Stumbling in the dark

It occurred to me recently that on the days you choose not read, or forget to read God's word, it's like turning off all the lights at night and stumbling around in the dark. You can't see where you're going. At best, you can get a feel of those things immediately around you. But even these things look very different in the dark. The light reveals things as they truly are.

"Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path."
Psalm 119:105

If the devil is the father of lies (John 8:44), and the whole world is under his power, then life in this world, without God's light in our daily life, is one of delusion, distortion and blindness.

"We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one."
1 John 5:19

If you just stopped moaning you might actually be happy

I felt God really speak to me clearly this week. And he said that I ought to stop moaning about everything. Life is hard work, yes. And you don't get much time to yourself and you're often quite tired. All good points, but you constantly moan!

What sparked it off was watching an older work colleague of mine who's had a tough week, and was sick, but was cheerful all the way through it. I realised that if I can do what I do, but in a cheerful spirit, I would be an awful lot happier. And my works would be a lot more pleasing to God.

"If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing."
1 Corinthians 13:3

It's like, if I short-curcuited that whole meditation process where I get really manked-off with everything, my whole outlook on life would lift dramatically. It's not so much the moaning, which is really just the symptom, it's the meditation process that's the real issue. The process of churning things in your mind over and over.

"As a man thinks in his heart so is he"
Proverbs 23:7

Anyway, a good bit of repentance is the order of the day. Which makes me think. Repentance almost makes sense to be done as a weekly habit. Surely lots of little acts of realignment with God are much better than the big dramatic acts of repentance that only occur when your whole life is devastated. A thought to dwell on.

Temptation, Meditation & Prayer

Spurgeon:

"He was well versed in the three things which, according to Luther, make a minister: temptation, meditation and prayer."
James Douglas, 'The Prince Of Preachers', 1894

I like this quote as it seems to lay out a string of three key areas: resisting temptation, having you're head in the bible and praying. Tie them all together and you could be a sharp tool in the hand of God.