I’ve had a setback. I fear that something I really wanted to see happen may not happen. How many times in my career have I dreamed about something, developed plans around it, got my team on board with it, spent money on it, and then it came up short? I fear that this will be another one like that.
Unconsciously but abruptly, I pulled away from God. Even going through the template that we posted on here didn’t bring its usual connection to Him. In the last ten days, I’ve eaten more than I should have, and I’ve sulked, worried about how a work project is going to go. I’ve been focused on the negative. I am usually a smiling optimistic person, but I’ve been down.
What does all this show? I wanted this dream more than I wanted Christ. I was using Him instead of loving Him. What I wanted sounded Christ-affirming, but now that I see in my response that it was more about me than Him.
So how do I get back? I need to pray and ask the Spirit to lead me to repent, I need to bring what is unconscious to consciousness, and I need to ask friends to help me bombard myself with the Gospel.
First, I need to repent. I can’t do that without Him empowering me. So begging God for repentance will be constant until I am there.
As I continue to beg Him for the gift of repentance, I can see my sin clearer. I can stop, really feel what I am going through, ask myself what my emotions show that I am worshipping, and I can see truth. The truth is that I am not loving Him first. I was using Him, like He was my servant, to get what I really want, which is the dream. I can see how futile and stupid it is for me to pursue that over Him.
I can allow myself to feel the hardness of my heart towards Him because I feel like He disappointed me. I can let myself experience how much I’ve felt that in the past. I can enter into a process of “forgiving” God for all the times I perceived He disappointed me. In the process of “forgiving” God, I can see how sinful and wrong I’ve been, I can allow truth to come in and show me that I’ve been a fool. He was always right. I am the one who’s been wrong. I can then beg Him to further soften my heart. I can bring friends in and confess where my heart has been and ask them to help me see His incredible love for me, especially through the Gospel, until my heart melts.
Chew On This:
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What is an area of life where you’ve been using God instead of loving Him?
The 1st Principle Leadership brand was created to equip Christian heads of companies to live in congruence with Christ and grow thriving businesses that truly glorify Him while functionally putting Christ and their families ahead of the business.
*This blog is an amalgamation of a few different clients. No client is being singled out.
