I used to be a list person. I think that it’s normal for list people to fill the top of their To-Do list with the quick and simple tasks that are easy to accomplish and leave the big, looming tasks constantly at the bottom. At least this is what I always seemed to do. Doing this used to give me the illusion that I was being productive and accomplishing something. Not only did I do with this with my normal “To-Do’s”, but for much of my life I did this with God. I believed in God, but I didn’t know how to process him. I knew that tackling the process of figuring out who God really is and what that meant for my life was a huge task and would take a lot of time, so I kept putting him off, leaving him at the bottom of the list, and telling myself that I would get to Him later, after I had crossed off everything else on my list that would be easier to take care of. The problem was that I kept adding more things to the list above Him. He was always there, but was always in the “I’ll get to it later category”.
Later finally came two and a half years ago. Life had rocked me, shaken me, and broken me. I had met God but had turned away from Him. Like Jonah running away from Ninevah, I too was trying to escape God, had been trying to escape to Tarshish, and had been hurled into the deep of the raging sea. But the same God that sent Jonah a whale, sent me a friend to rescue me. There came a day where I finally told God that I would make him #1 on my list. I committed my life to Christ, but even while I did, even while I told God that he would come first, I did so believing that it would be a sacrifice. I honestly believed that living for Him would mean that I would have to give up the things in my life that were fun and that I would be miserable.
As I sit here and look back on the last two years, this is what I gave up:
I gave up nights of black-out drunkenness….for a life that I will actually remember
I gave up surface level conversations with people….for discussions where I get to know who people really ARE
I gave up greed…for generosity
anger…for forgiveness
hurting…for healing
worry…for unfailing faith
judgment…for acceptance
I gave up trying to please people…for being comfortable with who I am and loving people whether they like me or not
I gave up the belief that I had to be dating someone to be whole…with the knowledge that I can never be complete without God
I gave up occasional happiness…for a constant, deep, and overwhelming JOY!
I gave up feeling empty inside…for the realization that I will never be alone
I gave up meaningless lists…for two goals: 1) Love God and 2) Love Others
I gave up a dead soul….for a Jesus-filled heart
I guess in some ways, I was right. I have given up a lot. But the more I have given up, the harder it is for me to even fathom what ‘miserable’ would feel like. By giving things over to God I have been cleaning the garbage out of my life and making room for those places to be filled with something so much better. I never could have guessed that living for Him would be so fulfilling and I never would have imagined that I would have so much FUN being a child of God. It’s amazing the lies that we believe and the true rewards of life that we let the world ROB us of when we listen to everything but the voice of God. It’s even more amazing the life He gives us when we finally listen to his whisper and Follow Him, finally put him at the top of our list, finally make him our number one priority. I know the result of giving things up to God and I no longer look at it as a sacrifice. I look at it as an honor and a privilege, and a GIFT! I will continue to give things up to my God until I have GIVEN IT ALL!!!
Constantly trading LIES for a TRUTH that sets me,
FREE
