It’s been less than 10 minutes since I’ve shut off all my electronics in the house and lay here on a sleeping bag in the middle of my living room floor. I think to myself “why have I not done this before?!” 10 minutes with no distractions is all it took for me to realize how much I’ve missed God lately and how much closer to Him I feel now just 10 minutes into this night.
I’ve been so consumed (more like overwhelmed) with all the prep work that needs to get done for this trip, that I wasn’t putting enough focus on my relationship with God, who happens to be the whole reason I’m going on this Race in the first place. And to top it off, I’ve been trying to shoulder most of this myself before going to Him, instead of going to God first and then doing what I can to meet Him part way.
All of this has left me feeling so overwhelmed and distant from God that I knew something needed to change.
As I lay here thinking about the times that I feel closer to God and the times that I don’t, I came up with my “trials” and “comfort zones”. Recently the biggest trial I have ever gone through has come to an end. I was so glad to be finished with that chapter of my life, but now looking back I can see what a blessing in disguise those two very long years were. During that period I went from being distraught and so alone to finding strength and hope in Christ. God was all that I had and every day I looked to Him to be my rock. Since then, I have moved back into my “comfort zone”, and what a distracted zone that is. I’ve spent so much time trying to catch up on everything I felt like I’d missed out on, getting so caught up in having a nice, happy life that I’ve once again forgotten to include God in my daily life.
I never ever EVER thought I’d be saying this, but I sort of miss my life being in such a major mess, if only because that’s when I felt closest to God. So, in an effort to draw closer to Him, I decided to put aside some of my comforts and distractions for the night like my phone, t.v., and even my bed.
During the middle of the night, I ended up getting sick. All I wanted to do was call this whole thing off early and go snuggle up with my comfortable things like my bed and a t.v. show to lull me back to sleep. One minor thing happened and I was already ready to throw in the towel. Really? Did I not just learn anything from this night? Oh wait, you’re right. This whole night was supposed to be about seeking God. So instead of curling up in my comfy bed, I sought comfort from the Lord as I crawled back into my sleeping bag on that very hard floor. And you know what? I felt more comfort in my heart than I know I would have if I’d chosen to revert back to my comfort zone just because things got a little hard and uncomfortable.
What I learned from last night is that when we find ourselves in less than desirable situations and choose to push through instead of turning back around, we will seek God more fervently to be our comfort and give us the strength we need to make it through because He promised He would never leave us nor forsake us. And when we find ourselves in a comfortable place we should remember who brought us there and what it took to get us to that place, instead of automatically sticking God on a back burner just because life seems easy at the moment.
If being uncomfortable is when I draw closest to God, then I pray that I always choose the uncomfortable situations rather than seeking comfort from something else.
