Reason #436
My brain is constantly going. It hardly ever shuts off, so I am always thinking about something. Sometime I replay old conversations or scenarios in my head, sometimes I just think about random things, most of the time I think about what I need to be doing, and sometimes I just have a thought placed there that stays for a while.
I've been thinking a lot about commitment over the past few days. Of course, I think the culprit was the pre-marital workshop I sat through this weekend. Anyhow, we talked a lot about commitment and I began to think about how so many people deal with commitment issues.
Commitment, a promise, a pledge. Commitment means staying regardless of how you feel. Commitment means hanging in there even though you might wish, with all of your being, that you could get out. And our society confirms that decision by saying, "It's easy to leave. No big deal. Just do what you want to do because you deserve to have what you think you deserve." But here's the kicker, a lot of times we don't keep our commitments so that we can chase what we feel we deserve only to realize we should have stayed right where we were. We should have been committed.
"Commit your actions to the Lord and your plans will succeed." - Proverbs 16:3
Commit your actions. Remember that what ever it is you do, you've committed to the Lord. You told him you would do it, you promised Him you would follow through. But we forget that and we start replacing Him with other people and things. It seems to make it easier if we walk away from a job, a person, a church, an event, but what if we realized that what we were really doing was walking away from the Lord? What if we understood that we were breaking our commitment to God rather than just to earthly people? And we wonder why we fail. We wonder why things don't work out the way they should. Well, maybe if we were committed to the Lord first before we commited to the things and people around us, we'd be successful. If we committed to following God more than following our own selfishiness we wouldn't end up in a worse state, broken, hurt, humiliated and dejected. Because there's never a thing that I have committed to the Lord that He hasn't honored. There has never been a time where He punished me for following through with my word. And the truth is, when I have followed through with the commitments I have made to Him, when I have done things I didn't want to necessarily do but did because I told Him I would, He has blessed me for it.
And so I'm grateful that even when we falter and fail in our commitments, God never does. I'm thankful that He is always there for us and that it's not contingent on how He feels but rather because He said He would be. Committed to keep His word, committed to His creation, I'm so grateful to serve a God like that.
#436 - Because He is the epitome of true commitment and will honor us when we follow through.
"For the grace of God has been revealed, bringing salvation to all people. And we are instructed to turn from godless living and sinful pleasures. We should live in this evil world with wisdom, righteousness, and devotion to God, while we look forward with hope to that wonderful day when the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, will be revealed. He gave his life to free us from every kind of sin, to cleanse us, and to make us his very own people, totally committed to doing good deeds." - Titus 2:11-14
I've been thinking a lot about commitment over the past few days. Of course, I think the culprit was the pre-marital workshop I sat through this weekend. Anyhow, we talked a lot about commitment and I began to think about how so many people deal with commitment issues.
Commitment, a promise, a pledge. Commitment means staying regardless of how you feel. Commitment means hanging in there even though you might wish, with all of your being, that you could get out. And our society confirms that decision by saying, "It's easy to leave. No big deal. Just do what you want to do because you deserve to have what you think you deserve." But here's the kicker, a lot of times we don't keep our commitments so that we can chase what we feel we deserve only to realize we should have stayed right where we were. We should have been committed.
"Commit your actions to the Lord and your plans will succeed." - Proverbs 16:3
Commit your actions. Remember that what ever it is you do, you've committed to the Lord. You told him you would do it, you promised Him you would follow through. But we forget that and we start replacing Him with other people and things. It seems to make it easier if we walk away from a job, a person, a church, an event, but what if we realized that what we were really doing was walking away from the Lord? What if we understood that we were breaking our commitment to God rather than just to earthly people? And we wonder why we fail. We wonder why things don't work out the way they should. Well, maybe if we were committed to the Lord first before we commited to the things and people around us, we'd be successful. If we committed to following God more than following our own selfishiness we wouldn't end up in a worse state, broken, hurt, humiliated and dejected. Because there's never a thing that I have committed to the Lord that He hasn't honored. There has never been a time where He punished me for following through with my word. And the truth is, when I have followed through with the commitments I have made to Him, when I have done things I didn't want to necessarily do but did because I told Him I would, He has blessed me for it.
And so I'm grateful that even when we falter and fail in our commitments, God never does. I'm thankful that He is always there for us and that it's not contingent on how He feels but rather because He said He would be. Committed to keep His word, committed to His creation, I'm so grateful to serve a God like that.
#436 - Because He is the epitome of true commitment and will honor us when we follow through.
"For the grace of God has been revealed, bringing salvation to all people. And we are instructed to turn from godless living and sinful pleasures. We should live in this evil world with wisdom, righteousness, and devotion to God, while we look forward with hope to that wonderful day when the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, will be revealed. He gave his life to free us from every kind of sin, to cleanse us, and to make us his very own people, totally committed to doing good deeds." - Titus 2:11-14