time for change...again

i've been doin a lot of soul searching the last month or so. (if you know me very well, you know this is not something new.) more like a personal evaluation. how am i doing? am i measuring up to god's standards? to be honest, i feel like i've lost myself over the last couple years, but not for any good reasons. mostly cause i've had a hard time acclamating myself to this new "calling" of motherhood, not to mention many trials that have worked very hard to steal any joy i could possibly muster and loosing your joy is a fast way to loose yourself. after reading an amazing christian fictional book last month, it really got me thinking. more like relating to the character in a way that made me yearn for what she had found. regardless of whether it was real or not, i could relate.
so now i'm on this journey of sort of disecting everything in my life. the way i serve at church and outside of the church. my priorities in the home, to my hubby, and son. the way i am when i'm with my friends. the things i think about...am i worldly minded or eternally minded? where's my focus? is it on increase, survival, appearances? all the things that will put distance between me and god. all i know is that i'm happiest, most content, and feel the most like my true self when i'm diligently trying to focus on god's agenda, when i listen to his conviction and obey it, when i spend time with people who love god and want to talk about him and what he's doing in their life, when i'm serving in my ministry with the right heart, when i'm spending intimate time with god in his word and on my face before him, and when i'm focused on serving my husband and son. so, it's time for a change, cause i've lost myself in many of these areas. i've gotten out of sync.
if this is you, you can start to change today too. sometimes i feel i'm a bit intimadated by these changes cause i know it may not sit well with some, especially the enemy. But i have to....cause i'm a miserable person when i'm not. i need to live up to god's calling my life.
god reminded me a wonderful scripture today. i hope it will serve you the way it did me.
I john 2:15-17
do not love the world or anything in the world. if anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. for everything in the world, the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes, and the boasting of what he has and does - comes not from the father but from the world. the world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of god lives forever.
i take these words for granted. i say, think, watch, listen, and behave in ways that show my love for the world. do you? if i'm honest, i spend more time than i'd like to, thinking on things that are worldly, instead of godly, eternal things. this verse is serious business and if we wonder why we can't feel content, like there's not direction, why we're unsatisfied, angry, frustrated, and we find ourselves complaining, maybe we do love the world. hard to digest? well maybe that's why most of us don't. as beth moore said, we are actually so hungry that we are chewing up the seeds instead of planting, watering, and letting them grow up in us in time. we have to be patient. one thing at a time. one repentance at a time. take this verse and plant it in your heart and mind. give it time to take root.
i'm giving any/all of you permission to ask me how i'm doing. the only way to stay on the narrow road is to walk with others. distancing ourselves pridefully, telling ourselves we can do it alone, will only lead us astray. so please do. hold me accountable and if you need it to, i'll make sure to ask you how you're doing.
I john 2:3-6
we know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. the man who saysj i know him, but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him (OUCH!) but if anyone obeys his word, god's love is truly made complete in him. (thank you jesus) this is how we know we are in him: whoever claims to live in him must walk as jesus did.
omgosh. are you reading that last line? really? cause if you see what i see, your heart might be all broken and twisted right now. am i living as jesus did? he said that's the ONLY way to know we are truely in Him. i'm convicted. are you? i hope you are. i think i'll just let jesus do the rest of the talking to our hearts. i love you, whoever you are, whatever you've done, are doing, and i'll be praying for you as i do for myself.