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Thanks to all of you who recently helped out by taking my survey on spiritual growth. I was able to get a good number of surveys completed, but still would love to get more responses. Here’s the link if you know anyone who would like to fill it out: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/6FLGQTJ
Over the next few days, I’ll be sharing the initial findings via the blog, starting with this post. I’ll wrap things up by telling you why I fielded the survey in the first place. Stay tuned.
According to the early findings, most of us seem to be suffering from a light switch relationship with God. On. Off. On. Off.
The majority of survey respondents said they were not content with their current spiritual walk. Sixty-six percent of those people said they were “On again, off again. There have been times when they felt close to God, and times when He seems very far away.”
Most reported they had the knowledge and support they needed to pursue a deeper relationship with God, and only a few stated they didn’t know where to start in terms of getting closer to God.
The most common reasons given for not successfully building a relationship with God were staying motivated and struggling with competing priorities. I’m sure in many cases, those can be closely linked.
Nearly half of the people surveyed said they needed a lot of help or all the help they could get in the areas of: Purpose, Wounds & Trials, Prayer, Witnessing
People believe they need the most help in the witnessing department and the least help in worshiping.
So far, the demographics of the responses have skewed slightly towards male, and are highly concentrated in the age range of 25-44. Most reported accepting Christ as a child.
I am still pulling my conclusions together on what I think the results really show. Interested in your thoughts on these results as well. Initially, I find it telling that so many of us (myself included) struggle with sustaining momentum in our walks. My experience over the last few years has played that out very well.
A lot of what I’ve learned about myself and my faith has revealed major drivers that perpetuate the on again off again rhythm that is so easy for me (and I suppose, us) to default to. I think this is an indictment on our typical approach to God, the support we receive from the church, and the negative influence of our culture, among other things. Fodder for future posts, I suppose.
Next Up: Recommended Reading. What respondents said were the best books to help them walk more closely with God.
I have a friend that tells me often, “Just for Today.” He will remind me that yesterday is the past, and tomorrow isn’t promised. So, basically, I should focus on the present, and walk as closely to God as I can…just for today. I believe this is good advice. It helps to have a focus on the short-term, dealing with the reality that lies before you. But I also believe you have to couple that short-term focus with a long-term perspective. Too many times I hear clichés such as “Life is Short” or “Life Comes at You Fast” or “Seize the Day.” This isn’t what my friend means when he proclaims “Just for Today,” but it is easy to confuse it with these slogans if I don’t have my mind right.
As Christians, we all know that our life on this earth is only the opening leg of our journey. That a Heavenly eternity awaits us. But many times, I find myself falling into the trap of “seizing the day” and panicking because I feel like life is passing me by, that I’m not accomplishing everything I want to accomplish. I get trapped within the artifical boundaries of time and space driven by the world’s view of existence. Sure, if this life was all I had to plan for, I’d definitely be behind schedule right now. In a world where long-term planning means 401(k) investments, it is easy to lose the forest for the trees.
We aren’t promised tomorrow. We are guaranteed eternity. I’m not sure why it is so easy for me to internalize the former at the expense of the latter.
I should act more like both of those things are true, combining a short-term focus with a long-term perspective. My actions and attitude would dramatically change for the better if I could make that happen consistently. It would be so powerful if I could combine “Just for Today” with “Just for Eternity.”
A quick aside about how God is speaking to me. I spent some of the weekend thinking about this post and journaling about the concept. Today, I was standing next to a co-worker’s cubicle where I saw a quote she had just written on her whiteboard. It said something to the effect of:
“I was living each day as if it were my last, but people got tired of hearing me scream, ‘I’m going to die!'”
I’ve had this experience over and over again this past year. Where God will lay before me an insight and then follow it up with subtle reinforcement as if to say, “Yes, I really meant for you to be thinking about that.” I never grow tired of that experience.
In closing, I have a few questions for you. How would you act differently if you truly approached death as only the first chapter in your journey? What if you really approached your time on earth as a phase of preparation for eternity? Would your priorities shift? Would you do things differently? How would your relationship with God change? What if you could approach your life in this manner, Just for Today?
