I recently had a conversation with my brother. It was a mundane conversation. It was so mundane that it was not until well after the fact that I realized God was speaking to me in a profound way. It was a simple phrase that my brother said, yet, it carried extra weight this time. He said, “Life is a marathon”. That’s it and yet, it was exactly what I needed to hear.
We live in a microwave culture. We want what we want when we want it and how we want it. We don’t want to wait. We don’t want to work for it. Instant gratification has become the name of the game. While this may be okay for your Saturday morning McDonald’s run or your Friday night Netflix purchase from your television, it is problematic when considering your walk with Jesus. You see we often translate the “I want it now” mentality to our Christian walk. Therefore, when we don’t get “it” now, or we make a mistake we often feel like a failure and become discouraged. We quickly forget that Israel spent 40 years in the desert, it was years before David was actually king after being anointed by Samuel, and Jesus didn’t begin His ministry until He was 30. God clearly is not on our time schedule.
As I have pondered this over the past few weeks it has proven very freeing. What if instead of looking at our most recent failure we took into consideration the last year or two? I think most would find that while they may not be where they want to be, they certainly are not where they began. I am learning that the Christian life is a process. Victory rarely comes overnight and progress is more clearly seen overtime than in an instant.
This is true in most areas of your life. The instant gratification mindset actually traps us in a cycle of defeat. Allow me to explain. I have been trying to change my eating habits recently—smaller portions, healthier snacks, etc. Often however, if I blow a meal, like lunch for example, I would throw the towel in for the rest of the day. I would feel like a complete failure and rather than getting back on track for dinner, the instant gratification mindset would set in. I would think, “I can always start back tomorrow, I ate bad for lunch why not indulge for dinner too?”. This type of thinking is short sighted and perpetuates failure; yet, we do it all the time in many areas of our lives.
I think if we learned to see our lives from God’s perspective we would be less critical of our own mistakes, and begin to celebrate progress in the process. It is the process that actually prepares us for the overcoming life that Jesus promised. If we had our “it” over night we probably wouldn’t be prepared to handle “it”. It is the reason that people that win the lottery are usually broke within a year as opposed to someone who has learned money management and built up wealth their entire life. The lottery was easier, but the process prepared the other guy to steward his wealth and, therefore keep it when he got it. I would encourage you to remember that life is a marathon. This is true in your walk with God, your finances, your relationships, and even your career. Learn to enjoy the small victories, don’t allow mistakes to derail you, and celebrate progress in the process!
We live in a microwave culture. We want what we want when we want it and how we want it. We don’t want to wait. We don’t want to work for it. Instant gratification has become the name of the game. While this may be okay for your Saturday morning McDonald’s run or your Friday night Netflix purchase from your television, it is problematic when considering your walk with Jesus. You see we often translate the “I want it now” mentality to our Christian walk. Therefore, when we don’t get “it” now, or we make a mistake we often feel like a failure and become discouraged. We quickly forget that Israel spent 40 years in the desert, it was years before David was actually king after being anointed by Samuel, and Jesus didn’t begin His ministry until He was 30. God clearly is not on our time schedule.
As I have pondered this over the past few weeks it has proven very freeing. What if instead of looking at our most recent failure we took into consideration the last year or two? I think most would find that while they may not be where they want to be, they certainly are not where they began. I am learning that the Christian life is a process. Victory rarely comes overnight and progress is more clearly seen overtime than in an instant.
This is true in most areas of your life. The instant gratification mindset actually traps us in a cycle of defeat. Allow me to explain. I have been trying to change my eating habits recently—smaller portions, healthier snacks, etc. Often however, if I blow a meal, like lunch for example, I would throw the towel in for the rest of the day. I would feel like a complete failure and rather than getting back on track for dinner, the instant gratification mindset would set in. I would think, “I can always start back tomorrow, I ate bad for lunch why not indulge for dinner too?”. This type of thinking is short sighted and perpetuates failure; yet, we do it all the time in many areas of our lives.
I think if we learned to see our lives from God’s perspective we would be less critical of our own mistakes, and begin to celebrate progress in the process. It is the process that actually prepares us for the overcoming life that Jesus promised. If we had our “it” over night we probably wouldn’t be prepared to handle “it”. It is the reason that people that win the lottery are usually broke within a year as opposed to someone who has learned money management and built up wealth their entire life. The lottery was easier, but the process prepared the other guy to steward his wealth and, therefore keep it when he got it. I would encourage you to remember that life is a marathon. This is true in your walk with God, your finances, your relationships, and even your career. Learn to enjoy the small victories, don’t allow mistakes to derail you, and celebrate progress in the process!
