Shopping Cart and Unicorns

“But let all who take refuge in you be glad; let them ever sing for joy. Spread your protection over them, that those who love your name may rejoice in you.” Psalm 5:11

 

 

Ihad been to lunch with my Mom.  The restaurant was on the opposite side of a strip-mall from Target.  I needed to get a few things, so afterwards I left my car in its space and decided to walk across the vast parking lot.  I figured I need every ounce of exercise I can squeeze in these days, so it was a win-win situation.

 

I high-tailed it to the store, out of breath of course when I arrived, but still intact.  Shopping was fairly routine, checkout was normal, the cart was full of heavy items…time to make the trek back to the car.

 

The minutes of the day had ticked away and I was running out of time to get the rest of the errands done.  I stepped up my pace and handled the crowded parking lot like a slalom course.  I saw my car in the distance and moved into a full clip towards my destination.  I was making up time.

 

Wham!  Out of no-where, my cart came to a dead stop. I folded so fast and so hard from the handle bar towards the basket part, my feet came off the ground and my chest landed on the backrest of the kiddie front seat. The noise my body made as the air left was unrecognizable.  My vital organs felt rearranged in my body. Not to mention my ponytail now looked like a Unicorn horn on my forehead.

 

 

 

Regaining composure, I checked for the almost certain boulder I must have hit, but nothing.  Not a thing was in front of the cart.  No pebbles, no rocks, no irritating penny on the ground—nothing.  There was no logical reason that cart came to a stop.

 

And the story continues.

 

I am in the middle of a thoroughfare if you will, where traffic flowed.  Cars are trying to get around me, dirty looks are coming my way and my embarrassment level is rising quickly.  I grab the cart and start pulling, pushing, turning–and it won’t budge.  I was playing tug-o-war with this thing in the middle of the parking lot, and I was losing big time.  With no end in sight, time had come to get the items out of the cart and into my car. Now I’m doing back and forth trips like a pack-mule.

 

I get that done and go back to round 13 of WWF on the cart.  Finally, exhausted, I was able to pick it up and at least get it out of the roadway.  My struggle was over.

 

As I finished this fiasco, I looked down and saw an impression in the asphalt that went on for several hundred feet all along where I was.  It dawned on me; there was an invisible barrier around the parking lot to deter the theft of the carts. Once my cart had reached that point, the wheels became locked. And I mean locked! Now I noticed a very small device on the cart that I hadn’t seen before.

 

And there in that lot, I had a thought.  Are we not like those carts?

 

We push and pull with God.  We play tug-o-war with him insisting to do things our way.  Oh, we give in and relent for a time, but then we pull again and say about this life “it’s mine, I want to go thattttt way.”  Yet God is like that barrier in the parking lot, He is our protection, He provides a safe zone, and He try’s to stop us from crossing over into areas that could steal our life.

 

IF we listen.

IF we allow Him.

IF we trust Him.

 

For me, it is like the small device I noticed after all the struggle; it was there the whole time, I just didn’t notice it.  If I had, I sure could have saved myself a lot of struggle that got me nowhere.

Can you picture God as an anti-theft device?  When you affix Him to your cart, your heart, and your soul–he will save your life from being stolen.  It may be an after-market add-on, but oh so worth it.