I do. It's who I am. How I'm wired.
Unless you're new to me, this doesn't come as a surprise to you.
There's an ebb and flow to life, and there's an ebb and flow to what I'm currently excited (and by excited I mean obsessed) about. Kinda like seasons, I guess.
I give you my top 7 as of late:
7. My Menu Board
6. The Packers. I love them, and though I've only been a fan for a few short years, I've invested myself fully :) and my Noah couldn't have been happier on Sunday.
3. New Tupperware. Sounds ridiculous, but when did Tupperware get so cute?!? A friend had a party and I got this stuff and I can't quit looking at it and smiling.
2. Reading. I've rekindled my love of reading. I don't really get into fiction all that much, but anything else will pretty much do. My husband (the pastor) also shares the same love so there are piles of books every.where. One of the last books I finished, I actually read the last page and immediately started at the beginning again. I love a book that grabs me by the shoulders and gives me a good *shake* to wake me up, make me think. Crazy Love did that. And it's ringing in my ears and heart daily that status quo is not good enough...it's garbage, actually.
1. Spending time with my God.
I recently watched a friend walk through a really tough life situation. Suddenly everyone who vaguely knew her wanted to be her friend in order to help...in reality, if they had really known her, they would have realized that some of the very things they were doing to "help" were actually causing her more grief. Their intentions were good, but it irritated me no less. And it got me thinking...
Do I do that with God? Do I say I know Him, yet fail to spend time with Him daily, hourly...regularly.
Relationships never grow without communication. Ever. And the closest of the relationships in my life are with the people I rub shoulders with on a daily or regular basis. Sure, there's some long lost friends that I can go without seeing and then pick up where we left off...but it's picking up where we left off...not from a place of deep understanding of one another in the current.
And there is a difference.
I realized I was doing this with God. And I grieved.
I want to know Him daily. Because that is really the only way that He is able to transform me.
Which leads me to this little book:
I notoriously dislike devotional books. I'll spare you my list of reasons, but mostly...they annoy me.
It never fails that God works greatly in my life through things I find annoying.
Over Christmas, I picked up a flyer that had the above book, Jesus Calling pictured in it. And, because I judge books by their covers, and thought this would look super cute on my pile of books, I grabbed my cell and asked my mom to pick me up a copy at the store by her house. It was very random...so I thought.
As soon as I picked the book up, I was hooked. I read through the whole thing like a novel. It's written as if Jesus is speaking right at you. The "I," "Me," "My," etc always mean Jesus, while the "you" and "your" mean me, the reader.
I fell in love with it. The kicker: It's a devotional FOR KIDS. Crack me up.
Oh it gets better.
About the same time I was searching for out next Ladies Bible Study material. We were wrapping up Forgotten God (amazing, by the way) and everything I thought was gonna be a great idea, just never quite felt right.
And then He hit me with it. I wasn't the only one who needed to be spending time with Him on a daily basis. I sat on the idea of it for awhile, hoping I hadn't quite understood Him right. After all, the lovely ladies in our Bible study more than graciously put up with my craziness, however presenting them with the idea that our "study" is actually going to be a devotional book for kids was not really what I wanted to share with them. Because who comes up with that?!?
God does.
Without a doubt.
And because it's His deal, and not mine, they were totally game for it.
Tonight, we meet together for the first time after starting this "study" and I'm so excited to see what God's doing.
I'll leave you with this little nugget from the book, that I've been chewing on since January 30th:
... whatever you think about the most becomes your god, your idol, the thing you worship. From Jesus Calling for Kids
I can't get past it. How many things do I think about more than Him? He's changing me though. Through this time with Him, daily, hourly...He's rising to the top.
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