Do we need a preview?

Often times when there is a movie coming out in your favorite series, or an album from your favorite band, you don't need a preview of it to go see it, or buy it. For example, if they came out with another set of movies based in Middle Earth, but apart from the Lord of the Rings or the Hobbit, I would go see it. I'd probably try to even make the midnight premier. If you have seen similar things before, more often than not you trust the new one will be good, or at least worthy of your time and money. So then if we trust God enough to follow him, why do we ask God for a preview when He asks us to go someplace, or to do something?

To be honest this is something I have struggled with before and still do. I want to do things beneficial to me, from my standpoint, and when God comes to me and tells me to do something. I tend to ask for a preview of it, for a trailer so I can see what is going to happen, if it's going to look worthy for my time. In a way, we already have a preview of what God will do because he has most likely worked in your life before and it most likely turned out to be what was best for you. I find this all ironic in a way because my favorite chapter in the Bible is Hebrews 11, which is the hall of faith. It's message is faith, and how those who are written about walked by faith, and didn't ask God for a preview, but rather did before they what they were actually doing.

The one example I immediately thought about was Abraham. He was living in a completely different country, in a far away land, and he didn't ask question, he just got up and left. I wish I could do that. I feel like instead of following faithfully, I would make excuses like the man who wanted to go bury his father first. Jesus saw right through his excuse and called him out on how he was trying to delay his following of Christ until it better suited him. But as I'm starting to realize, the time is now to start following God. Not after college, not when you're "better prepared", but now. God will use your weaknesses for his glory. And in that thought I find comfort. 

A Role Model

Recently I started reading a book called "7 Men" by Eric Metaxas and by recently I mean like 10 minutes ago. I haven't even read past the introduction when he wrote a few paragraphs that really made me think. 

This book is about 7 men throughout history who are good role models and heroes and what made them such. In the introduction he talks about why he wrote this book and he offers up the idea that the American culture fears strength, and in order to protect the weak, they must make the strong weak. But in doing so they have stripped men of the thing God gave them in order to protect the weak. God made men stronger than women so that men can protect women. And women in a way expect that because you notice that on the hearts of most young girls is the thought of a knight in shining armor coming to save them. So now our society is stuck in a place where everyone is weak and no one is there to stand up and be the good guy. 

Enter Jesus. He comes and shows that the way to be strong is to be a servant. That's why he washed his disciples feet, that's why he died for us. Jesus shows how men should use their strength, for the service of others.

This is where it really started to sink in for me. And in a way this may make for a late father's day post. 

As I was growing up I was blessed to have a dad who I thought to be super strong and super manly. But in that masculinity he never came off as overbearing or abusive. Sure, he had his moments where his temper would get the best of him, but he was a loving, caring father as well as a strong man. He wasn't afraid to help those in need, almost to a fault at times. I remember when we were on vacation in Pennsylvania and we were driving on the interstate when my dad sees this lady on the other side of the highway with a blown tire. He proceeded to get off at the next exit and go back to where the lady was. It turns out someone had stopped to help her in the time it took us to get back. But that is the type of role model I had, and I hope that I can be even just half the man my father was. 

He taught my brother and I to hold the door open for people, to help those in need, to give even when it hurts, to pick up heavy things for people that aren't as strong, and this never happened to me but help an old lady cross the road. Why? Because it's the nice thing to do, the right thing to do. He didn't just tell my brother and I, he more importantly showed it to us. And when you have a good fatherly role model show his sons how to do something, they will listen because they want to grow up to be like their dad. 

I wish he was still here. So often I try to be strong and have faith and I know that this was God's will and He has a plan. But I still miss him. Even time will never fully heal that wound, for it runs deep. I'm a man now, I'm 18 and my father never got to see me become who I am today. Oh how I wish I could ask him if he's proud of me, and so I could say to him, "Look dad, look at the man I've become." But I can't. I'm not bitter at God by any means, in some ways this has been good because it matured me and help me become who I am today, but that being said, I miss him and I will always miss him and I can't wait to get to heaven to embrace him again and tell him I missed him and that I love him. 

