I just have a quick thought for today, and I realize it might seem like kind of a "duh" moment to everyone else. It's been a pretty important revelation for me though, so I just thought I would share. Plus, it's something I need to keep coming back to, so writing it down should really be helpful in that regard too. Ready? Here it is:
I can only do one thing at a time.
Pretty earthshaking, no? Of course, there is always multitasking, and I don't deny it (even though it's a skill that many of you know I possess in very small measure), but that's not what I'm talking about. No matter how good of a multitasker you are, you still can only be in one place at any given moment. Whatever you're doing, be it one thing or fourteen, is all you're doing. Put that up against the countless millions of things you could theoretically be doing, and multitasking doesn't seem to matter as much. There are still way more things happening than you can ever possibly be part of.
That last thought is one of two things: really depressing or really freeing. It's just a matter of how you look at it. I think I've lived a lot of my life with the mindset that I had to keep from missing out on things. If there was a party or event going on, I felt like I had to be there or I'd be missing out on something I desperately needed, something that would make my life better. I'm sure my rampant desire for people's acceptance had something to do with that, but that's really another blog for another time. For the purposes of this one, it's just important that I've often felt like I was missing out. And of course, as I've said, each moment really does contain millions of things I'm not doing. It can get a little overwhelming if you start thinking about it like that, and that's where you can start getting depressed if you aren't careful.
On the other hand, the freeing side of this whole thing is that we can choose to focus our attention on whatever we are doing instead of what we aren't. What if that was all we had to worry about? How do we choose out of all the possible choices the one thing we are going to do and focus fully on that in each moment? Actually, that's pretty overwhelming too, on the face of it. That's why we need the Spirit of God in our lives.
Believing that God has a plan for you and is sovereignly directing your life changes the whole equation. We can actually ask God for directions, ask him to tell us by his Spirit what we should be doing, and he will! Then, we just have to be willing to do it, but again that's a different blog. If we know God is leading us, though, that should certainly raise our level of confidence. If we actually start believing that his plan is best, we probably will spend a lot less time worrying about missing out on things.
Having a job has really helped put this all in perspective for me. There are significant amounts of time that I just have to be there, some of which are also times that other things are going on that I might like to do. Now, I can get all worried about what I'm "missing out" on (the party, the girl, the worship night, the free time, etc.) if I want to. However, I can also choose to believe that God has called me to work as part of his larger plan to move me into the rest of my life and has provided this job for me to do that. If that's true, then that's where I'm supposed to be, and it will end up being the best for me in ways I can't even understand yet (and some that I do understand, like $$).
"We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose" (Romans 8:28). All things! Really, that makes it impossible to miss out on goodness. Whatever we do, God is working for our good as we submit to his purposes. That's true even if it doesn't seem good to us at the time because all too often what we feel has absolutely no bearing on what is true. Maybe that's why we get so worried and upset about many things, when only one thing is needed (see Luke 10:42).
So, if we feel like we're always missing out, it probably means one of two things: either
a). we don't really believe that what God is calling us to do is the best thing, OR
b). we don't know if what we're doing is actually what God is calling us to do.
The way out of this pattern, then, is to always be asking God what he wants us to be doing (note: even while we're doing things! Check out Philippians 4:6 and 1 Thessalonians 5:17-- Scripturally mandated multitasking! Looks like I need some practice... yet another thing my job can be good for). While we're at it, we can also ask for faith to believe that he will lead us and that what he tells us will be the best thing for us. That's freeing and comforting to me because it puts all the need to make things happen where it belongs--with the One who can actually make them happen. God doesn't call us to more than we can handle. Well, actually he kind of does... but then he handles it. He's in charge of the millions and millions of things. All we have to do is one thing at a time.
Friday, April 30, 2010
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Returning
I think I've been living life in the wrong metaphor.
What I mean by that is, I think that my fundamental picture of how life works has been slightly off. It's always popular, even to the point of being slightly cliché, to think of life as a journey. Countless books, poems, songs, etc. have been written from this perspective, even though the ones written apart from God often fail to offer much hope as to the journey's destination. As Christians, though, we especially love this metaphor because the Bible promises the ultimate destination, heaven.
