Consistency

As you can probably tell by now, one of my biggest struggles in life is being consistent.  I do not consistently give my time, effort, or trust to the Lord.  Today, I am starting something that is long overdue.  I am going to wake up an hour before I usually do to devote to the Lord.  I have tried in the past and always seem to come up short, but this time I want you (my readers/friends) to hold me accountable.  

Time is a very precious thing that most of us do not care enough about.  I waste time on facebook, watching tv, and playing xbox.  While all of these things are not bad things, the amount of time that I invest in these things are probably bad.  I could be using this time more efficiently by reading and studying the Word of God, investing in friendships, making new friendships, helping those in need, etc.  I encourage all of you to begin praying about how you could better use your time.  I propose that we start focusing on our eternal lives rather than trying to selfishly satisfy our earthly lives.  

My wife would be the first one to tell you that I also struggle with the idea of giving effort.  Sure, give me a basketball or a deck of cards, and I will put everything I have into what I'm doing, but when it comes to actions that I do not particularly want to do, words like "lazy" and "poor effort" come to mind.  I think that I am most guilty of this in my everyday conversations.  I do not put hardly any effort into talking with my friends and family.  During conversations, I typically do not ask questions or remember details.  This tells me that I am not putting any effort into the conversations.  I need to change!

This last point is a mystery to me.  I find it discouraging why it seems so hard to trust the Lord.  The Bible is full of promises that are given to Christians, but how many of us trust these promises?  God says to test him in tithing and see if He will not bless you, but how many of us struggle with tithing?  The Bible says to daily meditate on the Word and everything we do will prosper, but how many of us follow through with this?  Do we not want blessings and prosperity? I don't think thats the case.  I think we don't fully trust these words.  

My prayer is that we all begin to be consistent in these three categories of our lives; time, effort and trust.  As Christians, we need to encourage each other to do better!

Listen

After a fantastic week of Kiddo Camp, I returned home safely Friday evening. I was in charge of directing the kids up and down a creek for an hour at a time, helping them catch "critters". I am thankful that a) Nobody got lost on our adventure. b)Nobody got hurt on our adventure. We encountered two snakes which were probably poisonous and a mean hornets' nest. I have to admit that I did not notice the hornets' nest until the third time I made the trek down the creek. Its only by God's grace that the first two teams didn't get stung. c)Everyone seemed to have a good time on the adventure.

I love Kiddo Camp and everything that it represents. Adults sacrifice their time and often times vacation days to give to these kiddos. Parents put their trust in these adults to take care of these kids. The activities are planned for the kids' enjoyments. And God is praised and honored the whole week, by the staff and children. Who wouln't want to be a part of this experience?

I do have a little anecdote from camp that I believe can lead into what God was trying to tell me this week. It was Tuesday afternoon and the thunderstorms were coming through. We all were instructed to stay in our cabin until further notice. This means that myself and Mr. Caleb were accompanied by seven amped up fourth graders in our small cabin. Caleb and I were of the opinion that now was the best time for a little mid-day nap, so we turned the lights off and told the guys to just listen to the storm. This plan seemed like a great idea. Most of the boys were on board, but we had one little guy who had a different idea of what to do with his time inside the cabin. As Caleb and I were attempting to take a quick nap, this kiddo talked. I don't really know if anyone was listening to him, but he talked and talked and talked the whole time we were inside. After a half an hour of this (seriously), I think me and Caleb had about enough of the talking. We gave up the nap (it was not going to happen) and began doing something else to pass our time.

The Holy Spirit put this story in my mind today during church. Also, I was reminded of a story about Elijah from my reading this week. In 1 Kings 19:11-12, Elijah was hiding in a cave and the Lord told him that He was about to pass by. Elijah came out and a great wind, an earthquake and fire all passed, but the Lord was not in any of these. Finally, a gentle whisper came, and it was the Lord. As I think back to our little kiddo who would not stop talking, I wonder how many of us are in that same boat? What if God is trying to give us a gentle whisper and we are too busy talking? We could even be talking about something spiritual or something not "bad", but this talkng is getting in the way of our listening. I think we should all be still from time to time and see if God is trying to whisper to us. The examples in the Bible of the wind, earthquake and fire are the type of things that we look for God to be in. Yes, God speaks in tragedies, God speaks in very hurtful times in your lives, but are we missing the times when He is trying to teach us something and we aren't listening?

My prayer is that we begin listening to God. We begin listening to the Word of God. We begin giving God some time to speak to us during our prayer time. We begin to heed the advice of the strong Christians God has placed in our lives. Stop talking and listen!