Persisting

"All demand for constant light, for ever the best, all attempt at eliminating or minimizing the cross and trial, is so much soft folly and puerile trifling." -Baron Friedrich Von Hugel

I remember once telling a mentor of mine that I just wanted to be a mature believer, close to God and connected intimately with His desires and purposes. This wise mentor told me that I needed to be patient, that maturity takes time.

So many things in our society are instant or, at the least, conveniently quick. Cars, microwaves, grocery stores, data plans, Mbps, highways, streaming _______, Starbucks, apps, airplanes, digital cameras, status updates, pneumatic nail guns, text messaging, warm air hand dryers, light switches, the drive thru, narcotics, online learning, quickrete, money transfers, and pre-approved anythings-these things fill our daily lives. We are so used to getting what we want or "need" on our timelines. We barely ever have to wait for anything.

Imagine you're at a Wendy's and you order a biggie fry, a Dr Pepper, and a spicy chicken sandwich to go. How long does it take before you start to look over the counter at the "workers," as if them seeing you peer around the counter(designed to hide what's really happening in that "kitchen") will actually speed up the process of heating up your fresh meat? Maybe 5 minutes will go by if you're a patient person. Or maybe you don't like fast food; instead, you're at the DMV and you get your little ticket and are initially excited because you're number 103 and the scrolling marquee has number 99 on it. Soon you realize that there are five sequences of tickets being pumped out from that little machine at the entrance and yours is actually about 15 people deep. This discourages you a little bit until you realize that, of the 12 DMV employees, only 3 of them are actually working and 1 of the 3 is only doing drive tests. Now, how are you feeling? We're so upset when we have to wait for something that realistically should or could take a lot longer than we would ever be willing to wait.

We're just so used to getting what we want quickly. The concepts of cultivation, delayed gratification, savings, or commitment are not too liked by a lot of us. We like to get things as quickly and easily as is possible.

I've noticed that this mentality has caused me several frustrations over the years, especially in my relationship with the Lord. Often I feel as if the Lord should just go ahead and let me in on His master plan for my life. He knows I want to obey Him. He knows I am willing to listen. If He'd just let me know exactly where I am going to be, what I am going to be doing, how much money I will have in my monthly budget, how many kids I'm going to have, and which kind of car will have the least mechanical failures, then both of our lives would be much simpler.

That's the thing with the Lord though-He's not like our society. He tends to make big movements over long periods of time. He doesn't seem to be as concerned with immediate results or tomorrow's projections as you and I do.

Fear of indifference

"Now we must all fear evil men, but there is another evil we must fear most and that is the indifference of good men."

This quote has in many ways affected my life. I have a strong conviction against indifference and strive to always choose to act rather than refrain.

Recently, I've come across a new kind of indifference in my heart. This indifference isn't really new to me or new to this world but rather my awareness, acceptance, and acknowledgement of this growing indifference is new.

In his book, Running With Horses, Eugene Petersen draws his readers into the life of Jeremiah the prophet. When breaking down Jeremiah's increasing angst regarding his sermon to a disobedient and deceptive "pastor" from Israel, Petersen talks of Jeremiah's fear. Jeremiah didn't fear persecution, discomfort, lack of security, or even death. "What he did fear was worship without astonishment, religion without commitment. He feared getting what he wanted and missing what God wanted" (Kindle Location 845).

This really resonated with me. I've grown to learn that my heart has drifted from an appropriate response to the Truth. Missing out on what God has for me used to be my biggest fear. As life's responsibilities have increasingly come upon me, I've found that lack of comfort, financial instability, and other earthly concerns have seemingly taken over my fear landscape.

My prayer is that I will reawaken my fear of indifference regarding God's presence in my life. That I will see the gospel as it truly is and thus respond with nothing less than wholehearted obedience and commitment. I'd challenge you to do the same!

Glory in weakness

So, its been awhile since I've blogged. Things have been kinda crazy busy around here and I've just had a hard time practicing the discipline of writing.


At church, we're going through a series called "When God..." Basically the concept is about how to deal with those many times in our lives when we feel that God is absent, uncooperative, or late. Today's message was particularly refreshing. Pastor Stanley talked about the thorn in Paul's flesh and God's "uncooperativeness" when he asked God to remove it.

Obviously, there's a lot surrounding Paul's thorn that we do not know. We know that God said no. We know that God said His grace is sufficient for Paul (and us). We know that God's power is made perfect in Paul's (and ours) weakness.


For some reason, today's reminder of this passage and it's truth really refreshed my heart. There's a lot going on right now in my life that causes me to feel like maybe God is being distant, uncooperative or late. I thought that this was super relevant to me and figured I'd share it on here.