There was a question asked on a site I was on one day that read, “What if you woke up tomorrow with only the things you thanked God for today?” Naturally, I had a bit of a panic and immediately prayed, “Thank you, God, for everything.” But the question unsettled me, because it really got me thinking about my relationship with God. I pray every day, yes, but sometimes I think I’m just an automated call on God’s phone, just a recorded, mindless voice rattling off an expected message. Sure, there are some days when I really pray, and I really feel connected to heaven. But that’s not most days. Most days, I’m not that good at praying.
I have a problem with focus. My mind wanders through everything, and I generally get distracted and start daydreaming no matter what I’m doing, or who’s talking to me. It’s a terrible habit I have trouble breaking. This really gets in the way of me praying a lot, because I’ll be in the middle of my night prayers, and I suddenly realize I’m halfway through rehashing a movie I just watched, or picturing myself in one of my favorite daydreams. And God just sits there, patiently waiting for me to pick up the thread and continue my conversation with him. He puts up with so much from me, and then I blow up at him when something goes wrong.
Raise your hand if you’ve ever gotten mad at God. If you’ve ever said something like, “Why do you treat your followers this way? Why do I have such a hard life and then these non-Christians here are having it so easy?” If you’ve ever compared your life to someone else’s and demanded why God didn’t give you theirs, because after all, you’re a Christian and why is he so hard on his own people?
Well, I don’t know if you’ve done that, but I certainly have. Sometimes I wonder about the people who are doing everything so wrong, and somehow wind up with everything that’s so right. But then I realized something. There are definitely Christians with near perfect lives, too. I’ve met some of them. And I’ve met non-Christians who are down on their luck. It doesn’t matter if you’re Christian or not, some people have it easy and some people don’t. God didn’t promise anything about making your road easy once you become Christian. You still have the life you had before. What you now have is a way to deal with it. Christianity gives you a way to get through the life you were given. It doesn’t write you a completely new story. It’s not a contract that guarantees you a smooth and happy passage into eternal bliss. But it does guarantee that, if you really try, you’ll get there in the end. I just like to think about that.
Jeavoi
EurOK 