Reality Check

Have you ever thought to yourself, "Yes. Look at me. I'm going strong. Take off the training wheels dad, I don't need them any more." For a while, I felt something akin to that attitude. I thought that I'd shored up my weak points, sealed in the cracks in the walls, refortified and resupplied my resolute fortress. During the school year, I got so busy with class and CPG projects and Cellar Door editing and the whole slew of things I was doing that my quiet time fell to pieces. It was never all to regular to start off with, and by the end of the semester, it was pretty non-existent. During the summer however, I resolved to re-ignite my time with Jesus, and for this past month of May, I've seen marked improvement. No, I can't say that I had my quiet time every day, but I can say that it was back to a semi-regularly occurrence. I was actively thinking about Jesus, concerned with his plans and goals for my life, and because of this, I was forced by necessity to turn back to the source of everything I know about him: the B-I-B-L-E. I was doing better in other areas too. I was learning self-control. Discernment. Gaining wisdom. I was even improving on my relationship with my family, knowing that the transition from University life to home life is always difficult.

For a while, it seemed like it was smooth sailing. And maybe that's the first place I went wrong. I think I started to coast. I think I started to rely more on my imagined "forward progress" than on my Lord and Savior. No, my life wasn't perfect and I certainly didn't become a perfect Christian or anything close to it, but at times, perceptively, it appeared to me to be so much better than what it was. Thinking this, I let go of Jesus hand, like Peter when he looked down as he walked out to Jesus from the boat. Peter's feet began to sink, and frankly, mine have been sinking for at least a couple of weeks and I never even realized it. And now I sit here writing with drenched clothing, a drowned rat.

Several things have led me to this conclusion:

1) My girlfriend has been telling me about some of the things she's learned from reading a book entitled The Irresistible Revolution. It deals heavily with things such as justice and love in the way that Jesus talked about by his words and deeds, things which we're often uncomfortable with when we sit behind the fence that is White American Christianity like stoic observers. The author explores some of the irresistible consequences of our faith in Christ, how we ought to love one another and how that ought to manifest itself in some way in our communities, not just within the Church. Love is more than just a covered dish dinner and a fellowship meeting. It's making change in the world, causing ripples, because our love for everyone in the world mimics the overawing love our savior showed us on the cross. I haven't read this book yet. I don' t know what the author says specifically, and I may not agree with everything he says. Who knows? Regardless, I will read this book, because just hearing about it secondhand has already made me think about how I'm living out my faith.

2) Falling: At Rockbridge this year, Alex Kirk once spoke about how if the only thing that causes us to come to God is failure, then that is what God will send our way, because he wants us to come to him and not rely on ourselves. Lesson learned, Alex. I think this statement could be the theme of my struggle with sin. I fight this battle not to sin, and then when I don't, I pull away from God just as much as when I do. I try to take off the training wheels and do things on my own, relying on my own will power not to sin and using God's grace as a crutch "just in case I do". Seriously, WTF! When am I going to learn that I can't just rely on God when I'm crawling on my hands and knees? Jesus is my Lord when I'm humbled low and when I'm walking with my head held high. My life should reflect this, and yet it doesn't. And when I try to do things on my own, when I try to coast as I mentioned before, this inevitably leads to another hard hitting fall. It's like I'm the captain of a ship coming into port during a stormy night and I radio ahead to the lighthouse technicians asking them to turn off the power to the beacon. It shouldn't be any surprise that when I try to sail in, I smash up against the rocks. And I begin to wonder how many scars a man can accumulate from the rocks before the damage is permanent. I know Jesus is full of grace and mercy, but I also know full well that sin is sin, and that when I sin, I sin against my Lord. That wrenches at my gut, how I've wronged the one I love. I need to learn to lean on You, even when I think the sea is calm and I've finally gotten rid of my land legs.

3) My quiet time has dwindled to hardly anything. I was reading through Philippians, but when I finished it, for some reason I never thought to start reading through something else. Another symptom of coasting.

4) An argument with my mom, the first real argument we've had since I got back from school. It was a case of miscommunication on both of our parts, a little bit of an authority issue on my side, and some lack of empathy on hers. We were both in the wrong, but one thing it did was to give me a reality check. You can't just sit around and wait for your relationship with your family to magically heal itself. You have to actively seek to do that. In other words, I need to go out of my way to try to repair my relationship with my mother, even if that means humbling myself in ways that are uncomfortable for me. And most of all, I need to show grace towards my family, patience, and love. This isn't something I can coast with. I have to actively choose to do so.

And I think that's the lesson from all of this. Whatever I'm coasting in, whatever you're coasting in, the solution to coasting is always a choice to act. You have to take the initiative and realize that this isn't just something that comes of its own accord. You have to take the first step, and then the second step, and then the third... It has to be a conscious decision, every time, just like I need to decide to rely on Jesus when I'm tempted to rely on my own will power. Just like I'm tempted to let my relationship slide with my family, assuming that things are just fine as they are. Just as I'm tempted to just stop when I've finished reading through Philippians rather than choosing a new book to read through. The key is knowing that there is a choice to be made (a fact we often overlook, to our own detriment) and then making that choice.

Just some thoughts, late at night. Hope they make sense. This late at night, it's hard to keep track of my train of thought all the way through , so my apologies for anything that seems to not fit or flow.