It's worth it.

STOP AND READ YOUR BIBLE

You. 

Yes, you. 

Are you: exhausted, busy, overwhelmed, emotional, lonely, content, confused, depressed, or worried about anything?

{Okay seriously if none of those applied to you then good job. As for the rest of us...}

I love when I hear the same thing over and over and over during my life and hear it said so many ways, and then one day I'm just going along and BAM! It clicks. I mean if it clicked the first time that'd probably be better, but this is great too. 

Okay raise your hand if you ever go a day without reading your Bible. {okay put your hand down} I'd be comfortable guessing that a lot of Christians don't read their Bible every day. You wanna know why? Because I don't. {Whaaaat? Crazy. I know. I told you I was gonna be honest} But I also know that I'm not a special case. Now I'm not saying that you don't hear, think about, or see some scripture every day, especially at DBU. Heck I can't even walk up a flight of stairs without seeing it. I'm talking about actually being alone and spending at least 20 minutes reading His Truth and reflecting on what it means to you in depth. That is what we have a hard time doing. Again, I'm going to say 'we' because I know for a fact that a ton of Christians struggle with this.

Here's my ouch, burn comment for the day: how on Earth are we supposed to call ourselves Christ followers if we aren't daily reminding ourselves of the Gospels relevance in our lives, reminding ourselves of His glory, and learning and memorizing how to live out our testimony of redemption? Seems pretty stinkin' contradictory to me.

But of course- we're just soooo busy. How are we supposed to set aside an hour, or even 20 minutes a day for that? (insert image of me rolling my eyes at myself because of how stupid and selfish that sounds). Trust me, I know what it means to be busy. But I found where I'm wasting that time. And this week, I did some reconfiguring.

Social media. Oh, yes. This is one of those conversations. Betcha didn't see that coming. You guys- it WASTES our time. Not only does it waste our time, but I know that for me and many others it evokes envy and discontentment. So-and-so got has the best clothes, is so photogenic, got engaged, is so funny, got the most 'likes', has the cutest relationship, etc...

Every now and then I take a two week break from it all. And it's the best two weeks I could ever experience. So why don't I do it continually? Habit. Culture. Whatever you want to call it- we've been programmed to think it's normal. Think back to the 90s, you know, the decade all of us claim to miss so much. What did you miss? How easy it was, how simple, how much time you had? You still have all of that time! There hasn't been a shortage of hours in the day. We just spend our time differently. Quite frankly- we spend it worse a lot of the time.

On Monday I woke up and felt surrounded by a fog. Not a literal fog because that'd actually be terrifying; I'm talking about a worldly fog. I had sensed it creeping in for a few weeks, but I did nothing to stop it. Then I woke up one morning and felt completely consumed. I had let music, movies, shows, and most obviously -other peoples lives- cloud up where my focus was supposed to be. It is SO easy to get jealous of what others have, without realizing that they're only sharing part of their life. How can you compare your behind-the-scenes to someone elses highlight-reel? It doesn't add up.

The main reason that these worldly, nasty things had taken over though was because of ONE reason alone. I hadn't been spending enough time with God alone. When we don't wake up every day and put on that armor and prepare our minds and heart, and find ourselves falling in love with Him, our joy gets pushed aside. What we're left with is temporary happiness that fluctuates with every passing circumstance. But joy, now that is what we want. We all want that steady, daily, comforting hope that resides in us when, and only when, we are fixed on the things of Christ.

Challenge for the week: obviously there are exceptions such as school projects or business in which you need social sites, but if that doesn't apply to you then try taking a week off. See how much time you truly have. Spend that time with God. Read through books like James, 1 Peter, and Timothy that give such wonderful examples of how to live for the Lord. It will make such a drastic change. I promise. See what it's like to have that free time, to experience that closeness with God, to not have any feelings of jealousy over what so-and-so did last week, and to spend your time making memories with friends instead of just looking at pictures of the memories they're making with others. You might just love it.