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| Photo By: cdsessums (Creative Commons) |
In the Beginning
We often start our relationship with Christ in a flurry of excitement and unexplainable joy. We’re anxious to tell our friends and family about the change in our lives. We don’t go to the places we used to go; we don’t do and say many of the things that we’re accustomed to doing and saying. Our interests change along with our desires.
The Bible says this happens because God has worked a miracle in our lives and we are no longer who we were when we got out of bed that morning we are now “new creatures (2 Corinthians 5:17).” We find ourselves looking for the “Direction” God wants us to go.
Stuck in the Middle
Slowly we end up in a place of immense and intense confusion.
Reality sets in that we’ve made a commitment to live in a manner totally foreign to us. In a way that is so radically different than most of the people we know that it becomes increasingly difficult to maintain the joy and enthusiasm we felt, sometimes, only a few weeks prior.
We’ve spent our entire lives living for ourselves – and not really knowing that’s what we were doing. We have been selfish, self centered, rude, and disrespectful, liars.
Now we have to live for someone we cannot see, someone we’re told loves us, died for us and wants to set us free, someone that has a plan for our lives and wants us to prosper.
But what does all that mean and what do we do with it?
Moving Toward Your “Direction”
For me, the most important step you take at this point is finding someone that can help you understand the decision you have made as well as guide you in reading and understanding the Bible – because there is no substitute for reading God’s word.
It is the way He chose to communicate with us in this generation. It is our guide book to living our lives for him. But it can be confusing and difficult, at times, to understand. So, find a more experienced person that can assist you.
I am not saying you need to join a church at this point – or ever – but I feel strongly that the direction you’re now headed is too hard to travel without other “like minded” people. You can find them in a church but you will also find people that may make your new way of life more difficult.
Ask God to help you find people that can help you – which means, pray.
Yes, you need to pray – which is simply talking to God. There in nothing mystical about it; nothing difficult – at least there does not need to be. You simply talk to God. You can do it out loud or in your head. You can do it seated, kneeling, standing, driving, running or lying down. You can do it with your eyes open or closed, hands folded or at your sides.
I try to treat my prayers like a conversation with a friend – I am open, honest and I try to be vulnerable. Go ahead and tell God what’s on your mind because He already knows.
These suggestions are in no way all encompassing – this is just the tip, the beginning, the starting line to a journey that can be exhilarating and at times exhausting.
DON’T GIVE UP!
Mick Holt 