One of the struggles I have in my life is being content with what I have. Some might think I'm talking about money but believe it or not, it goes beyond money. Don't get me wrong, a big part of my struggle is wanting for more material things but it goes beyond that. Oh sure I want the new Expedition XL with leather interior and wood grain accents and I want that 2 story house with granite countertops in the kitchen and a large swimming pool in the back yard. I want the nice clothing my co-worker wears but its more than material things. I hate to say that sometimes I even want for people, sounds weird I know, but its things like wanting a typical daughter and not a daughter with a disability. Sometimes, I want a different husband, one that attends to my needs in a fashion that I want and not the ways he chooses. Sometimes, I want a different job; one where I feel like I am giving back to society, like a teacher or something like that. Sometimes, I even want a different church; one that inspires people to do more. I even want more friends; some who think I'm brilliant. Hahaha, that's a good one. It really made me laugh. Hahahaha.
All these wants sound good and fancy in my head but when I write them down and read them aloud, they sound so ridiculous and shallow. I'm reminded of a statistic I once heard, in that America controls nearly 20% of the world's wealth and yet the number of Americans taking anti-depressents in the last decade has trippled. We have so much and yet we are so depressed. Is it because we want more?
As I think about these things, I reflect on Adam and Eve in the garden. God gave them EVERYTHING but restricted them from only one thing and yet that is the thing they concentrated on. They did not concentrate on EVERYTHING they had, they focused on the one thing they didn't have. They were not content; they wanted more. That want, lead them to go against God's instruction and they took for themselves more than the portion God alloted them. The result of this, changed the entire course of humankind. It also lead to their own misery and separation from God.
When we are not content and want for more, we have this tunnel like vision. We can only think about the one thing we don't have and fail to see the things we do have. We think the grass is greener on the other side, but God, who sees everything, knows that the grass is NOT greener and in fact what we do have is exactly what we need. God is all powerful, ever present, and all knowing. He does not have tunnel vision. He sees everything.
When we are content with the portion God gives us it is as if we are saying, "God, I trust you". I wish Adam and Eve were content with the garden they were given and did not want for what they shouldn't have had. But even more, I wish I could be content. As I write this, I realize wishing is a ridiculous notion. Don't wish, do. Do I not trust God? I must realize that wanting more may not benefit me. Could me wanting more actually lead to misery? God knows and sees what I need. I must submit to him.
So, here I go, I submit to God's alloted portion in my life, trusting that he sees more than me. He knows what's best for me.
Could contentment be the route to happiness?
The truth I should be focused on is that God has alloted me a wonderful husband who cares for me and my children even above his own needs. He has alloted me a beautiful, fun-filled daughter who brings joy to our family regardless of the things she is not. He has alloted me a one story house big enough to welcome friends and family for dinners, meetings and overnight stays and finally, God has alloted me membership to a body of believers, my church, that puts truth above popularity.
I'm content.
Perhaps that which we have is actually the best thing for us after all, especially because what we have is GOD.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Cheater Cheater Pumpkin Eater
Is it cheating when you quote C.S. Lewis all the time instead of writing your own brilliant ideals? I sure hope not, because I'm not just going to quote C.S. Lewis, I'm about to blog him. I've been reading Mere Christianity and fell in love with this section, no pun intended and you'll understand the pun if you read along.
Enjoy.
starting at paragraph 7
It is hard because so many people cannot be brought to realise that when B is better than C, A may be even better than B. They like thinking in terms of good and bad, not of good, better, and best, or bad, worse and worst. They want to know whether you think patriotism a good thing: if you reply that it is, of course, far better than individual selfishness, but that it is inferior to universal charity and should always give way to universal charity when the two conflict, they think you are being evasive. They ask what you think of dueling. If you reply that it is far better to forgive a man than to fight a duel with him, but that even a duel might be better than a lifelong enmity which expresses itself in secret efforts to "do the man down," they go away complaining that you would not give them a straight answer. I hope no one will make this mistake about what I am now going to say.
