Men are sometimes notorious about not asking for directions, so don’t fall out on the floor when I tell you about two of them who made a call and asked for help.
My husband, Paul, is a masonry contractor. We’ve been in business for 43 years now, and throughout those years Paul has consistently added new skills and techniques—recently when he was working on a fireplace for a customer.
The fireplace renovations had messed up a few places on the plaster around the fireplace. Paul had never done plaster work before, but he likes to leave his jobs with everything pristine, so he and his employee, Aaron, went to the building supply store and bought a bag of plaster mix.
They dumped some in a bucket, added water, and then used a drill mixing paddle to blend it. The first batch worked perfectly. So they mixed a second batch—but there was a big problem: It dried before they could get it on the wall. The third batch did the same thing—it dried too fast.
At that point, they decided to call the company that made the plaster mix so they could talk to one of their reps. She explained what had happened, “The first time it worked because the bucket was clean. When you made it the second time, you didn’t clean out the bucket first. You’ve got to keep the bucket clean.”
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She also explained that they had to use a slower hand trowel for the mixing, not a speedy drill mixing paddle which made the stuff dry too fast. Her parting comment: “You’ve got to go by the directions.”
It worked. Once they’d asked for directions—and followed them—they were able to fix the wall without any problem.
Just as Paul learned that he needed to slow down and use the hand trowel instead of the drill paddle to mix the plaster, I learned in our spiritual lives we can’t rush God’s process.
As the company rep said, “You’ve got to go by the directions.” God’s instructions to us are all found in His Word. Guidance for what He wants us to do. Warnings about what will mess us up. And wise counsel for every matter that concerns us.
But those directions won’t do us any good unless we follow them. So I want to pay attention to what He says, because then He can mold my heart and life into something of beauty. How about you?
