I
don’t know if it has been obvious, but I have become quite the Old Testament
fan lately… this is a pretty sizeable
chunk- but is really what has been on my heart these past few days:
“When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for
the good land he has given you. Be careful that you do not forget the Lord your
God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving
you this day. Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied,
when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver
and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become
proud and you will forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out
of the land of slavery. He led you through the vast and
dreadful wilderness, that thirsty and waterless land, with its venomous snakes
and scorpions. He brought you water out of hard rock. He gave you
manna to eat in the wilderness, something your ancestors had never known, to
humble and test you so that in the end it might go well with you. You
may say to yourself, “My power and the strength of my hands have produced this
wealth for me.” But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who
gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he
swore to your ancestors, as it is today.”
-Deuteronomy 8:10-18
I have just been coming out of that time of wilderness and unknowing
where God really did sustain me and grow me closer to Him. He has now opened up doors and blessed me
with steady employment and with that more direction to plug in and go
places. This truly has been an answer to
prayer in many ways, however with things starting to click and fit together I
am reminded of the above passage. I know
my tendencies and the tendencies of so many- it is almost easier to rely on God
in the difficult and hard moments when we don’t know and don’t have control,
however when things are going well it is really easy to focus on ourselves and
what is going on instead of God. In this
time of great blessing I do not want to turn my face away from the giver- I do
not want to forget God and become comfortable in these blessings, eventually
shifting the focus and praise to myself.
I feel like it is so backwards because in times of blessing is when I
should be most focused on praising and worshipping him- and historically that
is not the case. I become a creature of
habit instead of worship- and of complacency instead of continuing to
seek.
