If you've grown up in the near vicinity of church folk, you've probably heard someone, somewhere say "we're not promised tomorrow". I've always avoided this phrase like the plague. How morbid could you possibly be? my negative little brain would think, way to ruin my perfectly fine today. And tomorrow...
I can't remember a time in my life where I'm not looking forward to something. Looking forward to getting my drivers license. To graduating high school. To Christmas. To the weekend. To getting out of this class in 2.5 minutes. Always forward, always next, never now.
My life has been inundated with mortality lately. The death of a friend's friend, a friend's grandparent, someone I went to high school with. The death of a personal friend, and then of a family member. It's everywhere. It's part of life. And it's rocking my world.
At times I feel like people should start referring to me as Israel (wrestled with God). God and I are duking out this whole "tomorrow's not guaranteed, what're you doing with your today?" thing like nobody's business. I've come to find I don't really know how to live in today. I don't know how to not have my mind set on tomorrow or the next day or the next month.
In more harsh terms, I suck at being content (how's that for transparency?). I'm having to relearn the whole game. And like I said before, it's rocking my world. I don't want to live in tomorrow anymore, I want to be in today. And it's like finally learning how to walk when you've been freaking crawling for 21 years.
I have spent my entire Christian life avoiding James 4 as much as possible. I mean, how do you constantly live in tomorrow and remotely enjoy reading "Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes." (v.14) I refused to read it because I was scared to death to come face to face with the reality of it. All we've got is today.
Want to know how I don't want to spend my todays?
Judging everyone and everything that walks past me like it's going out of style.
Running away from God and His abundant love and grace.
Stressing about what May 20th brings and if I'm going to totally fail at what I think I want to do for the rest of my life.
Talking crap behind the backs of my brothers and sisters in Christ.
Beating myself up for the way I look, or don't look.
Running away from God and His abundant love and grace.
Wrestling with God
I want my todays to look like 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18.
"Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus".
I want to spend my todays reveling in the beauty of the Creator and His creations.
Trusting that God's got it, and worrying doesn't make it any better. (It makes it worse, in fact.)
Enjoying the ones I love most.
Loving the ones that it's not always easy to (Yea, I'm super convicted by Luke 6:32-36)
And abiding with my Savior.
So if I seem a little out of it the next time we see each other, it's probably because I'm still trying to wrap my mind around the command I'm given to spend my day glorifying Jesus, not looking forward to tomorrow.
Trying to wrap my mind around being
Fearless
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