Constant Reminders

Beginning the study Falling in Love Again with Your Lord could not have come at a more perfect time. I have a two month old and, oh buddy, has that little dude thrown me for a major loop. I don’t know why this surprises me in the slightest, but things have just not been what I expected. I have all these feelings or expectations of the way things should go in my home and the things I should be able to get done or what my son should be doing and at what times during the day. When things don’t happen the way I thought they would lately all I do is pout about it or get frustrated or get angry. I don’t even know where all these expectations came from, honestly, or why it’s so important that it happen in this particular way, but it’s very real in those moments when they’re not happening the way I want them to.

In Falling in Love Again with Your Lord we’ve been talking about making the Lord our all, a life totally surrendered to Him and His ways alone instead of ours. Through the homework and lectures the Lord has opened my eyes so much to my unbelief that He can be my everything. Right along with that unbelief comes laziness because I continue to follow my feelings instead of disciplining myself to walk by His Spirit and pride for thinking that my ways are better and that I know what’s best.

Last week the homework prompted us to read through many verses of Psalm 119. I didn’t even want to do it, quite honestly, because it was going to take much longer than I accounted for in my head, but thankfully by God’s grace, I went through it as the homework prompted. Every time I had read Psalm 119 before, or really many psalms where David or another author makes such definitive statements about how they trust in the Lord, I always thought they were being cocky. I would wonder to myself how they could say things with such certainty because I knew that I didn’t trust the Lord all the time and I knew on this side of heaven I would continue to struggle with different sin battles. This time, however, the Lord allowed me to see this differently. He revealed to me how much David repeated himself. It was almost as if David had to remind himself over and over again of how he was resolving to live his life and remind himself of what he believed in. David also followed up many of his definitive statements with the phrase “according to your promises.” I started to realized that David wasn’t cocky at all. In reality David was just completely living out of his trust in who the Lord says that He is and he needed constant reminder of that to keep going. David wasn’t living by his feelings, he was living based on who the Lord was. The Lord revealed to me that I do not live from the reality of who I am in Christ. I’m not believing in my new identity. This is really hard.

Galatians 2:20 says, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” What a sweet truth that I could be believing. And really, wouldn’t living as if this were true make all the difference? I desperately desire to believe this with my whole heart. I want the Lord to be my everything. Maybe you do too, and it seems really hard and unattainable. I want to share a prayer I prayed to the Lord the other day, just confessing to Him and begging for help because I possess no power in myself to attain this.

“And believer—understand that if you want to be filled with the Spirit and the risen life of glory, you must first die to self” [Andrew Murray, Absolute Surrender]. Lord, this is so hard and I hate that it is so hard. Why do I want to hold on to my ways and desires so badly when I know yours are better? I guess maybe I really don’t “know” that. I have so much unbelief, Lord, and lack of trust in you, but also, Lord, just such laziness. It’s really hard to have a desire for something and when feeling that desire so strongly to not just go with that urge. In those moments when I choose to just feel those things and keep going with those feelings—like comparing myself or being frustrated with my son because he’s not following my schedule—instead of trying to renew my mind according to your Word, it’s like I’m saying you’re not worth the effort. Or that I am believing the lie that it will never get easier or that I’m “good enough.” It’s so crazy these lies, Lord, because there is never a “good enough.” I will never attain this. Lord, as I sit here I desperately want to believe and live from my new identity in Christ, not from my natural self, a person who constantly looks at herself with self-pity and could always do better, or who has that awful false humility of thinking she’s so great because she sees how awful her sins are and sulks. David had to work for this. He was constantly repeating himself, reminding himself of your promises and how he resolved to live. Lord, I want to surrender my life. I want to meditate on and follow your ways. I want you to be my all. I don’t have to always struggle with these things like I feel I will. Galatians 5:16 says, “…walk by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.” Lord, I can’t walk by the Spirit on my own. Please help me. I’m desperate for you to be my everything. I’m so tired of walking in my flesh. Do what it takes and may it be out of love for you alone. 

Most times when I see my sin I have a pity party. Yet again I’ve messed up. But even that is such a wrong perspective because in actuality how sweet it is that the Lord would continue to reveal sin to me, to continue to show me my desperate need for Him, to continue to remind me that apart from Him I am nothing and that I need to rely on Him completely. My instinct is not to rely on the Lord so I know that this isn’t going to happen overnight. I will need constant reminders. I will need to meditate on God’s Word just like David, and that alone takes discipline. How sweet of the Lord to just keep teaching me. May we all be given grace to believe the reality of who we are in Christ and given the discipline to constantly remind ourselves of that reality.

Planted for His Glory