MOVING MOUNTAINS

I’ve been trying to move mountains with my faith this past week and I’m a bit tired. It all started in the soup aisle at the grocery store. I had intended to make a quick stop to pick up a few items, then dash out to my next errand. Somehow, my cart became wedged between the employee stocking salsa and the little old lady with a walker trying to select soup. “Please God, let her choose quickly so I can just get on with my day,” I thought to myself. I tried to pray myself patient, but no luck. I tried to pray her to move forward, but no luck. Finally, she dropped a can of soup and I sprung into action to pick it up for her, which caused her to move on down the aisle. She thanked me profusely, but I only said a quick “You’re welcome,” and escaped to pay and leave.

Upon my return home, I tried to get my 17 year-old cat to eat. He is basically blind, paces a lot, and is losing too much weight. If I coax him, he will eat a fair amount, but not this day. He just sat there, unwilling to eat unless I would pet him for quite awhile. “Please God, let him just eat this food so I can go make dinner,” I prayed out loud hoping he would get a clue. No such luck, he sat still and refused to eat. I tried again to pray myself patient, but again, no luck. Finally, I put his favorite treats in with the food and tricked him into eating a bit more. I hurried upstairs to start dinner.

Later that evening I went out to the compost bin to check its progress. I am not very diligent in tending the contents of the bin, so I usually have to wait a long time to get decent compost. I looked at the black plastic bin and realized that the tree above it had grown enough to keep it in the shade. I summarized that without the heat of the sun, it did not heat the compost enough, thus further delaying the results. Perhaps I could move the bin a bit into a sunnier spot? I tried to push it for awhile, but this only made my back hurt. I was in no mood for an uncooperative compost bin and tried to figure out a way to move it with my own power. I recalled that I had been successful in figuring out how to get the little old lady and the little old cat to do my bidding, so there must be a way to solve this problem as well. Maybe another prayer for enough faith to move mountains, or at least compost bins would get the job done, right? Somewhere in the back of my mind I heard a voice that sounded like Dr. Phil asking, “How’s that working out for you, Kim?”

As I pondered a solution, I opened up the bin and began turning over its contents. In the process of stirring things around, I started to realize that the problem was not related to the location of the bin itself, but related to the contents within the bin. It needed more of the nitrogen-rich “green” ingredients to create the proper balance required to generate enough heat for decomposition. There were too many carbon-rich “brown” ingredients in the bin, leaving the contents cold.

I thought about my other two mountains that day, and realized that I was again trying to move another mountain with external force. I was trying to force a change in the situation by my own power and prayerful demands for faith. But like my compost bin, I realized I was lacking one essential heat producing ingredient. This ingredient was not composed of nitrogen, or carbon, but rather love. Without this love, I was left cold and unbalanced on the inside. As I replaced the lid on the compost bin, I began to see my mountain-moving experiences in a new way. I slowly began to realize that the little old lady did not need my silent, self-centered prayers to get her to move faster down the soup aisle. What she needed was a loving person to help her read the labels and reach up to assist her in making a selection. Similarly, the nourishment the little old cat needed was not from a can of cat food, but rather from that of a loving touch.

So Paul is right, we can have all of the power in the world, even enough to move mountains, but that is nothing compared to love. As Paul tells us later in 1 Corinthians 13, this is the greatest of all and will last forever. So if you’re inclined to do a little mountain moving in the future, let me offer you a bit of advice. Skip the back-breaking physical exertion and the insistent prayers for greater amounts of faith; just give in to the power of love. See how that works out for you instead. Amen.