It happens far too often. Something taps my wound, and like a cavity-stricken tooth meeting a cube of ice I am victim to a seething pain that aches and thuds and pulses within me. This “something” plays off the pain, and then spoon feeds me a lie. I am coaxed into accepting the lie, biting down on it only to intensify the throbbing. I get upset. Increasingly upset. Sometimes just on the inside. Other times visibly disturbed.
From here, I spiral, and it is as if all my teeth have cavities. Like they all might spill from my mouth like water from a glass. By the end, I am completely unwound and undone. And when I look back at what ignited this chain of events, it always seems so petty and insignificant. It’s hard to understand the cause and effect of it all. To trace the chain from beginning to end. For a moment, I feel defeated. AGAIN. And a mixture of anger and sadness courses through my veins, pounds in my head, pricks my heart. I’m so disappointed in myself and my inability to break this cycle. To keep ending up here. In this very same place.
You can see how unhealthy this pattern is. And it’s only when I somehow find the perspective to zoom out and actually realize what’s going on, to recognize the pattern, that I find any peace. The funny and glorious thing is that when I’m able to do this, there is not only peace, but complete peace. I’ve disrupted the pattern, at least for the moment, and it no longer controls me.
I’ve come to understand that my wounds are pretty much always going to be there with me. And that no matter how accepting I become of them, they will have the innate ability to trigger negative emotions if given the most remote of opportunities. I also can’t stop the lies from coming. They always do. They are powerful and strong and convincing and so believable. But at this point in the pattern, I actually do have a choice. I can choose to believe the lies and send things rolling down hill or I can choose NOT to believe the lies and cut the pattern short. When I am in a healthy, balanced state, I do a good job of this. The problem is that I quickly forget it.
Since I’m actually feeling a great deal of peace this week, and balance, I thought I’d capture this train of thought so that when I stumble into a darker place, I can have this to remind me of how to return to the light.
When I’m healthy, I even go so far as to anticipate the lies. To expect them. To wait for them. To look for them. To run toward them and take them head on. They are persistent and consistent. But these lies are never original. They just run along like a broken record. It’s the same old thing over and over again. For me, the lies are usually along the lines of me not measuring up, being good enough, being successful, being liked, being accepted and validated. Being relevant. Visible. Worthy. They just keep coming, the same line of them, over and over and over and over.
I know I use a lot of sports analogies, and I apologize for that. But really, there’s nothing in the world that you can’t compare to sports or Seinfeld to make a point. When I’m healthy, and balanced, I approach my lies like a batter in baseball. Hitting a baseball is one of the most difficult things in the world to do. Believe it or not, one great tactic for improving your ability to hit the ball is to guess which pitch is coming. There are certain scenarios when a batter can more accurately predict whether the pitcher will throw a strike or a ball, and whether the pitcher will throw a fast ball, or a curve ball or a slider.
When a batter is anticipating a fast ball thrown in the strike zone and guesses correctly, he usually makes good contact with the ball. Many times, he will crush it. And yes, if he guesses wrong, he will typically look really foolish. When I’m healthy, I’m poised at the plate, waiting for a certain set of lies to come my way. And then I crush the truth out of them. And I disrupt the pattern. As I just stated, it’s easy to anticipate the lies. And when you are able to do that, something that can seem so very difficult to master can become much, much more manageable.
I wish I could say that by now I always crush the lies. But there are times, many times, when I don’t. When I’m not in a good place, and I just can’t see clearly what’s coming next. They catch me off-balance. They surprise me. They overwhelm me. And it seems like resisting them is one of the hardest things in the world to do.
While I’m in my healthy, balanced, peaceful zone, let me encourage you to examine the patterns that lead you off your positive path and into the weeds. To seek out the lies you tell yourself. And then to extract all the power those lies hold by waiting anxiously for them to show their face and then laying the wood to them like you were trying to clear the left field wall.
And if you swing and miss, do what all successful baseball players do. Dig in and try again.
