Sunday, February 15, 2009

I know how to abound. Philippians 4:12

I love this idea. Spurgeon once wrote, "Many... when they are set upon the top of a pinnacle their heads grow dizzy, and they are ready to fall." Naturally, when I am suffering, I now go to God with my problems, but when He blesses me, I forget Him and drive on to do whatever I want to do.

In the Army, we are taught to perform Battle Drills. These are certain actions that we rehearse to do in certain common situations so that without communicating, we all do the right thing. Everyone knows what everyone else is going to do. So very often, we are taught to not think on our own. So, we joke around about people who "do whatever they want." "Oh... you want to be an individual." "Do your own thing." On second thought, that's probably not very funny if you're not here. Well, anyway, it's to make a point. So just go ahead and believe me, it's funny. Anyway, the point is that very often a Christian's Battle Drill is to go straight to God when there is a problem, praying fervently that God will bless him. But we forget our Battle Drills and just do our own thing when we are blessed, unstressed and successful.

3 comments:

abb said...

I actually do think it's funny, just for the record.

I know I have, at times, forgotten Him when I'm in a "good" season of life. It breaks my heart because I think about how no one wants to be treated that way. I mean, how would you feel if your best friend only wanted to be around you when he needed you to "fix" something for him?

I've been known to, at times, actually pray in the good times that He would help me remember to draw near to Him. I don't want to be the girl He only sees when something's wrong in her life.

J. Carr said...

You are very right Bobby, and I can see the humor in it - you remember the "it's all about meeeee Jesus" we'd jokingly remake the song lyrics to say.

In the midst of all these repetitive battle drills it's cool to see God teaching you these spiritual lessons.

JMH85 said...

Your words ring so true. We are on a never ending cycle. When we are at our lowest we find it easy to drop to our knees and ask for help. Yet, when we are filled with joy we seem to forget the Joy Giver. In my life I want to be like David before the Ark of the Covenant.To rejoice because my God is good.

Oh give thanks to the LORD; call upon His name;
make known His deeds among the peoples! Sing to Him; sing praises to Him;tell of all His wondrous works!
Glory in His holy name;let the hearts of those who seek the LORD rejoice!

1 Chronicles 16:8-10