Day 80 - Marble Run

On arriving at church the other week, I was quite surprised to see a ’ready to play’ Marble Run. This actually reminded me of when my children were little – we had one, and it was quite fun, building the run, checking to see if it actually worked and that the marbles got to the bottom - or if they scooted out and ended up on the other side of the room for us to chase after. Happy days.

Let’s have a think about Marbles and Marble Runs.

The marble run, when you are making it, is fun, adding the pieces together one by one, different colours, making the twists and turns, different heights, ensuring the pieces are the right way up. Then you test it out by putting your marble at the top, watching with bated breath as it goes through the different tracks, dropping, spinning, zig zagging until eventually, it ends with a PLOP in the tray at the bottom. Sometimes the marble gets stuck part way down and needs a helping hand before it speeds off again on its journey towards the bottom of the run.

Let’s look at this differently. The marble is us – that’s you and me – and the marble run is our life, our path.

Let’s pray together:

We pray that as we travel through life’s path, that you, Lord, are with us. You are there to guide us, you are the helping hand we need.

Sometimes we need to slow down, we go too fast, we get too excited and enthusiastic about a certain task or project we are running with. Help us learn to take the next corner a little slower and take time to pray as we go round it.

We go through many twists and turns as we travel life’s path, let us remember that you are with us at all times. We can rely and depend on you, all we need to do is ask and we will come out of it safely.

If we get stuck on the path or corner, let us take this opportunity to pray, praying to you Lord for your help us get through this difficult patch. We all need a helping hand and a gentle push to get us going again. Let us take time to pray, before we are off again ready to move onto the next stretch.

We get battered and bruised, worn and grubby, but that is just part of life, let us embrace this rather than complain. Let us learn and move forward.

Lord, help us to learn to adapt and change as we meet new slips, slopes, twists, turns, drops and spirals.

We know that you have a plan for us, all we need to do is be guided by your hand, not only when we get stuck, but through all our life journey and we will get safely to the end of the marble run. Amen

It was quite a journey at church that morning and, yes, I was the first to move to the front, after the service to have a play and send my marble off on its journey – followed by many of the others in the congregation.

Linda Cooke