Two things have converged for me this week. Once again, God is whomping me upside the head. He likes to do that. Maybe it’s His idea of a holy pillow fight?
We’re taking Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University. Again. We did it right before Paul deployed a few years ago, managed to get within a few thousand dollars of being debt free… Then we temporarily lost our sanity and backslid with two new cars. Oops.
This is one of those “get honest” kind of posts. We do great on one income in this family. We even manage to save some. But here I am, working Dave’s “Debt Snowball” and looking at the job I used to have where I earned a regular paycheck. And I’m thinking, “Man. If I still had that job, in three years we’d have enough money saved to buy a house free and clear.”
Oh, don’t get me wrong. I love writing. I love that God is letting me do this. But there are those moments when I get my focus on what I’m missing instead of what I’m doing. Big mistake.
So, our Bible study at church is Beth Moore’s Beloved Disciple. It was the first Beth Moore I did, back in 2005. (Hmm… Another repeat thing for me. Think God’s up to something?) This week, most of the lessons have revolved in some way around dying to self, dying to the world, taking up your cross, sacrifice…
Uh, wait a second. God? “You talkin’ to me?” (Moments like this make me wonder if God ever says, “Duh” to me.)
Being able to spend my time writing is an awesome gift. But I’ve been focusing too much on the gift part. It’s also a huge sacrifice. It never hit me until this week that God has asked me to give something up for Him. He asked me to give up things like being able to buy a house in three years. New cars whenever I want. Spur of the moment flights to Hawaii. Because we can live comfortably on one income, two would allow us to do crazy fun things and still grow up a huge savings account.
But that’s not God’s plan. And it is, once again, not His definition of success. He wants me right here, butt-in-chair, hands-on-keyboard, working for Him. Know what? He’ll take care of the rest. If I’m firmly in His will, He’ll take care of the house and the savings and all of the rest. And if he wants me to fly to Hawaii on the spur of the moment, guess what? He’ll provide the ticket. (But only if He wants me to go…) Because He is God and He can do that.
Writing. This is my blessing. It is also my sacrifice. Funny how God can do that, huh?
–JB
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