What we call "being in love" is a glorious state, and, in several ways, good for us. It helps to make us generous and courageous, it opens our eyes not only to the beauty of the beloved but to all beauty, and it subordinates (especially at first) our merely animal sexuality; in that sense, love is the great conqueror of lust. No one in his senses would deny that being in love is far better than either common sensuality or cold self-centredness. But, as I said before, "the most dangerous thing you can do is to take any one impulse of our own nature and set it up as the thing you ought to follow at all costs." Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing. There are many things below it, but there are also things above it. You cannot make it the basis of a whole life. It is a noble feeling, but it is still a feeling. Now no feeling can be relied on to last in its full intensity, or even to last at all. Knowledge can last, principles can last, habits can last; but feelings come and go. And in fact, whatever people say, the state called "being in love" usually does not last. If the old fairytale ending "They lived happily ever after" is taken to mean "They felt for the next fifty years exactly as they felt the day before they were married," then it says what probably never was nor ever could be true, and would be highly undesirable if it were. Who could bear to live in that excitement for even five years? What would become of your work, your appetite, your sleep, your friendships? But, of course, ceasing to be "in love" need not mean ceasing to love. Love in this second sense-love as distinct from "being in love" is not merely a feeling. It is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by (in Christian marriages) the grace which both parents ask, and receive, from God. They can have this love for each other even at those moments when they do not like each other; as you love yourself even when you do not like yourself. They can retain this love even when each would easily, if they allowed themselves, be "in love" with someone else. "Being in love" first moved them to promise fidelity: this quieter love enables them to keep the promise. It is on this love that the engine of marriage is run: being in love was the explosion that started it.
If you disagree with me, of course, you will say, "He knows nothing about it, he is not married." You may quite possibly be right. But before you say that, make quite sure that you are judging me by what you really know from your own experience and from watching the lives of your friends, and not by ideas you have derived from novels and films. This is not so easy to do as people think. Our experience is coloured through and through books and plays and the cinema, and it takes patience and skill to disentangle the things we have really learned from life for ourselves.
People get from books the idea that if you have married the right person you may expect to go on "being in love" for ever. As a result, when they find they are not, they think this proves they have made a mistake and are entitled to a change-not realising that, when they have changed, the glamour will presently go out of the new love just as it went out of the old one. In this department of life, as in every other, thrills come at the beginning and do not last. The sort of thrill a boy has at the first idea of flying will not go on when he has joined the R.A.F. and is really learning to fly. The thrill you feel on first seeing some delightful place dies away when you really go to live there. Does this mean it would be better not to learn to fly and not to live in the beautiful place? By no means. In both cases, if you go through with it, the dying away of the first thrill will be compensated for by a quieter and more lasting kind of interest. What is more (and I can hardly find words to tell you how important I think this), it is just the people who are ready to submit to the loss of the thrill and settle down to the sober interest, who are then most likely to meet new thrills in some quite different direction. The man who has learned to fly and becomes a good pilot will suddenly discover music; the man who has settled down to live in the beauty spot will discover gardening.
This is, I think, one little part of what Christ meant by saying that a thing will not really live unless it first dies. It is simply no good trying to keep any thrill: that is the very worst thing you can do. Let the thrill go-let it die away-go on through that period of death into the quieter interest and happiness that follow -and you will find you are living in a world of new thrills all the time. But if you decide to make thrills your regular diet and try to prolong them artificially, they will all get weaker and weaker, and fewer and fewer, and you will be a bored, disillusioned old man for the rest of your life. It is because so few people understand this that you find many middle-aged men and women maundering about their lost youth, at the very age when new horizons ought to be appearing and new doors opening all round them.
Enjoy.
Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis,
published in 1943.
Book III, Section 6, Christian Marriage, starting at paragraph 7
It is hard because so many people cannot be brought to realise that when B is better than C, A may be even better than B. They like thinking in terms of good and bad, not of good, better, and best, or bad, worse and worst. They want to know whether you think patriotism a good thing: if you reply that it is, of course, far better than individual selfishness, but that it is inferior to universal charity and should always give way to universal charity when the two conflict, they think you are being evasive. They ask what you think of dueling. If you reply that it is far better to forgive a man than to fight a duel with him, but that even a duel might be better than a lifelong enmity which expresses itself in secret efforts to "do the man down," they go away complaining that you would not give them a straight answer. I hope no one will make this mistake about what I am now going to say.
What we call "being in love" is a glorious state, and, in several ways, good for us. It helps to make us generous and courageous, it opens our eyes not only to the beauty of the beloved but to all beauty, and it subordinates (especially at first) our merely animal sexuality; in that sense, love is the great conqueror of lust. No one in his senses would deny that being in love is far better than either common sensuality or cold self-centredness. But, as I said before, "the most dangerous thing you can do is to take any one impulse of our own nature and set it up as the thing you ought to follow at all costs." Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing. There are many things below it, but there are also things above it. You cannot make it the basis of a whole life. It is a noble feeling, but it is still a feeling. Now no feeling can be relied on to last in its full intensity, or even to last at all. Knowledge can last, principles can last, habits can last; but feelings come and go. And in fact, whatever people say, the state called "being in love" usually does not last. If the old fairytale ending "They lived happily ever after" is taken to mean "They felt for the next fifty years exactly as they felt the day before they were married," then it says what probably never was nor ever could be true, and would be highly undesirable if it were. Who could bear to live in that excitement for even five years? What would become of your work, your appetite, your sleep, your friendships? But, of course, ceasing to be "in love" need not mean ceasing to love. Love in this second sense-love as distinct from "being in love" is not merely a feeling. It is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by (in Christian marriages) the grace which both parents ask, and receive, from God. They can have this love for each other even at those moments when they do not like each other; as you love yourself even when you do not like yourself. They can retain this love even when each would easily, if they allowed themselves, be "in love" with someone else. "Being in love" first moved them to promise fidelity: this quieter love enables them to keep the promise. It is on this love that the engine of marriage is run: being in love was the explosion that started it.