As I’ve been writing this blog, and studying and contemplating and meditating and praying, I’ve uncovered some themes that represent my past inability to grow closer to God. I assume these themes are at least more global than just me, so I thought I’d try them on for size.
Ironically, a friend of mine recently validated most of these in a conversation we were having, without any knowledge that I had already started this blog post. That gives me comfort that two people out there have had the same experience. Anyway, here they are in no particular order. Five reasons I suspect most of us fail in our walk with God. Or better put, five reasons I’ve historically failed in my walk with God.
1. Over-reliance on church and others. People are flawed. Institutions are flawed. Organized religion does not possess all the answers. If you are placing the burden of your spiritual growth on your church community or others in your life, expecting to be led, you will be left wanting. These gifts from God should accentuate the relationship you have with Him, not serve as crutches. At the end of the day, your relationship with God is just that. You…and…God. There is no 12-step program or tell-all devotional or one-size-fits-all solution handed down by your religious superiors so that you can just add water.
2. Gravity. Everything in this world pulls against your walk with God. It’s easy for us to get overwhelmed, beaten down, discouraged, taken out of the game. Worldly concerns and distractions are powerful. Competing priorities can be consuming. The challenge is filtering out the things that don’t matter and maintaining your commitment to knowing God. Easier said than done.
3. Lack of self-awareness. If we are not deeply in touch with our wounds, understanding that our sins are merely symptoms, searching for root causes and triggers, we won’t be able to work through the internal obstacles that are preventing us from growing closer to God. You have to see your true self and understand fully the idols in your life, the walls you’ve erected and the chains that bind you. Too often, we are numb or in denial or just so displeased with who we are on the inside that we can’t objectively see ourselves.
4. Ungrounded belief system. Most of us can’t defend or even define what we really believe. And most of what we say we believe has been handed down from someone else. Without deep roots, you will have a shallow faith. That will prevent you from being clear of your purpose and obedient to what God asks you to do. Without a well-rooted faith, it’s hard to hear God and even harder to act once we do hear from Him.
5. Absence of desire. If there isn’t a fire burning within us to know God, a longing and a passion to walk more closely with Him, we will only be going through the motions. If you are lacking this desire, pray for it. God will provide. But until you have a heart that is hungry and broken, you won’t be successful in knowing God more intimately.
So, there you go. Five reasons for failure. What do you think? Do you have other themes to add? Or a success story of how you have overcome these obstacles? I’d love to hear about it.
I say revival, and you think…
A week-long church fest featuring an overly eager guest speaker? Popping the tent and slapping the tambourine? Maybe even smacking someone upside the head to heal them?
Most of us have come to associate the word revival with an intense, focused (and staged) event intended to jar life back into the church congregation and create a “great awakening”. It’s supposed to replenish us, like we are a bunch of spiritual squirrels filling our cheeks and running back to our trees to store up for the winter.
In my personal experience, I’ve not seen many genuine situations where a church body enjoyed true revival. I’ve seen a temporary frenzy that fostered fleeting episodes of group think and follow the crowd mentality akin to the popularity explosion of the Snuggie or Justin Bieber. Those “revivals” are often short-lived and then it is back to business as usual until next year. I’m not suggesting a church body can’t experience true revival. I just think that when it does happen, it is more organic and inspired than the revivals I’ve been a part of in the past.
For me, revival is about a renewal of your fervor and desire to pursue God. Or it can be a restoration and healing related to a dark tragedy or deep wound. It occurs on a personal, not just a population, level.
My revival happened two years ago and has been rekindled probably about every two weeks since then. I was in a slumber, and then I received a spark. And quickly, I’ve seen the spark fade and then brighten again, over and over. If I’m being honest, it’s all I can do to keep it alive and “stay awake”. So far, it’s been worth the effort.
I guess my point with all this is that 1. you don’t need to wait for “potluck week” to have a personal revival, or your own great awakening and 2. while revival is a sudden combustion of flames, it can burn out just as fast if you don’t nurture it. In the end, I encourage you to displace your initial reaction to the word revival (at least if you carry the same baggage as me) and consider how you can achieve something much more powerful underneath a tent made for one.
