Breaking Script: Take 2!

Finish these lyrics:

So bye-bye, Miss American Pie, drove my ______ to the _______  but the ______  was ______. (Click to hear)

And I think it's gonna be a long, long time ‘til touch down brings me round again to find I'm not the ______they think I am at home, oh no no no, I’m a ______   ________.   (Click“hear” for the lyrics)

Wake me up before you ________, _______.  (Click “hear” for the lyrics).  This one’s for you, Lazamataz!

Ok, we all just got a window into my soul and my knowledge of not-so-current pop culture.  What was the point of that exercise?  Chances are, your brain could fill in at least one of those three sets of lyrics without even hearing the song.  How often do we do that in life?  We think “this scene looks familiar,” so we act accordingly, based on past experiences.  We fill in the gaps before the scene ever plays out.  It's like deja vu all over again!

Sometimes we get into ruts by allowing our brains to fill in the gaps with information that's not really true.  So how do we get out of those ruts?  I'm going to share with you today a revelation I received a few years ago: every time like the first time.  Treat every situation as if it were the first time.  By this I don't mean you should put up blinders.  Don't ignore what you've seen, but recognize what you really see. 

              

Imagine you go to the grocery store and you run into someone you don’t want to see.  Picture that person.  You awkwardly shuffle away, or turn your head, pretending not to see them, because you assume, based on past experience, that the encounter will be awkward or unpleasant.

Now imagine that you break script.  Imagine that, instead of high-tailing it out of there, you stop.  Pray for that person and ask, "God, what would You do here?" and "What should I do here?"  Oftentimes, we will be surprised by what we hear in response.  We know that God is love (1 John 4:8) and He would never ask us to do anything outside of love.  The beauty of being led by the Spirit is we experience better outcomes than we would if we wrote the script.

My challenge to you today, when you find yourself in the grocery store or wherever you may be, is to break script.  Stop.  Pray.  And Listen.  Then act accordingly, and see what happens.  From my own experience, I think you'll be amazed by how quickly your day improves. (But I don't want to fill in those gaps for you! ;-)  Let me know how it goes for you personally.)