Connecting Dot to Dot

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him, and He will make your paths straight.“ Prov. 3:5-6

Fifty three years ago this week, I went forward at VBS and accepted Christ as my Savior. Some things have happened recently and as I look back over the last 55 years, I can see God‘s hand in everything and saw it is all connected. When I was praying recently, it came to me that my life is like a numbered connect a dot page.

First, I found number 1-I was born. At some larger number along the way-I accepted Christ. I drew the straight line connecting number 1-2-3 and so on. I continue drawing lines from number to number as I go. At 1, my birth, I had to put my pencil down to make a mark.

As I moved on from dot to dot, slowly I begin to see a picture. I feel like my life has been a page of dot-to-dot – so many connections and evidence of God‘s hand on the pencil moving through my life.

As a pencil needs a hand to write, I need God to move and guide my actions. He is the pencil and I am the lead. Every line from…  number to number, dot to dot leaves a mark. He must hold my life in His hand to draw a picture - the final masterpiece.

Each dot represents a joy or challenge. It leaves its mark for the world to see.

At times, I look ahead and I can’t see where to go next. Where is number 16?? Where is number 52? Keep seeking, you will find it.

The innermost part of the pencil is the lead, my core being. What’s in the inner most part of my being is what leaves a mark on the world. What’s at my core? Sometimes my pencil lead, my core, needs to be sharpened in order to keep going. The master sharpener shaves away or grinds down to my core to remove the dull, worn down tip and exposes a fresh new point to move forward. Regardless of how dull my pencil becomes over time, I must keep moving forward from dot to dot, point to point. The sharpening is a painful challenge but it allows me to be sharp and to keep going. We all need to be sharpened from time to time.

If I go off the path and skip a number or go to the wrong number, He erases that line and lets me start again.

Every dot is a place in our lives, where at the end, it will all be connected to show the big picture. The dot-to-dot will show the image of our lives.