This week has kicked my butt, plain and simple. I’ve let stress, sadness, fear, anxiety, weakness and insecurity walk right over me. My problems have overwhelmed my progress; my self has prevailed over my soul. I’ve been caught in a swirl, and for the life of me I can’t fight my way out. Tomorrow is another day.
This morning I tried really hard to push the reset button. I tuned my iPod to an inspirational song and attempted to dial in to God, just for five minutes, just for a brief rest in Him. And I just couldn’t do it. My mind was racing, my thoughts were dancing around, distracting me. I couldn’t even manage to focus for 5 minutes to clear my head and hear God. It was a failure to communicate.
I replayed the song half a dozen times before the charge went out on my iPod. Every time it was the same result. Halfway through the first chorus, my mind was veering off the path, into a landfill of garbage, trash, litter and waste. As I pulled into work, I whispered, “It’s not you, it’s me.” As frustrated as I was about my inability to connect with God it at least felt good to use that phrase for once and not have it delivered to me amidst a bad breakup. Sorry, I digress. Another issue for another day.
I also felt somewhat healthy that even though I had been defeated by my worldly concerns, at least for today, I was healthy enough to recognize that God wasn’t the problem.
There is a time in a not so distant past that I would have been upset with God for not being there for me. You know, kind of like that cheesy story about the footprints in the sand and the guy says, “Oh, but see back there, dude, only one set of footprints, what’s up with that?” Slightly paraphrasing here. And God responds, “Um, hello, that’s when I was carrying you.”
Since I’ve been caught in multiple riptides during my visits to the ocean, I will use the following analogy as a less cheesy footprint in the sand example. It’s kind of like getting sucked out to sea with the current. You find yourself flailing for a moment; you see the beach getting smaller in the distance. You hopefully come to your senses and remember the proper technique for swimming out of the pull. And eventually, afer strenuous effort, you drag your tired, weary self back to shore. Beaten down, slightly shaken but alive. The land never moved. You drifted into danger. You got pulled deeper by outside forces. You separated yourself, actively or passively, from the safety of the sand.
In this analogy, of course, God is the beach. He didn’t move. He didn’t wander out of cell service. He didn’t turn His back or fall asleep. I allowed myself to get pulled down and out by the riptides of this world. I allowed issues that expire to trump the eternal. And as I type this, I’m still trying to work my way back to solid, safe ground. Not having a whole lot of luck yet, but this post was at least a bit cathartic. I’m always disappointed when I let my humanity get the best of me, as it has the past few days. Not surprised, but definitely disappointed. I appreciate knowing that God, like the beach, will welcome me back to His sandy shores if and when I’m able to shake loose of the down and out feelings that leave me at a loss for words. And when I get back into range, He’ll be on the other end. Ready to communicate.
Quality time with the fam at the Lake. God is Good.
Less than three hours after that tweet, three brothers would become two, as a cold lake in Washington took the life of a 24-year-old Christian artist. As I read the article on his death I was initially stunned. I had just played basketball with Israel a week before the accident. I hardly knew him. Didn’t even know he and his brothers were a gospel trio. Didn’t even know his last name. He was just a guy at the gym that occasionally joined us for pickup games. And now he was gone. Taken in his prime.
After I recovered from the initial shock of the article, I meditated on the situation. I just kept coming back to that tweet. God is good.
Any time you see or hear about tragedy, you also see or hear someone questioning why God would let it happen. Ultimately, part of the answer is that we don’t fully comprehend the master plan and that we can’t even begin to understand what God will do through the tragedy that just occurred.
God will no doubt do powerful, great, unimaginably beautiful things through this terrible event. I won’t dare place a bet on what those things might be, but I know they will happen. They always do. Regardless, God decided it was time for the world to say goodbye to this young man. He was ready to reclaim him and use him for His kingdom.
After being stunned, and then meditating on the situation, I thought about how this applied to what God has been showing me lately. What in this is for me personally to learn?
