A favorite childhood game from “way back when” is the game of hopscotch. All that was required was a marker (a rock, a bean bag, etc.. . .), a sidewalk and a piece of chalk or a flat piece of ground and a good stick! A court is first laid out on the ground. Single squares are lined up, interspersed with bilateral squares. Single squares must be hopped on with one foot – it doesn’t matter which one. Double squares require a foot in each square – but your foot must NEVER touch a line in the court. You start out on “home base” and toss the marker onto the court. You must then, hop forward, skipping the square with the marker until you reach the other side. Next, the player would turn around and hop the course backwards until they reach the square right before the marker. They must then, bend over and pick the marker up, without stepping outside of the lines. Once the marker is retrieved, they hop back towards safety at home, and it’s someone else’s turn.
Life is a lot like hopscotch. The object is to move forward towards the goal. Sometimes, it’s easy and you land squarely on two feet. Other times, it’s a little bit harder, and we may teeter and lose our balance, if we don’t stay centered. Our footing may not be stable – it’s like hopping around on one foot until we regain our balance. But, we can’t stop in the middle of the course and give up – we have to continue until we reach home.
Where are you in the “hopscotch game of life?” Are you moving forward? Are you walking “in His steps?” (I Peter 2:21) Are you like David when he said, “But as for me, my foot was almost gone, my steps had well nigh slipped” (Psalms 73:2), or can you say, “He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock and established my way?” (Psalms 40:2) Are you “pressing toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus?” (Philippians 3:14) We must be “faithful until death” (Revelation 2:10), and we’ll safely reach home. May you be moving forward in the “hopscotch game of life!” God Bless, Courtney
Hope I’m better at the “hopscotch game of life” than I was at playing the game drawn on the sidewalk in front of our house–never was too good at that!!