Johnny Hurricane

Bible Reading: Psalm 84:11; John 16:33; 1 Corinthians 3:10-11

CRASH! “Sorry!” Johnny said. SMASH…SPLASH! “Oops, sorry again!”

Amanda grinned at her mom. “Sounds like Johnny’s home.”

“I’m okay,” Johnny said when Mom and Amanda found him standing in a watery mess. “I broke two flower vases.”

As the three of them cleaned up the mess, Johnny said, “At school the kids call me Johnny Hurricane. Something always tips over or gets broken when I’m around. I’m telling you, I’ve got bad luck. It follows me everywhere!”

“There’s no such thing as bad luck,” Amanda said.

Johnny wrung water from a towel. “I think you’re wrong. At school we learned about the Leaning Tower of Pisa. It was built to be a cathedral bell tower. They had great builders, but the tower started leaning after it was finished.” Johnny shrugged. “See? Bad luck.”

“It’s not bad luck that it leans,” Mom said. “There’s a reason. When they built the tower, the foundation was laid on soft, marshy ground which couldn’t support all that weight—so it leans. The builders should have known, but they were in too much of a hurry to build it.”

“Oh,” Johnny said. “So it wasn’t bad luck—it was the foundation.”

Mom filled the dustpan with broken glass. “Exactly right. Sometimes bad things happen—or go wrong when we aren’t careful. But instead of calling it bad luck, we need to do what those builders failed to do and look at our foundation.”

“How do we do that?” asked Johnny.

“We need to remember who our foundation is—Jesus. He died and rose again to save us from the worst thing that could ever happen—being separated from God forever because of our sin—and He is in control of everything. Even when He allows bad things to happen—things much worse than breaking a vase—we have hope because our lives are built on Him, not luck.”

Johnny smiled. “So no more blaming things on bad luck.” He grabbed the broom. “And I’ve decided to be more careful and slow down. I’m starting tomorrow!”

As he spun around to run the broom back to the closet, the broom handle bumped the lamp. Amanda caught it just before it toppled off the table.

“Hey, Johnny Hurricane.” Mom gave him a hug. “How about you start right now?“

-Matt Shoemaker

How About You?

When things go wrong, do you blame it on bad luck? Luck—good or bad—is not a good foundation to build your life on. Let Jesus be your foundation. He has control over everything that happens, and He died for your sins so you could have eternal life with Him. Because we’re imperfect people who live in a broken world, bad things still happen, but you can stand firm in the hope of Jesus.

Today’s Key Verse:
1 Corinthians 3:11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have—Jesus Christ. (NLT)

Today’s Key Thought:

Jesus is in control