All my roads lately have led to the subject of ownership. God has been delivering messages related to this in many different ways. I mentioned in a previous post that I have been reading some of A.W. Tozer’s work. He talks about the “tyranny of things” and the dangers of getting caught up in the act of possessing. He references the story of Abraham being asked by God to sacrifice the life of his son, Isaac, who he had placed above God in his heart. You all know the end of the story. Abraham is obedient and is about to carry out the act when God presses pause and says he doesn’t have to go through with it. I’ve also talked about being convicted about my stewardship of all the gifts God has sent my way. And then I read about Israel.
I know for a fact that if God called on me today to sacrifice one of my sons, I would act like I didn’t hear him. Huh? Say what? Sorry, bad signal…let me call you back later. Like, much later. I also know for a fact that if it had been me at that lake, witnessing the death of my brother three hours after tweeting God is good, I’d be angry, resentful and then some. I also know that it doesn’t have to be life and death for me to ignore what God asks of me because of my desire to possess and to own. Not just my family. But my finances. My choices. My personal belongings.
I find it very ironic that despite the spiritual reality that God owns all and we own nothing, our entire society, particularly our economy, is centered on obtaining and attaining. About ownership. About possession. No wonder we are supposed to be in the world but not of the world.
I personally cling far too dearly to things that I think I own. I make decisions almost daily based on things I own or things I’d like to own or things I feel like I need to own. I love my family, and if push came to shove I would have to admit that God doesn’t always rank where He should in comparison to my wife and kids. I’m very thankful I’ve not been challenged as Abraham was. That being said, I am challenged in smaller ways, and unfortunately, I fail more than I succeed when those challenges come calling.
I’ve come to realize that I am much more “of the world” instead of just “in the world” and that pride of ownership is something God needs me to deal with before I can move closer to Him. I need to internalize the fact that I own nothing, and that I am merely caring for God’s possessions. This mindset would make all the difference in the way I approach life.
I need to trust Him to provide for my life and not be so stressed about mortgages and car payments, retirement savings and hip clothes (yes still trying to stay hip, even as I ride the freight train toward 40).
I need to come to grips with the fact that my family is a blessing but also is something He owns. As much as I love them, I can’t allow them to fill the space intended for God, and I can’t try to protect them from His plan. I just have to trust that the God I serve is good.
According to the CDC Foundation, humans are 99.9 percent identical, genetically speaking. It is the minute 0.1 percent remainder that accounts for differences ranging from traits as innocuous as hair color to predispositions for a wide variety of diseases.
As much variance as you see among human beings, it’s hard to think about how similar we truly are. At the core, we are mostly the same. Everyone seeks purpose in this world, myself included. We search and we search. And then we search some more. We think there must be some highly unique path we are supposed to take, which is hidden by overgrowth, buried deep in a jungle or the woods somewhere, likely not found if not by top-secret treasure maps or passwords. But at the end of the day, our purpose looks pretty much the same. Well, 99.9 percent of it.
So, if you are like me and turning every stone in search of your purpose, let me help you. 1. We are to be in relationship with God. To seek a deep intimacy with Him and to worship in Him and with Him. 2. We are to be obedient stewards of his gifts and to use them for the greater good of His kingdom. As I talked about last time, this means using each and every gift we are given.
If you do both of these things, the rest will work itself out. The final .1 percent becomes just details. Wildly varying details depending on your specific situation, but details nonetheless. The reality is that we usually focus on that .1 percent that gives us the brown hair or the predisposition to cancer. The .1 percent that makes us a writer or a photographer or a doctor or a missionary or a teacher or…
We focus on the .1 percent, the unknown, instead of focusing on the 99 percent that is laid out simply for us. Be in relationship. Be a steward.
Yes, of course the .1 percent is important. It makes us the unique creatures God created. But we do need to come to an understanding that even though He granted us unique abilities and to some extent unique genetic makeups, he ultimately created us with a very consistent purpose. It is my humble opinion that if we enter into obedience to fulfill the purpose He has so clearly communicated, we will reap the reward of unlocking that .1 percent that will be our unique manifestation, plan, impact and testimony. And that it will be as clear to us as the 99.9 percent He has already shared.
