Pushing Against The Rock There was a man who was asleep one night in his cabin when suddenly his room filled with light and the Savior appeared. The Lord told the man He had a Work for him to do, and showed him a large rock in front of his cabin. The Lord explained that the man was to push against the rock with all his might.This the man did, day after day. For many years he toiled from sun up to sun down, his shoulder set squarely against the cold, massive surface of the unmoving rock pushing with all his might. Each night the man return to his cabin sore and worn out, feeling that his whole day had been spent in vain. Seeing that the man was showing signs of discouragement, Satan decided to enter the picture placing thoughts into the man's mind such as; "You have been pushing against that rock for a long time and it hasn't budged. Why kill yourself over this? You are never going to move it...etc." Thus giving the man the impression that the task was impossible and that he was a failure. These thought discouraged and disheartened the man even more. "Why kill Myself over this?" he thought. "I'll just put in my time, giving just the minimum effort and that will be good enough." And that he planned to do until one day he decided to make it a matter of prayer and take his troubled thought to the Lord. "Lord", he said, "I have labored long and hard in your service, putting all my strength to do that which you have asked. Yet, after all this time, I have not even budged that rock a half a millimeter. What is wrong?" "Why am I failing?" To this the Lord responded compassionately, "My Friend, when long ago I asked You to serve me and you accepted, I told you that your task was to push against the rock with all your strength, which you have done." "Never once did I mention to you that I expected you to move it. Your task was to push." "And now you come to me, your strength spent, thinking that you have failed. But, is that really so? Look at yourself. Your arms are strong and muscled, Your back brown, your hands are callused from constant pressure, and your Legs have become massive and hard. Through opposition you have grown much and your abilities now surpass that which you used to have. Yet you haven't moved the rock. But Your calling was to be obedient, to push and to exercise your faith and trust in my wisdom, This you have done. I, my friend, I will now move the rock." _________________________________________________________________ Now for my belief as to what this means to me. I am a believer in Jesus & God. However I question if God was the first one to talk to this man or if it was Satan. Here is why I believe this based on my thoughts. They do not have to be your own and if this is inappropriate for this forum then please feel free to correct me and delete this. It's my first time posting a new thread here and I'm not sure if it is allowed. I have a hard time accepting this as wisdom. I see the faith reference and how it teaches us to trust in God and he will move mountains. But where is the part about bettering oneself to help others? Can Satan move mountains too? In my belief Satan would want us to waste our time pushing against a rock. Jesus would want us to not push a rock because it doesn't do any good for the bettering of ones self to help others. Instead all that was gained was the fact the guy learned faith and got strong. Also when he prayed it was very selfish and there was no mention of others. "Lord", he said, "I have labored long and hard in your service, putting all my strength to do that which you have asked. Yet, after all this time, I have not even budged that rock a half a millimeter. What is wrong?" "Why am I failing?" To me it seems this man was praying about selfish things that help no one but himself. So I question if he was truly in agreement with God's will which I believe has to involve others and bettering oneself for others. This is not meant to be an argument, I am simply stating that I believe Satan can also talk to us as if he were Gods voice. I had that happen to me once and believed that God was giving me a challenging test. But in reality I had justified pushing a rock because Satan tricked me into thinking I was doing good. Now that I no longer believe that's good I am able to move on to what Jesus would want me to do and that is humble myself for the better of me AND others. I can accept that the man had faith, but may not have found Jesus's way of living. That's about as much as I want to think about this for now so if you wish to respond to this please try to state only personal beliefs and remember that I am trying to find understanding and please be nice with any judgement. Constructive comments welcome.
Yeah in the story they come and say who they are, but I've never met anyone who told me they were satan or god, I once had a waiter at a mexican restaurant named Jesus, but idk if that counts. Anyways, couldn't anybody come to us and say they're satan or god; and if you're hearing voices, couldn't they just be a manifestation of your own subconscious? So overall, I agree that the story is kind of stupid. Also, how do you know what Jesus's way of living is? What with the amount of editing, rewriting, re-editing, re-rewriting, then re-re-editing and so forth that the bible has gone through, I think it's safe to say it generally isn't much of the story it originally was. With another note to add: what makes it the perfect story to begin with anyways? What with all the other religious texts and such... I could go on with this but that's not the point, these are questions for another topic. My real question is, you say Jesus's way of living is that of humility, many christians will disagree and say it is that of service, or whatever. Doesn't it just boil down to the fact that you're making your own interpretation of the Bible based on what you think is right? And that interpretation is based on years of experience and studies of your own human condition is it not? So is your belief in god and choice to see the way of Jesus as humility, not an unnecessary step? Shouldn't you just say, "hey, I think being humble is the bee's knees, I'm gonna do that." What reason do you really need to believe in god other than the fact that you don't trust your own instincts, so you trick yourself into thinking you aren't using them by saying it's god's will.
You are very accurate in that I did make my own belief in what Jesus' way is. I may be trying to hold on to that belief unknowingly because of unexplained events where I should have died and didn't and I've attributed that to "God" manipulating my fate. Thank you for your insight, I did not and still do not understand what a Christian lifestyle demands and that is very, very important to me. This is why I asked this question; I now have new insight of my own to seek. -NNY
"There was a man who was asleep one night in his cabin when suddenly his room filled with light and the Savior"