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It’s trivial, but I just solved a geometry problem! The problem wasn’t trivial, it was medium difficult, but my solving it or not solving it is certainly trivial. I do math for fun, and to keep my brain sharp, I subscribe to Brilliant and try to solve one problem each day. This particular problem has been hanging around since before Christmas, and I just solved it. I had been all around it, but I hadn’t put the pieces together just right until today.

What are the lessons? 

• Persistence is certainly one. I persist until I succeed (sometimes!). We are called to persistence in prayer; see, for example, Luke 18.1. We ought also to persist in tasks that need to be done. Nehemiah persisted through difficulties and finished the wall. 
• Flexibility is another lesson. When one approach doesn’t work, try another. Old-time Navigator Leroy Eims wrote a book called “No Magic Formula,” in which he observed that every Old Testament battle was different. They only marched around the walls to defeat one city – Jericho. Gideon took 300 men and used surprise. Joshua in defeating Ai took a lot of men and used a ruse. Flexibility. Churches are sometimes guilty of running the same program year after year because it worked once. 
• That leads us to creativity. God gave us the gift of creativity. Adam’s’ first task was to name the animals. Joseph was creative in how he reconciled to his brothers while giving them a chance to redeem themselves.

Persistence, flexibility, and creativity: not a bad set of lessons from a geometry problem!