results will come.
Speaking
with this same attitude, the apostle Paul says of his work with the church in
Corinth, “I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it
grow” (1 Corinthians 3:6). Paul knew he did
not did not control anything. In fact,
he had no idea what the result would be.
He just did his part. He “planted
the seed” and waited for God to do something with it.
So, forget
about controlling and shaping everything.
Forget about your plans and expectations and simply go and do the good
you can do right now.
Toss the
bottle in the river.
With God
involved, you may be shocked with where it ends up.
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