i “get” it…but i don’t…
“God calls us to pray and think and dream and plan and work not to be made much, but to make much of Him in every part of our lives.” – john piper
i so often fail that.
i desire to honor and glorify God in every aspect of my life.
yet it is seemingly rare that i actually do.
when we lose a basketball game i feel i have failed to glorify God.
i know that is not always true, but if winning is the goal and the best, doesn’t God desire that?
the best.
achieving the goal?
then there are times when i look back and just say i really do not think that how i how acted there made much of my Savior but rather made much of me.
how do i glorify God when i sleep?
a question i have long struggled with and have been given the answer to and yet so many times it didn’t seem to click.
i get it i do, that i can glorify God even in my sleep.
but you know what i really don’t get it.
is that possible to get it and at the same time not get it?
i “get” that God is my Creator.
i “get” absolute truth.
but i don’t “get” either.
life is simple right.
live to the honor and glory of God.
glorify Him in everything you do.
sounds simple enough.
yet how much more complex does that actually turn out to be.
so i have to ask, is it complex and seemingly difficult because it just is, or is it because i am human, or is it because humanity has perverted this concept just like humanity has perverted love and success and reward.
i know that i have struggled before with how to glorify God in everything i do and say.
i have even written about it before.
just as i have written about inconsistency and balance who knows how many times.
it seems like these struggles and questions may never leave my life.
but each day each struggle and each question becomes a little more clear.
a little more understandable.
i get a little less confused.
this has been poorly written, and poorly organized and extremely random at times.
for that i apologize.
to you and to God.
for not making this the best.
but right now i don’t know how else to write this.
maybe one day i’ll figure out how to write better.
“it is a sin to not give your best.”
i pray i did not waste too much of your time with this.
live love.
live Christ.
“love is doing what is best for someone” -john piper
December 15th, 2007 at 11:16 am
now this is where i get to say that i get it, but i don’t.
God made people and said that His creation was good.
as He did with everything else.
so why shouldn’t we look back on the good we have done and call it as we see it?
that is… call it good.
yeah we can look back at our sins and our faults
and say that we need to do better.
that’s easy.
but we shouldn’t only focus on our issues and our faults.
we should say stuff like, “i may not have been able to win that basketball game,
but i did do as well as i could on that test i took today.”
little stuff like that is worth calling good.
because if you only focus on the negative,
you’ll feel as though all you produce is bad.
i heard a preacher speak about this recently,
and his whole message was about giving yourself a pat on the back when you do something good.
that’s all well and good,
but you should also do a little self-criticism now and then.
he seems to be one of those, “feel-good pastors”
who only tell people what they want to hear.
but he did have a bit of a point.
i think there should be a healthy balance between
self-criticism and self-praise.
look at everything you do,
and classify it as either good or not good enough.
treat those behaviours accordingly.
feel good about the fact that you’ve done good,
and plan to change the bad you’ve done.
but i just thought of something else.
if you’re classifying all your deeds into good or bad,
then it might become very easy to slip into the trap of
trying to make your good deeds out-weigh your bad ones.
that’s definitely not good either.
so just hold yourself,
of better yet let God hold you,
in healthy tension between self-appreciation
and self-criticism.
both things are good, but at the right time, and in the right quantity.