When I was living in Fresno for my first year of college, I found myself not being as close to the Lord as I wanted to be. I wasn’t doing my daily devotionals and I was not attending church. When I decided to take a semester off of school (with the exception of one online class) to focus on work and figuring out exactly who I wanted to be and what I wanted to do, I was making sure that I spent some time in the Lord’s word daily and made an effort to attend church regularly. This past week I began my first semester at Modesto Junior College as a full time student, and right away I caught myself slipping on my time with God. I caught myself using the excuse “I just don’t have time today” on days I didn’t do my Bible study, and this weekend I was so burnt out and exhausted from the long and busy week I had that I decided I was too physically exhausted to make it to church.
Then today this thought struck me: how lucky are we that God never decides that He doesn’t have time for us? Could you imagine going to Him in a time of need only to have Him respond with, “Sorry, I’ve been really busy this week and am pretty worn out so I’m going to have to get back to you later.” How blessed are we that no matter what, God will always be there for us? I have been so immensely blessed in so many ways. Every day I find a new reason to be thankful, so the least I could do is take time out of my day just to be alone with the Lord. I’m not saying that not going to church makes you a bad Christian or even a bad person, and obviously God is still going to love me regardless of if I memorize all His scripture or not. But if I can make time to watch football on Sunday, yet can’t make time to just sit and be with the Lord and give him thanks, isn’t there something wrong with that picture?
We live in such a fast-paced society, one where everyone is constantly on the go and so caught up in what they think needs to be done and what they want to do. While obviously my education and work are important, the bottom line is that I wouldn’t be where I am today if it wasn’t for the grace and love of God. Yesterday my Niners suffered a devastating loss against Seattle for the NFC Championship. I’m a very competitive person, and typically I tend to overreact about these things to the point where if someone were to walk into my house with no idea of what was going on, they would probably think I was in actual physical pain. However, last night when it was clear what the outcome of the game was going to be I removed myself from the room and spent some time alone and really put thought into the situation. Was it upsetting? Yes, of course. Did it affect my well being? I could probably get creative and find some way to make the argument that it does, but the bottom line is that it doesn’t. I still have my family, my health, a roof over my head, and so much more. Football didn’t give me those things, my loving Heavenly Father did. And yet, I made time to put off my homework and studying to sit in front of my TV and be frustrated, but I was too tired to make the five minute drive down the street to church and give thanks. Funny how that works, isn’t it?
As I’ve stated before, I’m not one for “New Years Resolutions”, I prefer to make goals as I see fit. And after this weekend, it’s pretty clear to me that I need to get better at making time for what really matters. Whether that be time with the Lord, my family, etc. It’s so easy to make excuses and put things off. But the fact of the matter is that my daily devotional takes up about thirty minutes of my twenty-four hour day. That’s less than 4% of my day. So as the year is still young I urge you to figure out what really matters in your life and make an effort to make time for that every day. Everyone is different, and I know that what I wrote today won’t apply to everyone, and that’s okay. But the bottom line is that tomorrow isn’t guaranteed, so never put something off with the excuse that you will get to it later, because you never know what could happen today.
All the Little Lovely 