Over time the memories become less vivid, and become more of "This one time" than a history, my history. But through that I've tried in a way to become like my dad was. Obviously I'm different and also he wasn't perfect so I am becoming my own man rather than a copy of someone else. That being said, I still try to take the things I remember he told me, or the things I saw him doing, and put them into practice. Sometimes my mom will tell me say to me, "The way you were standing out there reminded me of your dad" or, "That's something your dad would have said." And I may not really respond outwardly, but inside, the kid me has the biggest grin on his face because I still want to be like my dad. And I can think of no greater challenge for me than to become a father one day and be such a good role model that when their 18, or in the middle of their rebellious teenage years, that inside themselves they will say "I want to be like dad when I'm older." 

Bare Feet and Walled Up Hearts

I don't know how many people have made this comparison before, but walking bare footed and living a life of love are very similar. I say this because as I was walking barefoot outside today, I remembered how good it feels to walk without shoes on. Sometimes, the ground feels soft and nice, and other times its hard and rocky. You will step on sticks, you might bleed, your feet will get dirty, but you will feel. You feel the ground as your foot slowly lands on it, and you notice that every footstep. You don't notice that when you are wearing shoes, you take it for granted and you go on without noticing the intricate parts of life, like why we were given feeling at the bottom of our feet to begin with.
The reason I compare this with a heart and love is because we do the same thing to our heart as we do to our feet. We put shoes on it, we cover it up. Deep down we know that we enjoy that feeling of love and of loving. But too often do we feel pain, rejection, cuts, and heartache, so we decide to not feel anymore. The reason I'm saying this is that I want us, particularly as Christians, but everyone in general, to love without the fear of pain lurking in the back of our minds. I understand that it will hurt, bad at times, but when the time comes when your loving and the ground is soft beneath your feet, it will be a brilliant type of love, and it will bring freedom to your soul.

Complacency Killed the Cat

Complacency is something that all people fall into at one point or another, and too often do people realize it, or do anything about it. Have you ever heard that if you put a frog into a pan of cold water, and heat it on an oven slowly the frog will eventually burn to death because it is cold blooded and doesn't notice how hot it gets. That is us as humans. Precisely us. As Casting Crowns once put it, "It's a slow fade." We keep falling and falling down into all this crap, but it happens slowly so we don't notice it. Then one day, you'll look up and finally realize that your at the bottom of a pit and you don't know how to get out. It happens with a lot of things. But recently to me its been complacency. I will go on with my not super exciting life and just go with the flow. Never really challenging myself, not getting out of my bubble of comfort. And I'll slowly lose my grip on my faith, and other things around me. It will start with staying up late and not getting enough sleep. Then I'll be tired the next night so I will say that I don't have time to get into God's word because I need sleep. Then I will stop encouraging, and witnessing, and letting God's light shine to the world through me. All the while I am just going through life because I don't notice that the water is getting hot around me. It's a slippery slope. One other thing is that it's hard to notice that your life is full of complacency until you hit rock bottom.
That's what has been happening to me in these last few months. And I didn't notice it. Then today someone keyed my car in the school parking lot and I became really frustrated and upset. I was trying not to show it on the outside but it was there in the back of my mind. Then when I got home a song came on and I just started singing out at the top of my lungs, and paying attention to the words. I don't remember the exact words but for some reason they were able to sneak through the defenses around my heart and whisper in, "Everything is not well, open your eyes." And I broke down and started praying. I realized that I was caring too much about my image, and my car and just other unimportant things more than I was caring about God.
I had also become complacent because I was just fine where I was at and I wasn't willing to challenge myself anymore than I had too. I was just scraping by.
I don't know where that is going to go from here though. I just want to give my heart over to God again because I know that I don't have the strength to do anything on my own, I had just tried that and it led me into a dungeon. What I do know, is that I need to stay into my bible, and be constantly in prayer and making use of fellowship. And pray that I don't become complacent. Because as the say, complacency killed the cat.