The other day me and my girls had gone to visit my sister and her family. As we were looking at the gifts my nephews had received for Christmas my sister was holding one in her hand that she was getting ready to put away. She said that her mother had gotten them for the boys, but when she looked at all it entailed she said there was no way she was going to even attempt with putting it together. I looked at the box and then took out the contents and said, “Let me try it.” They thought that I was crazy, but I didn’t have any doubt I couldn’t do it. It was a very long an strenuous process. It was a roller coaster that had a million tiny pieces. And looking at the picture there was a big hill and at least four loops with curves. You had to follow directions which caused you to be able to pay attention to details. Now that is one of my strong points. As I would progress they stood in amazement and were surprised that I hadn’t given up yet. My sister told my I had the patience of Job. She said, “You have been steady, diligent and focused.” I was almost finished with it, but there was a part at the bottom that wasn’t working properly which was causing me to get frustrated. It had already been at least three hours that I had been working on it and I was a little tired. I couldn’t understand what was going on because I had followed the directions. I had  to improvise in order for it to work. When I looked at the back of the instruction manual I realized it operated on batteries. You have got to be kidding me, right. I had not noticed it said anything about batteries until I looked at the front of the manual and there it was. I’m not sure how I missed that. Either way I was able to get it operating, but the cart wasn’t gaining enough speed to make all the transitions. I couldn’t figure it out to save my life. Frustrated, I decided to pull myself away from it. Deep breath. In the back of my mind I was still trying to figure it out because I wasn’t willing to give up on it. I had come to far and had put too  much work into it to just let it go. Something said, “Start the cart from the bottom of the hill and reverse the direction  it was pulling up the hill.”  With excitement I screamed, “I did it, it works” Everyone came in to see it. There were two areas within the loops that it wouldn’t complete the flip, but with a little push it completed the loops and started over. We were all happy with that. My nephew was ready  to try it for himself. 

Zechariah 4:10 ” Do not despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin, to see the plumb line in Zerubbabel’s hand”

Sometimes we can become discouraged, frustrated, overwhelmed and want to give up because we think what we are doing isn’t working. But the same process it takes for a seed to become a plant, a flower or even a tree or a caterpillar to become a butterfly, is the same process it will take for our visions, hopes and our dreams to come into fruition. We have to keeping working at it and watering it. Before we know it the very thing that started off small has turned into something much bigger than we had even expected.  What was once a dream has become a reality. My encouragement to you is, “Don’t give up on it just yet.”