Monthly Archive

Change is a funny and amusing thing.  I used to think that I liked change, but the older I get the more I learn that I only like certain types of change.  I love the change in the seasons.  I appreciate a change in the scenery.  As I sit and contemplate the nature of change I realize that one commonality with all the changes  that I like is that they are all easily identifiable.  The leaves change and you know that fall is coming.  It is an obvious thing and there is not much room for debate.  I wish that change in my own life was this easy to observe.  

When you are held captive in your own brain you sometimes don’t realize that things are changing in you.  Sometimes this is a bad thing.   There have been times in my life where I hear words that come out of my mouth and I am shocked.  I am appalled at the evil that I am capable of speaking into the air.  I then wonder have I regressed in my relationship with the Lord?   How did I get to the point that I would ever say that? I would never have said that a couple years ago. 

 But every so often you notice a good change…   

I am pretty compulsive about getting good grades.  Compulsive might be a little to light of a term probably more like morbidly obsessed.  I was taking a class last quarter and the teacher gives us an option to turn papers in a week early and he gives us feedback and we can make changes to our papers before turning them in for a final grade.  Turning papers in early it is usually the difference between a B+ and A- or A- and A, which is not a huge difference but enough of one to make it worth my while.  In the two classes that I have had this professor I have taken advantage of this with ever single paper that I could.  I was working on the final paper for one of his classes on a Wednesday night and if I wanted to get the paper reviewed I had to have it finished by 11:59 p.m. the next night.  I was thinking about how much time I had over the next twenty-four hours and I could have easily gotten the paper done, but it would have come  at a cost.  Thursday nights are when Kelly and I lead a college home group at our church.  Thursday is the day that I do the majority of my preparation for group that night and so if I was to finish my paper I would not have been prepared for college group.

A year ago this would not have even been an issue.  I would have just blown off whatever ministry was holding me back and finish the paper.  I might have had an internal debate over which one to do but in the end I am sure that I would have chosen the paper over preparing for the group.  But on this particular Wednesday night there was no debate in my mind at all, I put off the paper and chose to prepare for the group instead.   Most of you reading this probably think that I am being totally stupid but to me this was a huge epiphany.   This to me was a sign that God is changing the direction of my life and He is doing it at a foundational level.  God did not just enable me to make a right decision, or empower me to stop doing something that is wrong, He is working to fundamentally change my desires and the things that I am striving for.  

I came to Fuller with a certain end goal in mind and the longer I am here I feel the Lord shifting my focus and moving me into to something else entirely.  It makes me realize that sometimes God uses things to move you to a certain place just so that he can change you heart and direction.  I think sometimes we hold so tightly to an old dream that we miss the great work that the Lord wants to do in us now.  I pray that I can be flexible enough to follow God down paths that I did not intend to go down, even if the means letting go of things that I have held for a long time.