Distracted.

I never wake up in the morning and think to myself, "I'm not going to spend time alone with God today. I don't feel like it. There's a lot of other things that I'd rather do." I don't wake up with the intention of crossing my quiet time off my to-do list in favor of anything that might strike my fancy as the day goes on. But it happens. It's true for every single Christian, ever. Everyone, at some point or another, chooses the world over God; chooses doing whatever we want instead of choosing Him. 

How does it happen? I fall into bed at night, angry at myself for letting it happen again, promising myself it won't happen tomorrow. It won't! But what happens? I do it again. The next night I chastise myself and cry and despair and make a million promises I can't keep. "Why?" I ask myself. Why do I constantly choose not to spend time with Him? 

Here's the answer: because I'm always intending to get around to it, eventually. You see, Satan doesn't have to come and try to get me not to do my quiet time. He doesn't have to try to make me cross it off my list completely; he doesn't have to convince me it's not worth my time. He only has to distract me. That's it. He doesn't even have to try to make me sin! It could be anything. A lot of times for me it's in the morning when he throws the load of school I have for the day in my face, insisting it's urgent enough that I have to do it before my quiet time. Then I remember I'm reading this awesome book and maybe I could read a few chapters before lunch... I couldn't fit my quiet time between now and lunch anyways. And then I remember I need to shower because we're going somewhere later; better do that. Then I remember tomorrow is violin lesson and I haven't practiced at all this week; I probably should before my lesson. Mmm, I'm feeling lazy now and Netflix is calling to me with its sweet, seductively time-wasting promise of brain-dead pleasure. Oh darn, now we have to go somewhere! When I get back, I inevitably feel a little unsettled since I'm an introvert, so I need some tea and a book and maybe some knitting to relax, then I'll do my quiet time before bed. But this book is so enthralling, and before I know it, it's ten till midnight and I'm mad at myself for letting time get away from me and staying up this late. I have to get to bed immediately or I won't get up till ten tomorrow! 

And then this is the part where I get angry at myself for not doing my quiet time. I cannot even express in words how often the day described above is more or less, my average day. That's exactly how it happens. 

So what's the solution? How do I dedicate my whole heart to God and devote myself to Him? I have to strive to make Him a priority. He has to be at the top of my list, sitting on the throne of my busy day, and absolutely nothing can be allowed to dethrone Him for any reason at all. He has to come before everything, literally. I have to wake up and praise Him and read His word first thing, or it'll never happen. I have to set rules for myself. I have to say, "Faith, you cannot read, cannot do school, cannot watch Netflix, cannot get on Pinterest (the other time-wasting king), cannot knit, cannot do anything, until you get on your knees and seek Him. 

Nothing is more important.

Courage and boldness

God has been speaking to me about boldness and courage a lot lately. He's been showing me what it means to be bold and showing me situations in which I have the chance to be bold, and I don't even realize it. 

We tend to think that being bold has a lot to do with doing crazy, adventurous things like in the movies and a lot less about making choices. However, the picture of courage and boldness that Hollywood has painted for us isn't always the case. 

You see, Hollywood has painted a picture that says that doing adventurous things and being outspoken and extroverted are equal to being bold, but God says that we are most bold when we make the right choices. Making the right choice is hard. It's hard to die to your flesh and give up what you want for what He wants! And yes, sometimes God calls us to do things that are bold in the Hollywood-sense, like me moving at Texas in August or speaking publicly, but the chance to be courageous and bold by making the right choices comes every single day. 

Now you all know by now that I'm a major bookworm, so I'm going to use an example from J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit. Because of the recent movie, you probably know part of the context, but the part I'm going to talk about isn't in the movie. 

Bilbo Baggins, a hobbit (a smallish kind of creature that dislikes any kind of disturbance or excitement in general), is on a quest to help some dwarves regain their mountain, which is being inhabited by a large dragon named Smaug. The dwarves send Bilbo into the mountain to spy on Smaug, and here's what Tolkien (or the narrator) has to say about Bilbo's courage at that moment:

"'Now you are in for it at last, Bilbo Baggins,' he said to himself. 'You went and put your foot in right in it... and now you have got to pull it out and pay for it! Dear me, what a fool I was and am! ... I have absolutely no use for dragon-guarded treasures, and the whole lot could stay here forever, if only I could wake up and find this beastly tunnel was my own front hall at home!'

He did not wake up of course, but went still on and on, till all sign if the door behind has faded away. He was altogether alone. Soon he thought it was beginning to feel warm. 'Is that a kind of glow I seem to see coming right ahead down there?' he thought.

