Stop, Drop and WorshipSample

Knocked and Shocked

How is it that we can all be so surprised by that which is predictable? Life can be difficult but who ever said that it wouldn’t be so? The naivety of young adult living leads to a rude awakening when growing up and “adulting.” Even the physical Law of Entropy says that everything is decaying or becoming disordered if there isn’t some force offsetting this. Things are likely to decline when left undermanaged or not propped up by some intention otherwise.

Life takes WORK. Of course, marriages are hard when they are composed of two human beings coming from two completely difficult lives and childhoods. Both of those individuals had distinctly different parents raising them and influencing their lives and decisions. And, not to mention, each of these individuals have been raised in a fallen world filled with abounding sin. Hmmmm… This would lend one to easily think that marriages might take some hard work. But creating a beautiful love affair and relationship is possible.

And then there is parenting! Would we have ever thought that parenting would be easy? Two sinners making love and birthing other sinners. Yes, we have the marvelous hope of sanctified living, but we are also daily reckoning with the “flesh condition” that, left to itself, fosters a tendency towards sin. So, take the thought that these two people that married are now birthing individuals with different God-given personalities, purposes and strengths unbeknownst to the mother or father at birth. Often, I ended up parenting my “round peg to live in my square hole” because I had not yet discovered their true personality and giftings. Thank goodness for a Redeemer that can redeem and restore all that the locusts have eaten through misguided imperfect parenting from perfectly imperfect people.

We often expect education to be hard or certain jobs to be hard. We must “come to grips” that our lives will drift off course if we do not intentionally WORK on course correcting them. Some people end up knocked off track and shocked with the results of their lives. Let’s open our eyes today and roll up our sleeves and invest in the lives that we want to live. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. Choose to make today and the rest of your days… the very best of your life!

Let’s prioritize our choices. Let’s ask for wisdom. Let’s get to work. Yes, relationships take work but they are worth it.