My heart is heavy with worry. Almost as if someone opened it up and shoved it full of lead, and all I can do to make it lighter is pray. Prayer can be a funny thing. Sometimes you feel as if you are talking to thin air. Talking to nothing and no one. Sometimes you just have to believe that there is someone caring enough about your hurts and loving you enough to sit down and actually hear you. I heard a pastor say once, "When was the last time you got into your chair, face to face, knee to knee, toe to toe and actually talked with God?"
For me, I can't remember the last time I sat down to really converse with God. My day is filled with short, flittering prayers that can be so selfish. "God help me to pass this test" or even (and you might get a laugh out of this) "Please let me win some money on this lottery ticket". After examining my prayer life, I have come to the conclusion that I have a give/take relationship with God. He does the giving and I do the taking. What happened to giving Him all of me? Giving Him everything in my life? Instead I pick and choose what He can have, and keep asking for more. Selfish.
In the state of worry that I am currently in, I feel guilty coming to God. It is the common trend of Christian's to forget about God during the good times, and run back to him faster than we have ever run before as soon as trouble hits. I have fallen into that trend time and time again. He has become a God of convenience to us. I know that he has become convenient to me. I believe that this is the plague of Christianity.
Convenience has plagued our whole society. We have forgotten what it takes to build and maintain relationships because of text messaging, facebook and e-mail. For some of us, we have never known any different. Not only does this bleed into our relationships with our friends, family etc. but also into our relationship with God. All of these other things that we fill our life with become more appealing than sitting down with our creator and getting to know Him through His word, and talking to him like we would talk to our best friend. Allowing Him the opportunity to hear our hearts, share our joys and comfort our pain.
So in my time of worry I am going to get face to face, knee to knee and toe to toe with a God who is so much more deserving of a title of Holy, Mighty, Awesome and Amazing God rather than "convenient" God. I will sit in my chair with all my worry and a promise to spend time with the God I love, and to be still and listen to what He has for me. I will sit with a promise to give more than I take and to be a follower of Jesus Christ, not a follower of everything else that is "life".
"Be still and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth."
Psalm 46:10
Be still and allow for God to teach you something today.
Love,
Shea
This is something that is on my mind a lot as well. Wondering if what i am saying is actually reaching Him. I get selfish in my prayers also, always wanting more and asking for more, especially when it came to my surgery and whatnot, i always felt like i was just asking to be ok, and never actually taking the time to realize that all that i have, and even my health was already so much to just be thankful for. Its funny how God works. You know me, i can break down at any second and last night i was watching a show on a childhood disease called Pergeria (its where children age 8 to 10 times faster than normal). In the middle of this show i was hit with a wave of just how selfish i have been and how i take for granted the most simple things in life. Of course, i broke down and cried for these children that will never have some of the experiences and joys that i have been blessed with and for the first time in a long time i asked for nothing, i just offered everything that i am to Him and thanked him.
ReplyDeleteIt just goes to show that God is hearing me, but that maybe i am not hearing him, i mean he did have to reach me via the television so thats got to tell me something. HA. I love you Shea Perez.