It was. As he went forward it grew and grew, till there was no doubt about it. It was a red light steadily getting redder and redder. Also it was now undoubtedly hot in the tunnel. Wisps of vapour floated up and past him and he began to sweat. A sound, too, began to throb in his ears, a sort of bubbling like the noise of a large pot galloping on the fire, mixed with the rumble as of a gigantic tom-cat purring. This grew to the unmistakable gurgling noise of some fast animal snoring in its sleep down there in the red glow ahead of him. 

It was at this point that Bilbo stopped. Going on from here was the bravest thing he ever did. The tremendous things that happened afterwards were as nothing compared to it. He fought the real battle in the tunnel alone, before he ever saw the vast danger that lay in wait. " (J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit, pages 232-233. Emphasis mine.)

Out of all the amazing things Bilbo did in his adventures, all the courage and valor and boldness he showed in the different battles and situations, this was his bravest feat. The choice he made in that tunnel to continue to help the dwarves in the face of incredible fear was the bravest thing he ever did.  This kind of courage is not often mentioned in stories today. People like to see characters being brave is fights and battles, but you never see their personal battles going on when they make decisions. 

God is beginning to grow me in this, and teaching me how to have courage in the quiet way, when no one's watching.   

Amazed.

I just wanna give God some props for being absolutely amazing. He is so good. I think back over the past couple of years, and He has grown me so much. I remember how, not so long ago, the only great times I had in His presence were strictly at camp or Acquire the Fire or on a missions trip. I had such spiritual highs there, and in those places I would have amazing worship experiences; it was there that I felt closest to Him. 

How much has changed! After struggling for so long to keep up my quiet times, I now find them to be the best times I have with God. Sometimes, to my amazement and God's glory, I even find myself in a public worship experience (church, youth, etc.), and I actually desire to be alone with Him! I actually stand there at church or whatever and anticipate greatly the chance to be alone with Him, privately. I've shed tears with Him, been greatly moved by His presence while being alone with Him. 

If you had told me two years ago that I would be learning new things from God on my own, without a pastor preaching it, I wouldn't have believed you. But I find myself being molded and changed and taught and grown under His gentle guidance, with nothing but a guitar for worship, a Bible for reading, and a notebook to catch every word that comes from the mouth of the Father.

All to His glory. None of this is me. God knows, I still struggle to get alone with Him even after so much growth. I am utterly faithless but His faithfulness exceeds everything ever. He is so good. 

In view of eternity

I've played violin for almost 6 years now, so I've gotten to playing music that is very hard and complicated such as Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Vivaldi, etc. When I'm learning a new song, most of the time, several times throughout the song, there's a group of notes or a transition from one set of notes to another that I don't understand at all. It's not that I can't read the notes; I know what they say perfectly well. It's that I can't understand how the song is supposed to sound. A lot of times that group of notes or transition sounds terrible. When I'm struggling to get through the song while practicing, I get to the note and I don't want to play it because it doesn't sound right to me.

But when, eventually (usually not for some months later), I get to the point where I've finally learned the whole song and can play it through pretty well. It's then, when I can hear the whole song played together, that I understand that group of notes or transition. On its own, it made no sense to me. But in view of the whole song, it makes for a part of the song that is unique and really actually sets apart the okay composers from the great composers. 

I think in life we come across situations and changes that we don't understand in the same way. It makes no sense at all why someone in our family has to die, or go through a sickness, or be separated from family or whatever the situation is. As long as we're looking at the situation just in contrast to the season of life that were in right now, it won't make sense. But one day, we're going to see everything. We're going to see how God planned everything to fit His perfect will and used situations that seemed to be completely pointless to bring Him glory.

Doubt

"Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, 'Lord, save me!'

Immediately Jesus reached out His hand and caught him. 'You of little faith,' he said, 'why did you doubt?'"  (Matthew 14:29-31) 

Here's the thing about this situation. When Peter saw the waves and became afraid and began to doubt, he started to sink. To us it is quite obvious the reason for his sinking: he started to doubt. He was afraid, and in the moment, he didn't trust that Jesus would keep him afloat. 

But today I was reading this passage and it occurred to me that in the situation, Peter probably thought the reason he was sinking was because of the wind and waves. After all, he sees the wind, and immediately starts to sink. So he probably thought that the reason he was sinking was because of his situation/surroundings, not because he doubted. 

How many times do we think this in our everyday lives? Life gets us into so many situations where we cry out, "Lord, save me!" But when we get to that point of being overwhelmed, where we cry out to him because we think we're going to drown, what if the reason were about to drown is because of unbelief? Yes, obviously the troubles are there whether we believe on Christ to keep us afloat or not, but whether we start to drown under them is up to us.

God's Love

God loves you. 

