Tag Archives: life

How am I spending my time?

26 Aug

This question has been nagging at me for the past few weeks as I started to build a bio for my profile on The Nest. (See the unfinished product here). I can’t for the life of me find a legitimate, God-honoring reason to continue spending time creating this thing. It has taken hours–first I have to take the pictures, then I upload them, then I create the pages, insert the pictures, type in the captions. But I walk away from it all feeling like I just wasted hours of my life with nothing to show for it but a shrine to my life–and an enabler to my pride. I just know that when I get to heaven, there will be a record of all the hours I wasted on earth–and even though I won’t be remorseful there (because there is no sadness in heaven!) I want to put an end to the wasted time while I can.

I also find that I spend all of my time outside of work doing things for myself. I live in my own little world. I hate that!! I am praying for God to open the door to volunteer opportunities near my house so I can do something for other people rather than live in my own little bubble.

When I stumbled across a website today that asked this very same question and listed some analysis questions, I realized that I need to do a self-evaluation. These are the questions:

  • Where are you spending your time?
  • What would you really like to be doing?
  • Where would you really like to live?
  • How is your relationship with your loved ones?
  • Do you have time to help others in your town?
  • Do you have a hobby, a passion?
  • Do you spend time on your hobby or passion?
  • Do you focus on your health, your weight, your appearance?

    • I have also been going through this period of wondering what my life purpose is. I initially thought that it meant I should get a new job (though I haven’t even been at my current job for a year yet and it is seemingly the perfect job for me). But now I see that what I really need is an attitude/perspective adjustment. The Lord revealed to me last night that I was trying to live according to my own standards–my attitude was “I don’t want to go to a job every day that I’m not crazy about. I just don’t want to live that way.” Well, a crucial part of being a Christian is not living the way I want to live, but living the way God wants me to live.

    This verse has been convicting:

    “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18)

    I will post more on this topic when I have time to digest my answers to the questions above.

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    Life according to Woody Allen…

    16 Aug

    I just read this article about Woody Allen in the latest Newsweek. My heart breaks for him! A director who has had an amazing career but he says that he still makes movies “not because he has any grand statement to offer, but simply to take his mind off the existential horror of being alive.”

    “I can’t really come up with a good argument to choose life over death. Except that I’m too scared,” Allen says.

    Later on in the article, Woody Allen is quoted as saying, “Your perception of time changes as you get older, because you see how brief everything is. You see how meaningless…I don’t want to depress you, but it’s a meaningless little flicker…You have a meal, or you listen to a piece of music, and it’s a pleasurable thing. But it doesn’t accrue to anything.”

    As I read that article, I was reminded of something I wrote in high school. For several years before I became a Christian, I really struggled with the meaning and purpose of life. If I had not become a Christian after my sophomore year of college, I have no doubt that I would resonated with Woody Allen’s sentiments very much.

    This is what I wrote in my diary when I was a junior in high school: “There are no other words that I can think of to describe life other than futile and worthless. Really, when you think about it, what the hell are all of us doing here? We go through school, which everyone despises but supposedly it’s ‘beneficial.’ We get a career, which most people hate and they end up wasting their lives on things that don’t really matter. So what the hell are we doing? Sure there are some good times, fond memories. But they all end. Everything good or worth anything ends at one point. Nothing can be relied upon. You may think that you have your life figured out and everything may be peachy keen for a while. But just wait and see–life will throw you a curveball, guaranteed. There is absolutely no doubt that your life will truly suck. And not just once. Repeatedly, over and over. You know why? Because life’s a bitch and then you die.”

    By the end of my senior year of high school, this is what I thought: “I know that I have felt–and still remotely feel–that the good things in life seem to be constantly squashed by the shit. But I have also realized that while some good things are temporary, so are the bad things. Nothing in life is ever definite, without the possibility of it being changed.”

    Which is all fine and good that I held that quasi-belief then but it still didn’t answer my question: What the hell are we all doing here? I still didn’t have a purpose to my life, no meaning. Until I became a Christian, my life was all about pleasure and rebellion. I smoked pot, got wasted, and slept around because it was wild and free. There were no rules.

    But my sophomore year of college, I started rethinking my take on life. I wasn’t happy. I was miserable. My life consisted of surviving each week to get to the weekend and then being so hammered and stoned all weekend that I didn’t remember half of it anyway. I thought to myself, “Is this ALL there is to life? This is IT?” I think Woody Allen started in that place–but he’s questioned it for so long with no answers that he has resigned himself to “This IS all there is and life is SHIT. I would kill myself but I don’t have the guts.” That is truly tragic. And I am sure that he is not alone in his feelings. I think it is common for atheists to feel that way (but most likely not that intense).

    Without Christ, life is meaningless. Because only the Creator of the world can tell us what it all means, the reason why we’re all here. That was what drew me to Jesus in the first place–He was something to live for. I finally had something to live for, something to build my life around. I finally had a purpose. Reason #456,278 why I am so glad and thankful that God called me to be His.

