I read a story about a man caught in a fierce blizzard at night. He was desperately looking for shelter as he rode his horse through the blinding snowstorm and as luck would have it he happened upon a cabin. The door was unlocked, but the cabin was pitch black dark and he just curled up on the cold hard floor and fitfully slept and shivered through the night. When daylight appeared he looked around and noticed a bed fully made up with fresh sheets and a heavy quilt on it. As he gazed around the room he noticed that just a few feet from where he had slept on the frozen floor was a fireplace preloaded with wood and kindling with matches beside it.
It was there all along but he didn’t even notice.
When I bought Honey Lake Plantation there was one small dwelling on it. I rummaged around the small cabin that is located on Honey Lake and when I went down to the basement I discovered a painting of a Seminole Indian tribe that had been painted on masonite panels and attached to the basement wall. Typical of Florida, the basement was moist, dark, and dank and I was amazed that the mural was still in relatively good shape.
Later I had the panels painstakingly removed from the basement, and hired an expert to carefully remove the mold spores that were growing on it. I had the panels attached to plywood and installed them side by side some twenty feet high in our magnificent grand ballroom in the Honey Lake Plantation Gathering Hall.
I commissioned an artist to restore the painting and she did an excellent job. It is now one continuous mural that is 36 feet long and about eight feet high. It is a stunning sight to walk into that ballroom and see it. Further research revealed that the artist, J. Clinton Shepherd, who has since died is very famous. This was the largest and last mural that he ever completed and it’s worth a small fortune.
It was there all along but the previous owners didn’t even notice.
I have a friend who had a lovely family, but he was enamored with a young gal at work. It wasn’t long until things heated up and the next thing I knew my friend had dumped his little family for that sweet little thing that he met at the water cooler. Several years later his little sweetie soured on him and dropped him like a hot rock taking what little money remained after his first divorce. In the meantime his beautiful wife remarried and she and the kids are living the good life with a husband that adores them. My friend is miserable. He lost all his cash and possessions in the two divorces, his kids dislike him for what he did to them and their mother, he lives all alone in a tiny dump of an apartment, and most every night he spends his time enlarging his belly by drinking beer until he is senseless in a futile attempt at erasing all memory of what he has done.
His wife and family were there all along and he didn’t notice.
Hmmm… How many of us fail to notice what is already available to us? I urge you to take a long hard look at the treasures that are readily available to you. The Bible tells us that Jesus stands at the door and knocks, waiting for us to invite Him into our lives and hearts. Have you noticed?
No greater treasure exists. Open your eyes and use them to pour over the treasure trove of wisdom that He has provided in His Holy Bible, and then ask Him to forgive you and receive His greatest gift of forgiveness, redemption and empowerment – (free of charge).
Don’t wait until it’s too late to realize that He was there all along and you didn’t even notice.
2 Cor. 4:7
We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.