Several Months Ago I Read Jim Collins' Book, Good ...

Several months ago I read Jim Collins’ book, Good to Great , in it he describes what he calls the flywheel principle (pg.165). I’ve modified his illustration a little and I call mine “the merry-go-round effect”. Here’s the point.

As a kid I used to love to go to the playground with my friends. Everyone would load up on the merry-go-round and one of us would be picked to be the official “pusher”. Maybe you remember what would happen. You would start pulling on one of the bars, nothing would seem to happen at first, but then that first little give could be felt. Pretty soon the merry-go-round was starting to turn, ever so slowly, but it was moving! The more you pulled the more it would move and soon it was moving pretty steady. You’d continue to grab at the bars and pull or push and eventually the merry-go-round was flying and spinning almost faster than you could turn it. But it all began with that first pull. And the truth is, every pull or push after that first one wasn’t much different – it was the accumulation of each pull or push that got the merry-go-round spinning.

Our REALationship with Jesus Christ is a lot like the merry-go-round effect. God asks us to take one step, make one pull at a time. We don’t need to worry or stress over what happens later – God is interested in our now.