What a cliché statement! It is so utterly overused that I feel it has lost almost all meaning in today's society. You see it and hear it everywhere. 

It is so often connected with Jesus's death on the cross that I have found, even in my own life, that His love for me appears to be an action by itself. We emphasize love being an action, and neglect the fact that it is also and just as much so, an emotion. 

When people say "Jesus loves you so much that He died for you!" it registers with me subconsciously not that He feels moved by me, not that He desires to be with me so much that He would do anything to be with me, not that He is blessed by my presence, not that I am more precious to Him than anything else in creation, but that He simply practiced an action which was habitual to Him because of who He is. When people say He loves me I think that He does stuff for me. 

But think of this: marriage was designed to imitate and create a picture of our relationship with Christ. So think of a man who is utterly, insatiably, in love. Think of how he gazes at his wife and loves everything about her. He knows the little, tiny, insignificant facts about her and is crazy about them for no other reason than that he loves her. He knows her little quirks and smiles at them. He sees her little habits and chuckles at how cute they are. He looks at her and just purely loves. He loves her. No strings attached. He just loves her. That's all. For everything; despite everything.

That's a very small, unsatisfactory, inadequate allegory of how Christ loves us. He is moved by us. He longs for our presence. He sees the tiny, insignificant little facts about our personalities and smiles because He created us like that.  

Knowing this changes the way we view ourselves in relation to sin and guilt and shame and grace. For example, I miss my quiet times often. I feel guilt and shame, subconsciously thinking that God is disappointed in me. But in view of the way God loves me, I know that He is not disappointed but in fact just longing to be with me. That is all. We can view grace differently in view of this because then we know that He forgives and pardons us not just because He is good and gracious, but also and just as much so because He loves us so much He wants to look past our sins just to be with us. 

I got a revelation of all this today as I was cleaning my room while listening to classical music. I had discovered a book on my shelf in the middle of putting something away and got distracted and sat on the floor and started reading it. There I was, in my pajamas on my floor reading a book while in the middle of cleaning my room. And listening to classical music. And Jesus said, "I love that. I love how you just randomly sit in the middle of your floor and read even though you're busy doing something else. I love that you listen to classical music even though no one else does. I love how you love to read so much that you'll read more than one book at a time. I love your insatiable curiosity. I made you like that. I love you." 

Woah.

How different and more beautiful is His love than what we think it to be! 

I love you, Jesus.

High Places and Idols

God is very obviously speaking to me a lot about idols. Today, actually, the sermon at church and a book I'm reading and my Bible reading all harmoniously worked together. 

Pastor John talked about leaving a legacy of faith, and how we are to live today in order that our children and grandchildren would see our example and follow. He really challenged us to leave a Hebrews 11-type legacy.

The book I'm reading right now is called Gods at War by Kyle Idleman. He talks in this book about things in every person's life that have become idols that we worship in place of God. 

Right now in my Bible reading part of what I'm reading is in first and second kings. To be completely honest, these books can be a little bit boring at times. But I noticed that there are 3 different types of kings in the Kings books:

1.) Ones who did evil in the eyes of The Lord. An example is Jehoahaz: "In the twenty-third year of Joash son of Ahaziah king of Judah, Jehoahaz son of Jehu became king of Israel in Samaria, and he reigned seventeen years. He did evil in the eyes of The Lord by following the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he had caused Israel to commit, and he did not turn away from them." (2 Kings 13:1-2)

2.) Ones who did right in the eyes of The Lord. An example is Hezekiah: "in the third year of Hoshea son of Eleah king of Israel, Hezekiah son of Ahaz king if Judah began to reign. He did what was right in the eyes of The Lord, just as his father David had done." (2Kings 18:1,3)

3.) Ones who did right in the eyes of The Lord, but the high places were not removed. An example is Azariah: "In the twenty-seventh year of Jeroboam king of Israel, Azariah son of Amaziah king of Judah began to reign. He did right in the eyes of The Lord, just as his fathe Amaziah had done. The high places, however, were not removed, and the people continued to offer sacrifices and burn insence there."  (2Kings 15:1,3-4)

So I have this challenge for you: What idols do you have in your life? What do you talk about most, think about most, complain about most, what upsets you most? 

Once you've identified the idols, it will be hard to give them up. After all, you love them, otherwise they wouldn't be idols. So this is my question: What kind if legacy are you leaving? If we were to end up in some ancient record, what would it say about you?  Would it say, "____ did what was evil in the eyes of The Lord."? Would it say, "_____ did what was right in the eyes of The Lord, but they did not remove the high places, and they continued to offer sacrifices and burn insence there."? Or will you leave a legacy of faith, a legacy that everyone who knows you can look up to? It's up to you.