Give Me an Undivided Heart

Teach me your way, O LORD, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name.

Psalm 86:11

I cannot sleep tonight.  Honestly, I don’t sleep very well most nights.  My mind tends to run over the events of the day over and over again.  Sometimes my thoughts are stressful, while other times I am just so excited I cannot stop thinking.

Tonight, however, I think I’m awake because I need to reconnect with the One who holds my heart, Jesus Christ.  So I’ve turned on some of my favorite worship songs and opened up  my blog to pour out my heart.

If you’ve ever read my about page you know that this blog is a compilation of my journey with the Lord and my struggle to surrender everything to Him.  Maybe you’ve seen that pattern in my posts.  I write this blog to remember what He is doing in my life.  I read it when I need a reminder or want to remember what He has done.

Lately, I have found it hard to spend quality time with Him.  Maybe you’ve been there sometimes.  Maybe devos are easy for you.  For me, they have always been a struggle to consistently maintain.  But this week, I have felt their absence.  Tonight I felt desperate for just a taste of His word and to draw closer to Him.

But the thing is, I don’t want to keep waiting until I am desperate after a few days of no devos to spend time with Him and pour over His word.  Every day that I didn’t spend time with Him this week, I was very aware of, but I still chose not to spend quality time with God.  The days that I did spend time in His Word, I felt so refreshed.

It seems like such a no-brainer right?  Why would I chose the things that don’t satisfy over spending time with God?

A lot of reasons.  A lot of really selfish reasons that when they are put all together really don’t amount to much of anything.  A lot of reasons that end up giving me a divided heart between this world and the Lord.

Today was one of those days where so many different thoughts and emotions ran through my head.  But of all the things that happened today, all I really want to remember about it when I read this blog in the future is Jesus.

How desperately I need Him every day.  How incredibly important it is to spend time with Him.  How alive and peaceful and right everything seems when I am in His presence.

You know a lot of people and experiences are going to come and go in this life.  There will probably be a lot of days in the future like today that are busy, challenging, and wonderful.  But at the end of the day, and at the end of this life only One will remain, Jesus.

And tonight I am clinging to Him.  I am clinging to Him because I need His help every day.  I am clinging to Him because He knows be better than anyone on this earth.  I am clinging to Him because He is the only One who can save me.  I am clinging to Him because He is fun to spend time with.  I am clinging to Him because I love Him and His love for me is overwhelming.

Recently, I have been listening incessantly to “The More I Seek You” by Kari Jobe.  There are a few lines in the song that say…

I want to sit at Your feet

Drink from the cup in Your hand

Lay back against You and breathe

Feel Your heartbeat

This love is so deep

It’s more than I can stand

I melt in Your peace

It’s overwhelming.

That’s my prayer tonight.  I want to sit at His feet.  Daily.  Hour by hour.  Minute by minute.

Dear Jesus,

I need you.  My heart is so divided so often.  Forgive me for the many things I have chosen instead of You.  Lord, I want an undivided heart. I want to walk in Your truth.  I want to fear Your name.  Please teach me Your way, and guard me from my own.  It’s early on a Sunday morning.  I’ll be starting a new day and week in a few hours.  There are a lot of different thoughts swirling around in my mind.  I surrender them to You.  I trust You with my day.  I trust You with my future.

I love You, Jesus.

In Your name, Amen.

A Life Changing Secret

I have learned the secret of being content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength. –Philippians 4:11b-13

Have you ever been entirely out of your comfort zone?  I can think of several examples.  Most recently, I experienced the unique transition that comes with starting college.  I spent my senior year of high school sad about leaving friends, but also excited and completely convinced that I was going exactly where God wanted me to be.

However, the night before moving in, I found myself curled up on my mom’s bed sobbing.  I was terrified to start my first day.  I was worried about making friends, starting classes, and saying goodbye.  I also had no clue where to even find my school on a map and the realization that my family was going to be thirteen hours away made me feel vulnerable and alone.

The next morning, driving up to campus, I was short with my family, could feel the tears about to spill over, and yet was desperately trying to hold it all together for the moment I stepped out of the car and risked running into a future classmate.   I had stopped trusting that God had a plan in all of this and that I just needed to follow, and had started focusing in on everything that could possibly go wrong with a set of circumstances that were completely foreign to me.

Have you ever felt that way before?

I love the verse at the top of this post.  I love how it challenges and convicts me that there is still a lot of work to be done.  I have learned the secret of being content whatever the circumstances.  And what are the circumstances?

• In need
• In plenty
• In any and every situation
• When well fed
• When hungry
• Living in plenty
• Living in want

This year in my discipleship group, I read a book called Calm My Anxious Heart by Linda Dillow.  In each chapter, Linda addressed a different area of our lives that we need to learn to be content in.  She included one woman’s recipe for contentment to help us view each day differently.  It was so incredibly convicting to me that I want to share it with you…

1. Never allow yourself to complain about anything—not even the weather.
2. Never picture yourself in any other circumstances of someplace else.
3. Never compare your lot with another’s.
4. Never allow yourself to wish this or that had been otherwise.
5. Never dwell on tomorrow—remember that [tomorrow] is God’s, not ours.

(Calm My Anxious Heart page 13).

I remember the night we discussed this in discipleship group and I was overwhelmed with how much I needed a serious change in my attitude towards each day.  My leader challenged us to try to put one of the items on the list above into practice for the week.  As I left the room, I had already messed up on mine several times.

This first year of college has certainly been a journey for me.  I have been broken down and built back up.  I have learned that I have strengths and weaknesses that I did not even know existed.  I have tried new things and made new friendships.  I have written a lot more checks.  I have learned how to manage my time better, and how to do well in my classes.

All my circumstances have changed around me constantly.  Our circumstances will change around us every day.  But did you catch the end of the verse above?  The secret of being content whatever the circumstances is that we can do everything through Him who gives us strength.   

That’s the biggest thing that I have learned this year.  No matter what my circumstances are, I can overcome and flourish in them through Him, Jesus, who gives me strength.  I still mess up each and every day.  But I’m finding that I am a lot more content when I am tapping into the strength of my Savior rather than my own limited supply.

I smile when I think about how nervous I was on that first day of school this year.  In a lot of ways, I am not that same person.  God knew exactly what He was doing.  I just needed to trust that His plan was a lot bigger and better than mine.  And that He knew my circumstances and would bring me through them.

Today, I want to issue to you the same challenge that my discipleship group leader gave me at the beginning of the year.  Pick something on the list of contentment and try to put in into practice this week.  I think you’ll be surprised by the results.