Now, I'm not trying to say there's anything wrong with the idea of a journey. It's hard to argue with the popular success and powerful impact of a book like Pilgrim's Progress, for example, and the story of Christian's journey to the Celestial City has actually been a big inspiration to me over the years. It's just that the allegory in that story, like all metaphors, is limited in scope. Obviously, no metaphor can ever fully become the exact thing it represents, or else it would be superfluous (which by the way, is one of my favorite words and one I've been dying to work into one of my blogs somehow). That's why it's important to recognize where comparisons fall short and see just how far they can stretch before they break.
Here's how the Pilgrim's Progress-style journey metaphor got my thinking a little off: basically, I started thinking about life as a voyage towards God, who waits for us at a fixed destination as we slowly and circuitously (another one of my favorites) make our way closer and closer to him. Catch the subtle twist introduced in that viewpoint? It makes God the destination instead of heaven. It's an easy jump to make, especially in light of the fact that heaven is where our fellowship with the Lord will be complete and full. The thing is, he's not just sitting around up there waiting for us. If God was a destination, he would of course be the best one to aim for. But he's not. He's everywhere. In fact, our only hope of making it to our destination of glory in heaven is that God is in us (Colossians 1:27).
Now, the hope of heaven is a huge deal, and it has helped me through a lot of struggles in this life to know that one day all those struggles will be permanently erased by joy. If we make the mistake of confining God to heaven, though, we can miss out on the fact that he travels with us.
We are not alone on our journey.
This is immensely important, not least of all because the idea of trying to get closer to a God we can't reach until heaven is a bit of a depressing prospect. It's also important because it gives us a much more accurate picture of what life is actually like.
I'm coming to think of life more and more as a constant returning. Instead of thinking of a one-way voyage toward heaven, I'm thinking more of a continuous coming back to God, wherever he is. That way, my actions are relieved of the pressure of moving me closer to or further from heaven. Really, if I've truly accepted Jesus, my salvation is secure and I'm moving toward heaven at the same rate as all other Christians: 60 seconds per minute. I have no control over that; when I reach the end of the time God has written in my book, I'll just be there! However, I don't have to wait to be with God until then. Eternal life begins now, because eternal life simply means to know God (John 17:3), and he is actually walking with me.
God is not distant. He is near me, and at times I walk right by his side. Other times, I get distracted and let things pull me away. Because this is a fallen world, there are a lot of opportunities for distraction. The question, though, is not so much of moving forward or backward, of climbing up or falling back down, of progress or regress, but of whether the things of life will draw me towards God or away from him as he walks with me.
Will I return to God if a situation draws me away from him? Will I re-turn my face toward his if something distracts my attention elsewhere? The command to return to the Lord is echoed over and over again throughout the Old Testament by all kinds of prophets in all different situations, from captivity to prosperity. In fact, every single thing that happens in life (like jobs, relationships, emotions, our own sins, or God's gifts to us, just to name a few) offers the choice to turn toward God or away from him, but he is always with us. He is in control of the destination and how we get there. The part he gives us a say in is how much like him we'll become along the way.
We become like whatever we look at. To become like God, we need to turn towards him. And because this life is so distracting and so many things draw our attention away, we need to re-turn towards him. Often. Always. We have to fix our gaze on him, and then when we look away, look back. Constant returning. God's grace to us is that no matter how many times we need to return, he will still be there.
I was worshipping God at c-hop recently, and we ended up singing that Jesus is our soul's refrain, the part of the song we keep coming back to. That's a whole different metaphor that I don't have time to address right now, but I think the journey works fine if we understand it correctly in the sense of always returning to a God who walks with us. To finish, though, here's part of another song (Psalm 73: 23-26) that pretty much sums up what I mean by all of this:
"Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."
