My Time

I was going to write to you this week about something I felt God saying to me during our churches Easter drama. But the simple fact is that I’ve not been willing to give God the time needed to use me to write it. I struggle with this problem a lot… not giving God time. I’m really good at giving him my employer’s time. I’m not very proud of this fact so my telling you about this is probably more of a confession than a message or thoughts this morning. Why is it that I find it so easy to give someone else’s time to but struggle so much with giving God “my” time?

I get almost angry at myself for doing this but it’s one of those things that I keep telling myself, and God, that I’m going to change but before I know it, I find myself at home watching TV, playing XBOX or surfing the internet. The last couple weeks it hasn’t been so bad… I’ve not really been that busy at work so… I just take a little time, record my thoughts and then back to work. That’s not that bad… is it? I might make some notes here and there and then come into work and put them all together. It’ just that the last couple weeks have been really busy so the thoughts have become less and less.

I’ve also become very good at using my employer’s time as study time for God so that when I get home, I don’t feel as bad about not giving God any of my time. I go to work, plug in my mp3, go to one of several different “world class” preachers, pop on my headphones and sit back and listen to someone teach me about Word of God. (***Warning*** extreme sarcasm ahead, proceed with caution) Great huh? Technology today is wonderful… I can listen to God all day long while I work and then when I go home, I can do whatever I want and not feel bad about it. After all, I’ve just given God eight hours or more of my un-divided…. ok, slightly divided time. I bet that is still about 7 ½ more hours than any of those other heathens… I mean Christians… I hang around with! (see Luke 18:10-14)

Then there is the whole “called” thing. I’ve slowly come to accept the fact that I believe God has gifted me in the area of words. Sometimes, I speak, sometimes I pray and sometimes I write and for the most part I enjoy these all these things. There are moments when I’m doing one or more of these things and I just feel so blessed to be able to be a servant for God. Then there are those moments when I just feel the pressure. Those are the moments when I take ownership of what God is trying to do in my life, moments when it becomes all about me. What if I’m not any good, what if I run out of things to say or write, what if this is not what God has really called me to do, what if, what if, what if…

What if… I started giving God more of “my” time? What if I stopped making everything in life about me and started really, truly relying on God?

This is my confession to you… I don’t give God the time that I should and I don’t rely on God the way that I should. James 5:16 talks about confessing our sins and praying for one another so that we may be healed. I ask for your prayers this morning. I am ready to be healed. I’m tired of living a pattern that looks like the rest of the world and I’m tired of doing God part-time. For many years of my life, I spent a lot of time trying to be different and standout so that I could fit in. I’m tired of fitting in, tired of being who others think I should be and I’m ready to start being who God created me to be. I think of the early disciples and how their lives were after that death and resurrection of Christ. Most were in and out of jail, continually persecuted and beaten. Ten of the first twelve were put to death for their faith. Their lives stood out from those around them. They were put to death for their faith, mine has cost me nothing but given me everything, and yet, I’ve given so little in return. During one of the many podcast I listen to, Craig Groeschel said these words about giving. “We give our lives, it’s the only reasonable response to what Christ gave.”

It’s in the giving of our lives that we being to learn how to live as God created us to live. When we give our lives to those around us, we learn to do life together in a way that allows us to experience love as never before. It’s in the giving of our lives where we learn to be open and honest with one another so that others may pray for us and we can begin to be healed. It’s in the giving of our lives that we learn the value of the sacrifice that Christ made for us so that we can fully grasp the depth of Gods grace and His love.

To give our life, we have to lay the things that have filled our arms and hands at the foot of the Cross so that we can begin a new journey through life cradling only the Cross, learning what it means to fully rely on God.

2 Corinthians 1:8-10 (New International Version)

8We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. 9Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. 10He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us, 11as you help us by your prayers….