If we are unable or unwilling to embark on the path He has set, to do good with the 99.9 percent we already know, why do we think He would be compelled to reveal the .1 percent to us? That’s a tough pill to swallow, but it makes me feel a little better. I know that the ambiguity I feel at the moment will continue to dissipate as I get deeper into relationship with Him and improve upon my stewardship. I know there will be a day when I open my eyes and suddenly the rest of His plan for me will become painfully obvious and delightfully clear. Until then, I need to be worried less about how I’m different and more about how I can conform to the universal purpose God has for his people. Care to join me?
As I was settling in tonight to sink my teeth into a work project that I should have finished during business hours, I felt the need to pause for a moment and read some scripture. Reset if you will. Take a moment to breathe in God and breathe out the toxic attitude I was carrying from a stressful, long, painful day.
Nowadays, when I read my Bible, I consistently take one of two approaches. 1. I thumb through the appendix looking for a specific topic that I think will speak to me. i.e. fear, sin, purpose, etc. 2. I randomly open the book and let my eyes turn where they may. I’ve had success with both approaches. Tonight, I rolled the dice and landed in Amos. I must say that I have no idea who Amos is, other than he is evidently famous and makes some really good chocolate chip cookies. I have no context for what the book of Amos is about. I do plan to research it after the fact, or after this post as it were.
In Amos, I landed on chapter 9, which according to its title speaks of “the destruction of Israel.” In other words, an upbeat, joyful read. Verses 1-5 basically can be summed up as saying, no matter where you try to hide, I (God) will find you. Whether you “dig into hell” or “climb into heaven” or “hide at the bottom of the sea” or “on the top of Carmel” it says, “I (God) will set My eyes on them, for harm and not good.”
I closed my Bible, feeling good about providing space for the Lord to speak. I briefly pondered the passage, noting that you can’t really hide from God. And then I turned back to my work project. As it turns out, God had more to say. I had grabbed a stray notebook to write in, something my wife had sitting around. After filling up one page with scrawl and scribbles, I turned to the next page and noticed a footer at the bottom, centered with quotations. It said, “How will I be different because of what I have just read?” Hmmm. Odd. I flipped to the next page, and there was the same quotation. It was the footer for every page in the notebook.
So, I stopped. And I asked myself the question. How will I be different because of what I just read? Obviously, I had not fully extracted the message God had for me. So, I meditated a bit longer on the verses and deeply considered how they applied to my life. After several minutes of silence, I broke through to the next level.
I can’t hide from God. That was my initial take. Upon further probing, I found myself contemplating when and how I usually try to hide from God. I do it often. I run from things that are hard. I duck behind my insecurities and fail to act even when it is the right thing to do. I dig a hole with sin, giving into temptation as a way to cope and a way to resist facing reality. Much like an ostrich with its head in the sand. Basically, I make excuses. I have a rationale or a reason for my inability to obey His call, to follow His will, to live by His word. I cast blame on my “human nature” or my “situation” or just life in general.
Some of my most common excuses include, but are not limited to:
I’m under a lot of stress right now. I just feel uncomfortable doing that. There’s too much going on. I can’t help myself. It’s not the right time. It’s too risky. No one would listen to me. I couldn’t pull it off. I’m not ready. I don’t think that’s really what God has for me. No one is perfect. I’ll do better next time. Today was just a tough day. She/He/They are really to blame. I’m the victim here. I’m not cut out for this. I just need a break. It’s not my place to get involved. She/He/They don’t care what I have to say. I don’t know where to start. It’s just too hard. Tomorrow is another day…
I could SO go on and on and on.
Bottom line is you can’t hide from God. If you want to know Him, to walk with Him, you have to step out from behind the excuses and take ownership of your situation. With two small children, I watch a lot of animated movies. There’s a scene in Madagascar which I love dearly. The penguin mafia has hijacked the ship, but they are having trouble operating it. The lead penguin responds to a sequence of explanations from his comrades by saying, “I don’t want excuses, I want results!” And then he slaps the offending bird across the face. Now, that is the way to approach our walk. No excuses. Just results.
