But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
Matthew 6:33 NIV
Are there ideas in your head that you have been mulling for years? Demands and good expectations? Things that you know are important, valuable, and good, and which, because they are so important, are standing in line until you find more time for them in your everyday life? Are you waiting for the right moment to come to start doing them? They may be things that we even talk about with others and express how important they are. On certain topics, we are real specialists in theory, but our implementation is lacking.
What about you? My head is full of such things. Some of my wishes, demands, and resolutions date back as far as 1998! For decades I've been living with wishful thinking in certain areas of life! So now I sat down and made a list of these, and here is a small excerpt:
Take a walk in the fresh air every day. Do sports three times a week Create a photo album of my voluntary service in 2009 Drink only tea and eat fruit once a week Eat little in the evening Lose 4 kilograms (depending on the phase of my life the amount varied)
So, for years I've been fooling my brain into thinking that these things are very important, that they are a part of me, practically speaking. It doesn't matter if this only takes place in my wishful thinking.
What does your list look like?
Again and again, I tried to live up to these good intentions, but mostly they were short-lived phases.
I remember very clearly how I gave my heart to Jesus when I was 14 years old. Since that moment, I have wanted to start every day with Him, praying and reading the Bible. BUT ... study, being a late riser type, night owl, then a child ... all of these phases kept putting off the implementation of my desire. For years, I would take time for Him when the most urgent things of the day had been done. In my wishful thinking, however, my heart longed to spend time with Him in the early hours of the day.
Then, four weeks ago, I read a sentence with a completely different set of eyes:
“But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” Matthew 6:33 NIV.
And then something happened inside me. It's now or never, I thought to myself. I don't want to fool my God or myself anymore. I want to live one year the way I have wanted to live for 23 years. As to the rest of the list, I'll leave it for later, but starting tomorrow, I want to start the day with Him, for a whole year. I want to live one of my most important values in life, faith, as I understand it, practically for twelve months like that.
What shall I do with the other things on my list? I will put them aside and first experience the reality of the promise in this verse in my daily life: "All these things will be given to you as well.”
I am convinced that God will come in when I open up. And he will change me, lovingly and patiently. My hypothesis that is some of the items on my list I may start doing automatically, some will disappear, others new ones will be added, and a few will also need a very personal resolution.
Will you join me?
Elitsa Boksberger, pastoral care, and counseling for women