Wow, okay so mental laziness got better for a while, but blogging laziness caught me. One problem I’m having with blogging is that it takes away from time I used to spend journaling. This is not good! I’ve got to figure out a new rhythm of life. As I wrote about in Soul Revolution, journaling my prayers and the history of God’s work in my life has been one of the most significant practices I’ve done. My ability to forget God’s past work in my life is astounding.

I think this is a human challenge as Moses and Joshua were given instruction on practices to help God’s people remember God’s works and faithfulness (Deuteronomy 27, Joshua 4:20-24), and Jesus said “whenever you eat this bread or drink this cup” (which likely meant more than just during the official communion service—every time you eat and drink!) remember me! (Luke 22:19)

So for me, journaling what I’m praying about or the issues I’m facing and what I sense the Lord wants me to do has helped me be able to “see” and remember his faithfulness throughout the years. And it really is amazing! One year I read back through the years of journals, noting specific things I was praying about or challenges I faced, then I marked the pages where God showed up, answered, or provided his clear direction—I was blown away (and a little shocked that I could ever doubt or fear again). I guess that’s why remembering is necessary—we do forget…easily! That’s why I’ve made it a practice to re-read the year’s journal each Christmas, because it builds my faith. Do you do anything to help you “remember” times when God has been faithful? It will build your faith so that when you face times when it seems like God’s not involved or not answering, you’ll remember.

Wow, I had such a great week with the Lord. Even in the midst of deadlines and stresses, I found myself experiencing more than just a peace—experiencing “remaining in His love.”  It really turns otherwise anxious, stress-filled days into great days. I had a day that otherwise would have tanked me, but it turned out wonderful. Then I find when I’m “off” (like this weekend), I get lazy and so quickly disconnect and forget everything! I then easily slip into a funk—feeling bored, or discontent, or anxious and missing moments with my family and friends.

I was reading some of the writings of Lawrence, this 17th Century guy who was a soldier in the French army and then a hospital cook most of his life. But he was known most for his character and the way he “practiced the presence of Christ.” Lawrence writes, “Do you know the highest kind of life we can experience? There is no other life in all the world as sweet and as delightful as the life lived in a continual walk with God. Even as I write such a statement I realize that the only ones who can comprehend it are those who have practiced and experienced that unbroken walk with the Lord.”

This is exactly the challenge of it! Unless you really go all out in willingness, not holding anything back, and do so long enough to “taste and see” how good life can get living in God’s will and ways, you’ll just lazily relapse into what you’ve already known and done.  And even when I have tasted something so much better, it’s still really easy to get mentally lazy and slip back into days, weeks or even months, if I let myself, of doing life alone.

It really does take a direct mental effort, but it also makes life and decision-making and everything else incredibly “doable.”  Because all you “have to do” is this One Thing—stay connected and willing, and then you can be sure that you are doing the very best you can to live out the life God created you to live. There’s nothing else you need fret or stress or worry about.  And the experience of many thousands is that “all these other things we worried about really do take care of themselves as we seek first His kingdom will and ways.” (Matthew 6:33)

So even though I woke up feeling lazy, lousy, and disconnected, I’ve decided not to roll with that attitude. Instead I’m gonna catch my mental laziness and even talk that over with the Lord, and seek to keep this mental conversation with the Lord going all day—increasing my willingness to respond as I go. We’ll see how it goes.

I had so many people come up to me recently and say, “I experienced the same thing…such freedom and relief when I finally did a full spiritual inventory, put it all down on paper, confessed it to God and one other person.” But I also know that most people won’t do it out of fear. It takes tremendous courage. I was thinking this morning about why it takes such courage, and why long-time Christians are often unwilling to do this very biblical thing. I think it’s because we subconsciously live our lives playing roles. We play the lead role in our own drama about how to have a fulfilling life, and in order to keep the act going, we have to be a little bit better than, or different than, reality would dictate.

But we don’t just play this role for fun, we are doing it for LIFE—to get the soul satisfaction from knowing we are secure, lovable, valued!  Anything that threatens our character (in the drama) threatens our sense of security, lovability, value! That’s why most of us are stubbornly trying to hang onto the role even if it’s costing us health, relationships, and life itself! We’ve believed the part so fully, we can’t let go of the act to learn to fully be ourselves. But those who have the courage to let themselves face reality (the good and the ugly about themselves) can then live where God lives, because God only lives in reality (truth).