I’m setting a goal for myself to be on the lookout for excuses. To not let myself off the hook so easily and to demand results. To at least understand the drivers behind my excuses so that I understand what it is I’m hiding behind. That will make it easier to step out from behind it. And to stop hiding from what God has for me, whether it is out of fear, lack of faith, sin or another culprit.
After all, I can’t truly hide from Him anyway, so it’s rather silly when you think about it. Kind of like when my kids play hide and seek with me, and insist on going to the same place (underneath the dining room table) where I can clearly still see them even though their hands are over their eyes. That must be what we look like to God when we throw up an excuse as a smoke screen. When we offer up a reason why we can’t obey. Or we try to rationalize our sin. Or cast blame and point fingers. How refreshing would it be if we stood before God and said, “You know, here’s the real reason I have fallen short, or why I’ve been unable to do what you’ve asked of me. So, I’m asking for your forgiveness, but I’m not making excuses.” Ownership is the first step toward true growth.
I’ll close by asking you a question. The same one God asked of me tonight. “How will you be different today because of what you just read?”
Every Thursday night and Saturday morning, you can find me on the diamond, coaching baseball. Well, actually it’s tee ball. Ok, tee ball for three and four-year-olds. Otherwise known as herding cats.
I really love coaching these kids. But some days I’m tested. A few weeks back, we were attempting to practice. It was 95 degrees and humid. The kids were distracted, even for toddlers. I had two players whizzing behind a tree…together, one running for the hills (literally), a la Forrest Gump. Another with his knuckle shoved up his nose, like a booger-seeking missle. Yet another sniffling and calling for his daddy while ramping up the heebie jeebies. Another stirring up a cloud of dust with his sneakers. Another pulling at my shorts, asking to play duck duck goose (he wanted to be the cow). And then there was my son. Waiting patiently in the field, in the ready position, anticipating a ground ball coming his way. He was focused. He was locked in. He was listening to me. (If only we could replicate this behavior at home on a consistent basis!)
I was proud of my son that day. He made a decision to listen to the coach and commit to the game of baseball. He wanted to get better. It wasn’t because his dad was out there coaching. Like I just said, he has no problem NOT listening to me whenever he feels the need. That attitude is what I am finally bringing to my walk with God. What we all should bring.
Psalms 37:4-6 – Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, and He shall bring it to pass. He shall bring forth your righteousness as the light, and your justice as the noonday.
What I’ve noticed since I truly committed to this journey, since I finally reached a place where I truly yearned for a closer relationship with God, is that I’m a lot like a kid on a baseball field who is actually paying attention to the coach. Who is committed to getting better. Even my mistakes have positive results. For anyone who has played a sport, you know the feeling of hearing a whistle blow and the words, “Let’s try that again!” A coach doesn’t just cheer you when you succeed, they teach you when you fail. Every time you mess up, the coach is there to offer insight and advice If you listen, if you truly listen, you are going to get better. If you are just playing ball on your own without a coach, or not actively listening to the coach you have, your mistakes will just keep happening and you may not even realize what you’re doing wrong or how to fix it.
Recently, when I step off the path, make a wrong turn, get caught up in poor behavior, I hear Coach. That is much different than it used to be. But because I’m tuned in to my sin, and because I’m finally ready to listen, I’m getting coached. When I make a mistake, it’s a learning experience, not just another mistake. And I’m getting better as a result. Instead of going off-road into a ditch and then off a cliff when I goof up, I merely spend a few moments on the shoulder and then find myself back between the lines.
My son will grow his baseball skills this season if he keeps his focus and commitment. I think many of the other kids will as well. As long as our recent practice becomes a distant memory. After all, whether they are listening or not, I’m there every Thursday and Saturday, coaching the entire time. Offering advice. Correcting mistakes. Teaching lessons. God is a lot like that. So, if you can’t hear Him in times of sin, when you make a wrong turn, then I ask you: Are you committed to the game? Are you listening? Are you genuinely interested in getting better? Because once you are, you’ll be able to hear Him as clearly as a whistle in your ear.
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