You Need To Resize Passport Too

Some years ago, I was trying to write the common entrance examination to get into secondary school. We had a couple of forms to fill but there was a particular one that required us to affix a passport photograph. Unfortunately, the space provided for the photograph was too small for my black and white passport.

My first reaction was that my passport isn’t the problem. I have filled other forms already and it was good enough, if it’s not fitting into this form, the problem is with the form. My teacher then told me something very profound, “If you don’t resize this passport to fit the form, you’ll be disqualified from entering the exam hall and by extension secondary school” When I heard that, I reached out for scissors very fast and started trimming until my passport was fit. Back then, the fear of missing secondary school was the beginning of having a common sense for me.I later realized the threat wasn’t true, it was just supposed to force me to do the right thing.

Today, however, size is still a problem but in a different way and what is at stake is more than just a secondary school admission or degree certificate. In Hebrews 12:1 the bible says “Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us”.

In the course of our Christian journey, there are so many weights that are constantly weighing us down in this life and making it difficult for us to run the heavenly race. Weights of materialism, survival mindsets, and all forms of sinful carnal desires.

Some of the things that distract us from truly serving God are sometimes things that look really legitimate like our job, friends and so on, our first reaction whenever the holy spirit is prompting us is usually the same reaction I had with my passport photograph back in the day, we think to ourself ‘The problem is not my job, God gave me this job too’ or ‘the problem is not my friends, what if God wants me to win them to Christ?’, my dear the truth is you’re already oversized and need to be pruned.

What are the things that have entangled you and are suffocating your spiritual life to death? Sometimes these entanglements are not things that are sinful on the surface but they still have the capacity to kill you all the same, some of them may even appear spiritual, perhaps you’re taking on more church responsibilities than you can handle and they’re choking your personal Christian life, the devil might be deceiving you that since those things are still spiritual activities you don’t need to worry. You’re on a night bus dear and you need to snap out of that illusion fast before it destroys you.

Of course, I know from experience that resizing is usually not a very easy process but with sincerity and the help of the holy ghost, nothing is impossible.

May God grant you the grace to sit down to re-examine your life and give you the courage to cut down every unnecessary burden in Jesus name