When I did this spiritual inventory this time, I didn’t really think I had any built up residue. I did it more because I was asking everyone else to.  I was shocked when I took an hour and sat quietly before God, asking Him to show me if there’s any junk in the closets He wants me to deal with—I found pages worth to write. There were little resentments that had developed and affected the way I was treating people, there were patterns I was making excuses for in the way I dealt with my family. It’s sobering to be rigorously honest. After I read my list to my Spiritual Running Partner and he did the same, we both had a sense of gratitude for the other person—realizing we’re in it together and we are committed to each other. We asked one another what we learned and what we wanted to do to move forward—it felt very life-giving. There’s something incredibly freeing about living in reality and allowing God and others to meet you there and show you how much you’re worth.

I don’t know why it amazes me so, but it always does. I just heard several stories of what God is doing as people connect and stay willing. A twenty-year old told me last night about his wife who divorced him. They were both coming out of a life of drugging and partying. When they both came to faith, he was more zealous about growing than she was, and he drove her away by being critical and demanding.

During the 60-60, he sensed that instead of giving up on his marriage (which he had done), he needed to pursue her–but not to change her–to love her as God does. He told me that in the past month, she as seen such a change that she doesn’t go 12 hours without calling him now (they weren’t talking before that). She says she still doesn’t want to be married, but she wants to be his friend for life (he said that alone is a miraculous change, and he’s praying for a full re-uniting one day).  Then he told me that his parents, who have never had an interest in faith, have been coming to Gateway and doing the 60-60 and he thinks his father has found faith!

I keep hearing such amazing things that the Lord is doing. At the same time, this is stirring up a lot of pain and emotional junk for a lot of people. When you’ve lived for years running and hiding in order to not face old painful junk you’ve been dragging with you through life, often the first thing the Lord wants to do is set you free from it—that stirs up a lot of fear and angst.

Jesus once encountered a man blind from birth and asked him what seems to us like a silly question: “What do you want me to do for you?” When being blind has been all you’ve known (and it’s even become your identity), and Jesus comes along and asks, “What do you want me to do for you?” Some of us out of fear say, “Leave me alone—I’m afraid to get better. How will I survive? I’ve never done anything but beg. If I get better, how will I eat? Who will I be with eyes that see?” You have to overcome your fear with trust. You have to focus on God, not on your fear of that which you don’t know. Let go (you don’t have as much to lose as you think), and let God show you what you have to gain!

I’ll never forget a quote by a guy who joined Gateway’s recovery group. He had just found faith earlier that year and had been growing to experience this moment by moment life with God. When asked what he hoped to get out of the group, he said, “I’m here because this thing I’m experiencing with God right now is so good, I just don’t want to do anything to screw it up!”

Too often we focus on “not doing” this or that—it doesn’t work. The more long-term successful approach is to focus on staying connected and responsive to God, and when we stick with it long enough, we start to experience something better that replaces the old behavior until it’s not such a struggle. Paul put it this way, “Walk by the Spirit, and you won’t carry out the desires of the [old nature].” Galatians 5:16   Frank Laubach, who I’ve told the history of in my last post, wrote this in his journal after the first five months of seeking moment by moment life with God:

“Oh, this thing of keeping in constant touch with God, of making Him the object of my thought and the companion of my conversations, is the most amazing thing I ever ran across. It is working. I cannot do it even half of a day – not yet, but I believe I shall be doing it some day for the entire day. It is a matter of acquiring a new habit of thought. Now I like the Lord’s presence so much that when for a half hour or so He slips out of mind – as He does many times a day – I feel as though I deserted Him, and as though I had lost something very precious in my life.” – Frank Laubach, May 14, 1930

I can now believe him, but this was not always the case for me. For many years, my spiritual life felt dutiful. I would say it was the right way to live, or a good way to live, but not amazing, life-giving, exciting, thrilling, fulfilling like nothing else. Now I can say that because that’s been my experience as I’ve stayed more and more connected in a daily, hourly, sometimes even moment to moment way. When we learn to stay connected and responsive, sin begins to lose its appeal. We sin (go against God’s will or ways) because we think it will get us something we want or need, but the more you stay connected and experience the fulfilling inner life God’s Spirit produces, you selfishly don’t want to sin because you don’t want to ruin something much better with something less satisfying. That’s when lasting change takes root.