What I mean by that is, I think that my fundamental picture of how life works has been slightly off. It's always popular, even to the point of being slightly cliché, to think of life as a journey. Countless books, poems, songs, etc. have been written from this perspective, even though the ones written apart from God often fail to offer much hope as to the journey's destination. As Christians, though, we especially love this metaphor because the Bible promises the ultimate destination, heaven.
Now, I'm not trying to say there's anything wrong with the idea of a journey. It's hard to argue with the popular success and powerful impact of a book like Pilgrim's Progress, for example, and the story of Christian's journey to the Celestial City has actually been a big inspiration to me over the years. It's just that the allegory in that story, like all metaphors, is limited in scope. Obviously, no metaphor can ever fully become the exact thing it represents, or else it would be superfluous (which by the way, is one of my favorite words and one I've been dying to work into one of my blogs somehow). That's why it's important to recognize where comparisons fall short and see just how far they can stretch before they break.
Here's how the Pilgrim's Progress-style journey metaphor got my thinking a little off: basically, I started thinking about life as a voyage towards God, who waits for us at a fixed destination as we slowly and circuitously (another one of my favorites) make our way closer and closer to him. Catch the subtle twist introduced in that viewpoint? It makes God the destination instead of heaven. It's an easy jump to make, especially in light of the fact that heaven is where our fellowship with the Lord will be complete and full. The thing is, he's not just sitting around up there waiting for us. If God was a destination, he would of course be the best one to aim for. But he's not. He's everywhere. In fact, our only hope of making it to our destination of glory in heaven is that God is in us (Colossians 1:27).
Now, the hope of heaven is a huge deal, and it has helped me through a lot of struggles in this life to know that one day all those struggles will be permanently erased by joy. If we make the mistake of confining God to heaven, though, we can miss out on the fact that he travels with us.
We are not alone on our journey.
This is immensely important, not least of all because the idea of trying to get closer to a God we can't reach until heaven is a bit of a depressing prospect. It's also important because it gives us a much more accurate picture of what life is actually like.
I'm coming to think of life more and more as a constant returning. Instead of thinking of a one-way voyage toward heaven, I'm thinking more of a continuous coming back to God, wherever he is. That way, my actions are relieved of the pressure of moving me closer to or further from heaven. Really, if I've truly accepted Jesus, my salvation is secure and I'm moving toward heaven at the same rate as all other Christians: 60 seconds per minute. I have no control over that; when I reach the end of the time God has written in my book, I'll just be there! However, I don't have to wait to be with God until then. Eternal life begins now, because eternal life simply means to know God (John 17:3), and he is actually walking with me.
God is not distant. He is near me, and at times I walk right by his side. Other times, I get distracted and let things pull me away. Because this is a fallen world, there are a lot of opportunities for distraction. The question, though, is not so much of moving forward or backward, of climbing up or falling back down, of progress or regress, but of whether the things of life will draw me towards God or away from him as he walks with me.
Will I return to God if a situation draws me away from him? Will I re-turn my face toward his if something distracts my attention elsewhere? The command to return to the Lord is echoed over and over again throughout the Old Testament by all kinds of prophets in all different situations, from captivity to prosperity. In fact, every single thing that happens in life (like jobs, relationships, emotions, our own sins, or God's gifts to us, just to name a few) offers the choice to turn toward God or away from him, but he is always with us. He is in control of the destination and how we get there. The part he gives us a say in is how much like him we'll become along the way.
We become like whatever we look at. To become like God, we need to turn towards him. And because this life is so distracting and so many things draw our attention away, we need to re-turn towards him. Often. Always. We have to fix our gaze on him, and then when we look away, look back. Constant returning. God's grace to us is that no matter how many times we need to return, he will still be there.
I was worshipping God at c-hop recently, and we ended up singing that Jesus is our soul's refrain, the part of the song we keep coming back to. That's a whole different metaphor that I don't have time to address right now, but I think the journey works fine if we understand it correctly in the sense of always returning to a God who walks with us. To finish, though, here's part of another song (Psalm 73: 23-26) that pretty much sums up what I mean by all of this:
"Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."
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