If you disagree with me, of course, you will say, "He knows nothing about it, he is not married." You may quite possibly be right. But before you say that, make quite sure that you are judging me by what you really know from your own experience and from watching the lives of your friends, and not by ideas you have derived from novels and films. This is not so easy to do as people think. Our experience is coloured through and through books and plays and the cinema, and it takes patience and skill to disentangle the things we have really learned from life for ourselves.
People get from books the idea that if you have married the right person you may expect to go on "being in love" for ever. As a result, when they find they are not, they think this proves they have made a mistake and are entitled to a change-not realising that, when they have changed, the glamour will presently go out of the new love just as it went out of the old one. In this department of life, as in every other, thrills come at the beginning and do not last. The sort of thrill a boy has at the first idea of flying will not go on when he has joined the R.A.F. and is really learning to fly. The thrill you feel on first seeing some delightful place dies away when you really go to live there. Does this mean it would be better not to learn to fly and not to live in the beautiful place? By no means. In both cases, if you go through with it, the dying away of the first thrill will be compensated for by a quieter and more lasting kind of interest. What is more (and I can hardly find words to tell you how important I think this), it is just the people who are ready to submit to the loss of the thrill and settle down to the sober interest, who are then most likely to meet new thrills in some quite different direction. The man who has learned to fly and becomes a good pilot will suddenly discover music; the man who has settled down to live in the beauty spot will discover gardening.
This is, I think, one little part of what Christ meant by saying that a thing will not really live unless it first dies. It is simply no good trying to keep any thrill: that is the very worst thing you can do. Let the thrill go-let it die away-go on through that period of death into the quieter interest and happiness that follow -and you will find you are living in a world of new thrills all the time. But if you decide to make thrills your regular diet and try to prolong them artificially, they will all get weaker and weaker, and fewer and fewer, and you will be a bored, disillusioned old man for the rest of your life. It is because so few people understand this that you find many middle-aged men and women maundering about their lost youth, at the very age when new horizons ought to be appearing and new doors opening all round them.
Monday, August 16, 2010
iGive Up
I've lived most of my life focused on me and those around me. To be honest, my focus has never been wholeheartedly on God until recently. That's weird to say seeing as how I was a born and raised a Pastor's Kid and went to church my entire life. As a matter of fact, as a child, I attended church services on Friday night, Saturday morning and Saturday afternoon without fail. We got to church early and were always the last to leave. Even when we were not at church, we talked about church. Church was a major focus in my life. Actually, church works and church ministry became my main focus for quite a while in my adult life. Then God called me out. He shut all the doors of the church and said, "its just you and me kid." It was humbling to know there was nothing I could "do" for God and yet it was the best place He could have brought me to.
In my new encounter with God, removed from all my church works, I realized nothing else mattered but being with God, and no one else mattered but God. To some that seems harsh. I can hear the questions already, "No one else matters? Not even your children?" Of course I love my children and I also love my church, but they are not and cannot be my focus, cannot be my God.
When we are focused on people, our focus is not on God. The truth is, someone who is focused on God will end up being a better parent and even a better church-goer in the long run.
The word church doesn't even mean what we think it does. It is not a "service" or "building". The word church means assembly or gathering. We can have church in my back yard as long as we are gathered in Christ. But this is not a bashing on church. Though church doesn't save us, it is a good practice for us. Gathering together with others who believe to share what we have encountered in God is an extrarordinary boost in our spiritual growth. But if our focus is on church, then church becomes our God. Even church-goers like myself must admit that the traditions of an assembly will not save us. From the fancy churches with the awesome media technology to the simple churches with conservative tradition, it simply will NOT save and if it cannot save, then it should not be our focus.
There are other things that infiltrate our minds and our hearts that often become our focus, like food, clothing, money, and even our own families. Focusing on these gives us a sense of control - as if we could possibly control any of these things in our lives. When something happens in our lives out of our control we become disillusioned and even depressed. We must give it up from being our focus. But how? We must eat, right? We need money. We love our families. Thinking about these things and planning for them is not what I mean to take away. Instead, my point is to stop making them priority over God. Maybe this is what Jesus meant when he said, "Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it."
