The Shopping Cart

I am at the grocery store parking lot after a long work day and a long shopping trip. I have nestled all my shopping bags safely in the trunk and am dreaming of the relaxing night I now can have when something gets in my way to the car… the dreaded shopping cart. I am now faced with the epic question that I have on every big shopping trip: do I take the long trip to put the cart in the cart corral, or just leave it in the parking lot?

I look around the parking lot and see dozens of shopping carts that have been left haphazardly. I don’t see a single cart boy taking the carts back into the store. It doesn’t seem like the store cares what I do with the cart. Why should I have to walk, what it seems like in the moment, miles to put a cart away when no one cares? So, as I start to skirt around the cart and get into the car, I feel the all too familiar pang of the Holy Spirit’s conviction.

“You need to do the right thing, even when no one is looking.” Ahh. The internal struggle was intense. Should I do the right thing or what I want to do? In the end, you will be happy to know, that I chose to obey the Holy Spirit, walk the 10 miles, and put that shopping cart into the correct receptacle. I may have been slightly more tired, but my soul felt the warmth of knowing I made the right choice.

I know returning shopping carts is a very trivial matter, and might not be an issue for you at all, but the Bible says in Luke 16:10, "Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much…” I want to be trusted with much. I want to be someone that God can look at and say, “look, there’s my girl. She trusts and obeys me even when it’s not easy.”

Integrity is fast becoming a thing of the past as the world feels that they are justified in anything they do as long as it makes them happy. Trust me, what will make you be happy in the long run is not following your heart, but putting the shopping cart away. Have integrity in the little things, and you will have integrity in the big things too.