Sermon Illustrations

A KEEN EYE FOR STRAY COINS

There was a story from the Week magazine regarding a 67 year man by the name of Roger Pasquier.

He was a retired ornithologist who has a keen eye for spotting stray coins.

In fact, he had found almost two thousand dollars’ worth of coins dropped onto New York City’s sidewalks since he started his strange hobby back in 1987.

As years passed by, he began to be focused, developed some strategies and implemented some scientific methods to keep track of collecting loose coins and bills.

Most of the time, Pasquier hovers around bars, targeting careless drunk people, and avoids eye contact with other pedestrians.

“It’s important that I keep my eyes on where the money is.”

Crucially, he deploys his expert knowledge of birds—and their use of “search images”—as a guide. “They have a general sense of what their food looks like and they become very attuned to those shapes.”

He had been so adept to this that he can spot a coin by its shape or by the sound it makes when it drops.

But his biggest boon has been the introduction of the iPhone.

Since its invention in 2007, Pasquier’s annual takings have nearly doubled, because most people are too busy staring at their phones to notice coins on the street.

APPLICATION:

I wonder if we could be that earnest and keen in seeking for God like Pasquier.

He was so focused to his hobby that nothing could distract him.

His senses for lost coins developed over time.

The text says that if you seek the Lord, you will find Him if you search after Him with all your heart and soul.

Seeking the Lord earnestly means we do it seriously, solemnly and sincerely.

Nothing could distract us, nothing could take away our passion for more of God.

If we keep on seeking for God, our spiritual senses will develop and mature over time.

In fact, we can find God not just in the church, but everywhere we go.

We can find God in the beautiful sunshine, in the blooming flowers, in the streams of running water, among our friends, in the marketplace, in the face of an infant and in the infinite stars of the universe.

Wherever we go, we can find the hand of God at work.

He wants us to get close to Him and learn from Him.

But the question is, are we earnestly seeking for Him or are we distracted by a lot of material things around us like the i-phone?

May God give us the passion for more of God and less of us.

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