Focusing On The //real// Stuff In Life

Wedding planning makes you really think about things in life.

Post wedding planning makes you really think about grown up life.

And grown up life really makes you feel like everything else in life was a pretty coloring book- the kind you could use water and a paint brush with to make the colors appear.

Things like cars and money and health and people and relationships and personal belongings and paperwork and jobs and all that goody good real stuff... it's real. And not so good all the time. 

Like losing your job. Or totaling your car. Or losing a loved one or a relationship. Or messing up some 'serious BIG person' paperwork.

But the really REAL stuff isn't the money in your wallet or the friends on your friends list. It's the faith, patience, love, kindness, and trust that matter. Above all, faith, as "faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen," Hebrews 11:1.

Perhaps the best example I can think of is Matthew 14:22-32. Peter was all cool with trusting Jesus, up until things started to look 'bad'. He was WALKING ON WATER! But all he could focus on was the wind and how bad and big and REAL that was. And in that moment, he started to sink.

If he could have only kept his eyes on what was really REAL. Jesus Christ was smack dab in front of him. He was walking on water. But as soon as the earthly things got more 'real', he lost vision and focus.

How many times do we do this? We have something 'bad' happen to us, and suddenly that earthly encounter becomes more real than the saving grace of Jesus Christ.

Oh you of little faith. All of us. 

Or what about the Israelites making their way out of Egypt? Who freaking cares about the fact that God parted the Red Sea and allowed human beings to cross the ocean DRY?

All they wanted to know was why God was allowing them to starve to death.

Okay okay, forget that, God is amazing and awesome and let's sing songs and play kazoos, because TA DA! God gave bread from heaven! Old Testament Little Caesar's from the dome in the sky.

Oh, but just kidding. This is a boring menu. God must hate them.

And we read through Exodus and ask ourselves how the Israelites can be such chowderheads for doubting God's power in the face of earthly reality... and yet. Well. We do the same thing, time and time again.

Did you lose a job? Great. That means God has a plan for you- and it involves being jobless right now.

Car broke down? Perfect. God needs you to get rid of that car. It's not in the plan right now (and his plan is perfect!).

Lost a loved one? Trust in Him. He is the author of eternity. Trust him to write the perfect story.

In the end, faith is such a small, small word that is overused on jewelry, t-shirts, and in the mouths of Christians (including myself) who are quick to praise God in one moment, and doubt him with great fury in the next.

And immediately Jesus stretched out his hand and caught him, and he said to him, "Oh you of little faith, why did you doubt?"