Little by Little
Col. 1: 10-11 You may live a life worthy of the Lord and please Him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to His glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience.
I am looking out my office window at Douglas fir trees that are over 200 feet tall. They are dark green, stately, and graceful. The Douglas fir tree has relatively small cones that are full of small seeds. Each one of these huge trees outside my window grew from one small seed. This is how God works. He takes the small and then He grows it big.
When the Israelites were preparing to enter the promised land God gave them a promise. In Exodus 23:30 He said, “Little by little, I will drive your enemies out before you, until you have increased enough to t take possession of the land.” God started small, slowly decreasing their enemies because He wanted His people to go big. God wanted to grow the Israelites capacity to handle what He had planned for them in the future. He didn’t want the demands of the promised land to overtake them; He wanted them to overtake the promised land. God was continuously increasing them throughout their journey. He would prune them of their weaknesses and bless, increase, and help them to grow their strengths.
Just like thousands of years ago with the Israelites, today God wants to increase us. Unfortunately, it is not uncommon for us to get impatient with the process, overlook the small things, and just want to go big. We may even think that it’s ok to overlook the small things because they aren’t big enough to make much difference anyway. It’s easy to think how we treat our spouse when we are tired or all the complaining about our job doesn’t really matter. Perhaps it’s a matter of integrity, such as leaving the office a few minutes early, because the boss will never know. Maybe we think we don’t have the right education, finances, or know the right people to achieve the dreams God has planted in our hearts.
These are just a few examples of what many people think of as the “small stuff”. However, God says what we believe and our attitudes are very important. The small things matter to God and if we don’t learn to handle the small things He won’t be able to trust us with the big things. In Luke 16:10 Jesus says, “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much”. Perhaps you need to forgive someone, show up for work on time and not leave early, or speak only positive things. These may seem like little things but it’s only “little by little” that you can go big. If you want a great marriage or that promotion at work you have to daily do what is right in the small things.
Remember the biggest trees started with the smallest seeds.
