Before the summer begins, I always have an idea of what it will be...I imagine days of soaking up the sunshine, going on walks in the early morning, reading book after book on the porch, eating fresh food, drinking a lot of tea and coffee. I think of all the things I will buy with the money I'll earn from my job I'll love, taking long drives late at night with the windows down, smelling the air. Running through sprinklers, cooking with my family, spending my nights alone in my room journaling and reading my Bible and praying and letting Jesus become my best friend.
But what really happens every time? What has happened thus far? I'm lazy, I hardly ever go outside, I've read two books, I drink too much coffee and no tea, I eat the same food as I always do. I don't love my job and I certainly don't have money to buy whatever I please, I've run through zero sprinklers and have yet to make anything but cookies. And these nights I'm up until the earliest of hours? I'm not praying and listening to what God has to say, I'm stalking and looking and lusting over the things of the world that I don't have because instead of working hard and trying to start my life I'm sitting on my butt.
Each night I fall asleep hoping tomorrow, tomorrow will be better. Tomorrow I'm going to start fresh, tomorrow I'm going to read my Bible before I get out of bed, tomorrow I'm going to take a walk, tomorrow I'm going to make dinner, tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow and I create a world in which I am living for a series of tomorrows that never come. Because I never choose to start today.
I'm sick of it, and I'm done. Dreaming isn't going to get me anywhere. Dreaming is going to give me ideas and goals and wishes to aim for but if all I do is hope for them, I will never receive them! We reap what we sow. And dreaming is not equivalent to sowing.
Hebrews 10:35-36
"So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised."
Funny that I often seem to think the "will of God" is so daunting. I've heard you need to pray, ask for wisdom and seek seek seek until you find it. But all it is, if you ask me, is a summation of small moments of obedience. God's will is for me to love. God's will is for me to be selfless. God's will is for me to find beauty in every human he's created. God's will is for me to talk to him. God's will is for me to be grateful. God's will is for me not to envy, not to lust over anything. And God's will is for me to obediently comply with all he's asked of me. If I can do the small things won't the big decisions already be blessed?
I don't want to underestimate the importance of patience in waiting for God's answers, truth, guidance for the biggest moments of our lives, but the point I have so often missed is that we don't need to to wait to complete the will of God because most of it we are already aware of.
Romans 13:11
"The hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light."