Besides our vying for control will only leave us empty and sometimes even crazy. Been there, done that. We must rely on God and let him lead us. Jesus said, "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well."
What are some ways we can focus on God? I've asked myself this question and keep coming to simple solutions as written in God's word. 1) Accepting Jesus as LORD over our lives (be born again by baptism and leting Christ lead us in all we do and say); 2) Praising God for what He has done, what He is doing and what He is yet to do. By praising God, we give Him the glory - the credit. It is not us but He who has done great things. This brings about humility, repentance and a letting go of control.
So yeah, go ahead and give it up. Focus on God.
MORE WORDS FROM JESUS:
Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.
Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?
And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
-found in Matthew 6:19-34
In my new encounter with God, removed from all my church works, I realized nothing else mattered but being with God, and no one else mattered but God. To some that seems harsh. I can hear the questions already, "No one else matters? Not even your children?" Of course I love my children and I also love my church, but they are not and cannot be my focus, cannot be my God.
When we are focused on people, our focus is not on God. The truth is, someone who is focused on God will end up being a better parent and even a better church-goer in the long run.
The word church doesn't even mean what we think it does. It is not a "service" or "building". The word church means assembly or gathering. We can have church in my back yard as long as we are gathered in Christ. But this is not a bashing on church. Though church doesn't save us, it is a good practice for us. Gathering together with others who believe to share what we have encountered in God is an extrarordinary boost in our spiritual growth. But if our focus is on church, then church becomes our God. Even church-goers like myself must admit that the traditions of an assembly will not save us. From the fancy churches with the awesome media technology to the simple churches with conservative tradition, it simply will NOT save and if it cannot save, then it should not be our focus.
There are other things that infiltrate our minds and our hearts that often become our focus, like food, clothing, money, and even our own families. Focusing on these gives us a sense of control - as if we could possibly control any of these things in our lives. When something happens in our lives out of our control we become disillusioned and even depressed. We must give it up from being our focus. But how? We must eat, right? We need money. We love our families. Thinking about these things and planning for them is not what I mean to take away. Instead, my point is to stop making them priority over God. Maybe this is what Jesus meant when he said, "Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it."
Besides our vying for control will only leave us empty and sometimes even crazy. Been there, done that. We must rely on God and let him lead us. Jesus said, "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well."
What are some ways we can focus on God? I've asked myself this question and keep coming to simple solutions as written in God's word. 1) Accepting Jesus as LORD over our lives (be born again by baptism and leting Christ lead us in all we do and say); 2) Praising God for what He has done, what He is doing and what He is yet to do. By praising God, we give Him the glory - the credit. It is not us but He who has done great things. This brings about humility, repentance and a letting go of control.
So yeah, go ahead and give it up. Focus on God.
MORE WORDS FROM JESUS:
Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.
Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?
And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
-found in Matthew 6:19-34
Thursday, August 12, 2010
the STEP
"Wow, I have come so far. I must be close. I must be close to being like my teacher, the savior who stands at the top of the stairs."
You look around you and you see other stairways with people climbing up. You even see some stairways with people walking down. Again with pride and now with some added jealousy, you say to yourself,
"Well hey, I am a lot farther than that poor guy, who can't hardly walk up a single step" or "Man, look at that lady, she's sprinting up the stairs and is surprassing me."
As you walk up, you come across a step that reads,
"Is the goal to look at each other to be like each other? Or is the goal to be like the teacher?"
Luke 6:39-40: "Can a blind man lead a blind man? Will they not both fall into a pit? A student is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher."
So you stop looking back at where you came from and you stop looking at others and you finally look up to your teacher, who stands at the top of the stairway. The long way up is humbling and makes you realize you have a far way to go. You feel naked and embarrased because your teacher is perfect and you are not. He is good. You are not. He is love in action and you...most certainly are not. With one foot on a step above, you try to climb, but you can't. You've stopped. You feel ashamed of how you are no where near the likeness of your teacher and you stop. You proclaim your feelings of shame. You feel you are nothing so you stop. You feel you will never reach the likeness of your Christ. You are lame and unable to move.
Romans 5:8, "But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
And while you are still paralized in shame, you hear the teacher's voice. He calls you his love and beckones you,
"Come."
"Follow Me."
Your shame turns into repentence and His forgivenes covers your nakedness allowing you to once again focus on the truth. The truth is that you can be like your teacher.
Luke 6:40: "...but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher."
So you look in his eyes and with clear focus on him, you take the next step up and proceed to follow your teacher.
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