Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Second Chances

This week in the video series Jonah: Navigating a Life Interrupted, Priscilla Shirer points out that God gave Jonah a second chance to do what He asked Jonah to do the first time.  She emphasizes the point that we are blessed to have a God who gives us second chances (and more).

God knows that we will fail because we live in a fallen world.  Do I have the option to obey the first time He calls me to act?  Yes, but I will freely admit that I am not the best at immediately obeying Him.  It has taken me five months to come to terms with the fact that our second little one is not the sleeper that the first one was and that I will likely be waking up with him in the middle of the night for months to come (hopefully not years).  He has called me to wake up and take care of my child with contentment, but it has taken me some time and plenty of second chances to finally take hold of that calling and do it.  While I still miss being able to sleep without interruption, I am no longer the emotional wreck that I was becoming before I accepted this challenge in my life right now.

Shirer points out that God will empower us to do what He has called us to do.  The funny element about Jonah's story is that he did not run away because he did not feel up to the task; he just did not want to do it.  I wonder how many time I use the excuse of not being equipped to complete the task to cover up the fact that I just don't want to do it. 

She also mentions that it is easy to impersonate obedience.  I will need to reflect on this idea more this week as I am sure that there are areas of my life where I think that I am acting in obedience when in reality I am going in the opposite direction.

No comments: