I’m from New York. As a family, we’d drive through the city and I’d see antennae’s on top of the apartment buildings. The purpose of the antenna was to make television watching clearer and easier. In the apartments below, all the person would have to do is to adjust the ears on the antenna and sit back and watch.
My father would come home from work and sit down to watch Walter Cronkite on the 6pm news. Back in those days, there was no remote control for a television. Children were the remote control. At my father’s command, I would change the channel or adjust the volume. If the picture on the screen wasn’t clear, I had to adjust the “bunny ears” on the antenna until the screen came into focus.
The quality of the picture on the television was dependent on how well you worked to adjust your screen. The television waves were always broadcasting the channel’s contents (except at 2am, when the Star Spangled Banner would come on and the screen would go fuzzy until about 6am when programming would resume.).
God is like the television waves – always broadcasting. Our job is to bring the picture of what God’s will for us is, into focus. We have to make sure we plug in the television. Then we must turn it on. We have to be on the right channel. We must adjust the volume, and then work with the antenna to bring the picture into focus. That is our work – doing footwork to get a clearer picture.
It’s hard to know what “God’s will” is for us in our lives. That’s why I have a spiritual advisor. Without one, I am running my life on my will, and that has not had great outcomes. I have erred in my Life, thinking that what God ‘wants for me’ is what I want for me. I rationalize and manipulate my way into getting my way or doing my will. Needless to say, the results are disastrous. (I mean, did you ever look across the room and know that someone was “God’s will” for you? Then you actually were with ”God’s will” and it wasn’t a good outcome?)
God is always broadcasting the message of what we need in our lives. Our job is to do the footwork to get the clarity of the picture God is showing us.