Choose This Day...
The Lord dumped this info into my mind recently while I was praying - along with the words "don't live on the bubble" haha God is so fun!
It's become more and more clear to me that I have a daily choice to make between the world and the Spirit.
I've lived virtually my entire life by the world. The world is LOUD and demanding and it's so easy to simply get swept up in it's urgency and silly concerns.
By contrast, the invitation to life by the Spirit is much gentler. Quiet. Patient. It's painfully easy to set it aside to deal with the urgent noise and stress of the world.
But I've noticed something important...even when I'm responding to EVERY single need the world puts on me, I'm left lacking. Empty. Sad. Disappointed. Lonely. It doesn't matter if I "have it all", if the bank account is full, or if I'm surrounded by people. There's still a longing in me that tugs hard on my heart. The world would say I should just work harder. Get up earlier. Grind and work and strive.
What IS that deep longing?
It's a HOLY longing.
It's a longing for the deep things of the One who created me. For His voice. For His smile. For His presence. There's nothing like it.
The natural next question is "how do I satisfy that holy longing?"
The answer....NOT "on the bubble"!
Balance is overrated, friends. WAY overrated.
Balance is compromise and exchanges and sacrifice.
Balance is LUKEWARM
In some situations in this fallen world, compromise is good and necessary. But God doesn't want the compromised "balanced" pieces of us that remain after we work a full day of chasing the dollar and stressing to get the approval of man.
He wants us ALL IN.
And really, there's no other way. Just as a ball on a seesaw can't roll both ways at the same time...it can't roll a bit to the left and a bit to the right....it must go ALL one way or the other...we, to must "Choose this day who to serve" (Josh 24:15)
Easy to say, more challenging to do
The choice is made in the battlefield of the mind. In the tugging of the emotions. In the shifting ways of the human will. We are, after all, in the flesh at the moment. And again, the flesh is LOUD. And typically very hungry for pleasures of the world.
This is the "dying to self" we're called to - this daily choice of laying down the things of the world/flesh so that we can be all in for the things of the Spirit. He's given us a spirit of self-control for a reason...I'm pretty sure it's because we need it as His followers ;-)
Please don't hear what I'm not saying. I'm NOT saying we're called to a life of misery and suffering and poverty (unless you are). I'm NOT saying that life in the flesh is nothing. I'm NOT saying that I'm good at this!
I'm still figuring it out.
Life in the flesh has beauty and purpose.
We are called to "taste and see" that the the Lord is good. Life in this world is meant to be BEAUTIFUL and ABUNDANT. God is the greatest of Fathers and He gives incredible gifts to His children. He's the most generous, loving, and patient Father you'll ever know.
What I AM saying is that we can only be in a position to live in the abundance that He offers when we stop trying to cling to all the stuff of the world and surrender... let the ball roll all the way to His side of the seesaw ;-)
In that surrender...in that letting go...we find ALL that we're looking for. Even (especially!) the satisfaction of that holy longing.
So today I choose to live from my place seated with Jesus Himself (Eph 2:6). I choose to serve the Lord and His purposes. I choose to worship instead of grind. I choose to be free and joyful. I choose to measure everything that comes at me (including/especially my own thoughts) by the Word of God.
I choose to believe that since Jesus taught us to pray "on Earth as it is in Heaven", it's God's will to do just that.
