“Consider him (Jesus) who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.” Hebrews 12:3

We’ve had a Black & Decker coffee pot for about 5 years. In ‘gettin’ old years,” it’s more like 20! It’s the best coffee pot we’ve ever owned and just keeps chugging along. Last night, while preparing coffee for this morning, a tiny incident caused my ‘Hulk’ side to peer out from behind some crevice in my mind. He was being incredibly stupid!

In order to make coffee, the coffee has to be placed INTO a filter to separate grounds from the drink. Every once in a while I get moving too fast and bump the scoop of coffee against the maker, spilling grounds all over the inside of the machine. It takes nanoseconds to make the mess. But quite some time to clean it up! I don’t like cleaning up messes! Especially my own.

Having made the mistake often enough, you’d think that I’d ALWAYS be careful when getting to that stage. But hey…it’s ME! Sometimes I wonder if Jesus SAVED me just for the challenge… since He’s got PLENTY to work with! To this day I STILL haven’t learned to SLOW DOWN when putting the coffee into the filter! And my Hulk side STILL hasn’t learned to simply STAY PUT! It’s the same problem I have with my spiritual life!

I am on the winning team! Team Jesus! He gave me an INCREDIBLE playbook filled with techniques and expectations. They are so detailed as to be predictable. The enemy (satan) doesn’t stand a chance! But my fleshy side hasn’t completely learned to stay put and to put on the ‘I win’ smirk! When ridiculous happens, the Hulk in me never fails to predictably arise!

This verse today is my medicine. As with most Bible verses, it points to Jesus… the object of my salvation. Thinking about what HE endured for MY sake makes this coffee issue smaller than the loss of a penny! And the ONLY way to get better at managing ‘the Hulk’ is to continue to look to Jesus. And like making coffee, that means EVERY DAY… ALL day! The coffee goes INTO the filter… Just like Jesus goes INTO my soul.

How do YOU filter life and it’s messes?