The Point of Friction

I've been traveling along the road of self-improvement for a long time. It's sort of how I operate: I do my best to learn from other people's experiences and mistakes so that I don't have to learn those lessons the hard way. Sometimes that isn't always possible and experience becomes the best and most fearsome teacher of all. Much of my desire for self-improvement stems from the high amount of importance I place on morality, which comes from my upbringing in the churches I have attended. For many years I believed in a salvation that was very much works-based, even if I fooled myself and others into thinking that I didn't. It's still hard to get away from that incorrect belief because it's hard for me to see true salvation by grace. Part of that is my failure to preach the gospel to myself daily, as I have been encouraged to do by my mentors, and another part is my simple lack of faith. But I know this:

-Hebrews 11:1

I need to cling to that verse and to Christ every day. It must be a conscious decision to do so and it takes a lot of discipline. It takes more discipline than I have.

Which brings me to the next stop on my train of thought: that I can't change myself. I find myself unable to wrench my desires and affections away from their current objects and redirect them to the right places. I can't simply *snap* have faith. I can't simply *snap* want to read my Bible. I can't simply *snap* desire to pray more. To make matters worse, there were times where I have been able to do those things, at least temporarily. But then it all goes back to the way it was. Back to the same old sinner, the same old faithless Christian, the same old unfocused kid floating through life, unable or unwilling to muster up the self-control and self-discipline to change and work toward a stronger faith, a better witness, a person who loves others.

I've been told by some that I just need to be patient. Just trust in God's perfect timing. But I feel like time is running out for me. I feel like I'm far behind where I need to be as a Christian, as a leader, as a man, as a son and a friend and a brother. God hasn't seemed to be changing me or really doing any work at all even though I've been praying for the things that He wants for me. Maybe I'm praying those things for the wrong reasons.

Anyway, my thought process led me to a sobering and terrifying place. I suddenly felt like I was less of a person than I was two years ago. I'm in the place in life where I am defining myself and my personality. I've been so focused on school and life and the future and what people think of me that I've begun to suffocate my personality because I don't think people will like it. I am so caught up in being guarded and hardworking and responsible that I'm not myself anymore. I used to have adventures and climb buildings and make scavenger hunts and watch the stars and play ping pong, and now it feels like I just do school. I'm trying so hard to become better and more attractive that I'm suppressing a lot of who I really am because I'm afraid people will think it's stupid and immature.

I spent a lot of time in that place. And it actually wasn't until much later that I realized that that entire thought process was stupid and immature.

God, who created the entire universe, made the ultimate sacrifice for me, and gave me my entire life and skills and desires and abilities is watching to see what I will do with His incredible gifts, and I'm focused on what other people think of the gifts God has given me. Who cares what they think as long as I'm glorifying and worshipping God with my whole life?

My focus was wrong. I was becoming like the church in Rome that Paul wrote about in Romans 1:21:

I don't want to be there anymore. I don't want to be futile in my thinking. I don't want to be so self-focused and so selfishly focused on others. I want to take JOY in living. So I'm going to get up tomorrow morning, thank God for the incredible blessings He has given me, ask myself who my audience is, and live accordingly.