Colossus of Rhodes

The Colossus of Rhodes was a statue of the Greek god Helios, erected in the city of Rhodes in the third century BC.  It was constructed to celebrate Rhode’s victory over the ruler of Cyprus.  Strangely this statue, which stood over 30 meters tall, was also destroyed by an earthquake in 226 BC.  After its destruction, Ptolemy III offered to pay for the reconstruction of the statue, but the Oracle of Delphi made the Rhodians afraid that they had offended Helios, and they declined to rebuild it. 

How strange, or should I not be surprised?  It seems the devil uses the same tactics as the Oracle resorted to.  We build great structures in our lives, our plans for the future; our homes, children, education and even marriage become great monuments of success.  Destruction comes, from the devil of course, and just when we feel we are ready to rebuild our lives the devil comes and puts fear in our heart and we draw back from chasing our dreams. 

It is said that the remains of the Colossus lay visible for all to see for over 800 years and even in its broken state travellers would marvel and be impressed.  Do we not do that too?  Instead of dealing with and eliminating the reminders of failure, be they divorce, financial collapse, a child off the rails, or other glaring disaster, we leave the reminders lying about and commiserate over and over. 

God says, I have created a new thing, a new day, a new plan, a new path, a new life for you to grab on to but you have to let go!  We cannot take our past failures into our future and expect to have better results than before.  Whatever your monument of collapse and disaster is today, deal with it! 

We are new creations in Christ with great future blessings lying ahead of us, so seize the day!