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    More than just getting by

    30 Apr

    I was just listening to the new MercyMe CD–my only CD purchase in the past year–and there is one line in the song “Where I Belong” that really spoke to me. It says:

    “Everybody tries
    To find the purpose for their life
    In hopes that one more day is justified

    But once you truly see
    The very reason why you breathe
    It becomes so much more than getting by.”

    That line makes me think back to my high school and college days before I became a Christian. My life was just about getting by. Back then, the lyric that triggered these feelings was from Amy Hit the Atmosphere by Counting Crows. The line said:

    “There has to be a change I’m sure
    Today was just a day fading into another
    And that can’t be what a life is for.”

    Humans want meaning! We want purpose! We want someone or something that will give us something to live for, to tell us that our lives are not for nothing and we’re not just wasting our time here.

    As I was pondering how my life was before I became a Christian and after, I realized that there are still moments in my walk with God when it feels like I’m just getting by. I’m bracing myself as I go to work for another long, restless day. I brace myself for another tension-filled evening with Travis. I stop thinking about how hard it is to be in Colorado, away from my friends and family who I miss so dearly.

    As I was getting in the Word this morning during breakfast, Psalm 97:11 caught my attention. It says:

    “Light is sown for the righteous, and joy for the upright in heart.”

    Joy is sown for believers. We get joy. It comes standard with the salvation package. The Lord knows that I need reminders like this–like Philippians 4:4 “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.” Psalm 97:1 “God rules: there’s something to shout over!”

    More than all that, we get joy IN GOD. He is our exceeding joy (Psalm 43:4) and our refuge (Psalm 62:7). He is our praise, our glory, our righteousness, and most importantly, our hope.

    “And now, O Lord for what do I wait? My hope is in you.” Psalm 39:7

    “Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.” Psalm 42:11

    So when those days that seem to never end come, or when it seems that there is no limit to my sinfulness, I can turn away from my circumstances and self to the Perfect One, my Redeemer. In Him, I find hope that my life has meaning. In Him, I find joy in being where I am, doing what I’m doing. Like Zane Black said today in chapel, God has it all planned out–we just need to walk in it.

    So I praise you Lord for giving our lives meaning, for revealing what our purpose on earth is…and for making our days about more than just getting by.

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    Is this thing still on?

    18 Apr

    I haven’t done this in a while…I’ve just been running around like a chicken with my head cut off.

    Here’s a recap of everything I’ve done since my last blog post:

    1. Went skiing the past 3 Saturdays in a row.

    2. Ran 7 miles, then 8, then 9 the past 3 Sundays.

    3. Went to the final regular season game between the Avs and the Wild.

    4. Went to the Frozen Four–two games last Thursday (4/10) and one on Saturday.

    5. Went out to eat at a mongolian grill and then to a wine tasting with a couple from church.

    Add to that all the craziness of work and daily life and it has been one busy month! So that’s why I’ve been lax on the blogging.

    Here’s a highlight from the past month: My understanding of the Gospel is increasing. I feel like I fell back to the bottom of the ladder of Gospel understanding. I had been a couple rungs off the ground but the past couple months, I was lying flat on my back at the bottom, so out of it I wasn’t even sure there was a ladder. I just had–and am still kind of having–a really hard time grasping the impact of the gospel. I could tell you what the gospel IS but I couldn’t say what it DOES. The effect of the gospel on a human being is mysterious and complicated. And awesome. I guess I’ve been trying to take off the packaging and look at the gears so I could figure out how it worked.

    I’ve come a little bit closer to understanding how that works. Here’s my journal entry from this morning:

    “When we GET the gospel, when we truly understand God’s love for us, we are able to love and serve selflessly and humbly…because we are LOVED…Boasting in Jesus, His death and resurrection, is boasting in the Gospel. It’s boasting in the love of the Father for me, a sinner. It’s boasting in the fact that I am nothing apart from Christ, that He makes me what I am, and I live in daily dependence on His grace and mercy. It’s boasting that I HAVE A SAVIOR! Boasting in the Gospel naturally eliminates boasting about myself and my accomplishments or anything worldly. Like Paul writes in Galatians 6:14–‘But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.’

    “The Gospel eradicates our need for the world. We are already loved. We already have a secure future. Our desires have already found their satisfaction. We are already validated as human beings. We already have a purpose.

    “THESE are the effects of the Gospel that enable us to live humble, selfless, generous lives. This is what allows me to turn the other cheek, to return good for evil, to be patient and gracious in the midst of anger and hostility. Make it REAL to me God! I want to SEE the Gospel transform my life!”

    I know the Christian life is one of constant learning. I just didn’t know that I would have to keep learning the same basic stuff over and over again. But I’m seeing it like I have never seen it before. It’s fresh. And exhilarating. And amazing.

    Our God is amazing.

     

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