You don’t know what you can do until you try. 

We often assume or think we can’t do something we have not tried. It’s sort of our go-to determination. 

We might see someone riding a skateboard and our immediate thought is, “I can’t do that”.

I remember when I was a teen talking to my grandmother about skateboards. Back then they were a very crude iteration of what they are now. 

She had been watching us from the living room window when I said, “Gram, you could try out my skateboard.” 

Her response was quick and decisive: “Oh, I’d land on my head.”

… Granted she was in her late 80’s at the time and probably would have if she had tried. But there was no consideration on her part. It was simply an automatic response that she could not do that. 

There are many things we see each day and make that same kind of instant determination that we could not possibly do that. 

Maybe it’s making something with our hands, or working some kind of machine. It could be coordinating colours in a room, or designing a landscape in a back yard. 

We just don’t think we can do it. 

But how do you know you can’t do something if you have never tried? 

Sometimes we base our judgement on our results of doing something similar. We may have tried something years ago with poor results so we think we can’t do anything similar now. 

Drawing is one of those things. It takes some talent to draw and most people don’t think they can draw very well, so they only draw stick figures.

I’m not even talking about drawing a picture that you would consider showing to others. I’m just talking about drawing something that looks like what you were trying to draw. 

When I was in high school, I listened to music a lot. Sometimes I would look at the cover of an album and get inspired. I started to draw the faces of some of my favourite music artists. 

I’ve never taken art classes, so I don’t know how to properly shade something. When it comes to pen or pencil strokes, I know nothing. I just tried to draw what I saw. 

I never showed anyone what I drew, but you could see the resemblance from the pictures. 

Well, recently I got a new iPad along with the Apple Pencil. I decided I would try to draw something with it … after all, it’s only been 45- 50 years since I did it last. 

So I took a few photographs and tried my hand at drawing parts of them. 

When I showed my daughter, her response was, “Hey, Mom is artistic and can draw. Dad, you can draw. What happened to me? I’ve got no talent to do any of that.”

My only thought was, “Give it a try. Maybe you can, and you just think you can’t.”

Here’s the thing: We often make quick determinations when it comes to God. We think, “He won’t do this” or “He will say no to that”. Before we even ask God, we’ve written Him out of the picture. Maybe if you weren’t so quick to count God out, He might respond to your request. But you will never know unless you get past that automatic response.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What have you believed God would not do so you’ve never asked? Leave your comments and questions below.

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