Spiritual Reflections: Guidebook for Life

2 Corinthians 3:18:

Our faces, then, are not covered. We all show the Lord's glory, and we are being changed to be like Him. This change in us brings more and more glory. And it comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

As followers of Christ, we come to realize that our lives have great purpose. We are to bring God glory in all that we do. I have been singing this song which is taken from I Cor. 10:31:

"Whatever you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God."

(Another post will be on this amazing CD project for children. All the songs are taken directly from scripture).

This means that we are being changed, even daily, to reflect more and more of Christ's glory. On this earth, we will never be perfect. We can not even strive for perfection because it will never happen. But, we have the ultimate role-model, who is Jesus Christ. He came to earth as a baby but then grew up until he was approximately my age. Then he died on the cross for our sins.....so that we did not have to pay that ultimate penalty of death. He was the only person in the history of the world who was ever or who will ever be.....PERFECT.

But, the Christian life can surely be overwhelming at times. People who intimate that all becomes rosy and wonderful when you give your life to Jesus are woefully ignorant or simply not telling the truth. The Christian life is far from easy.....in fact, it is quite hard. But, we have help!

One of the biggest tasks or responsibilities that we give to our children is this dreaded phrase:

"Go clean your room."

If your children are anything like mine, that is a BIG job because somehow they become little Tazmanian Devils and tear up the place on a daily basis. My 7 year old stands in the middle of the floor and cries because she is so overwhelmed. It is quite pathetic, actually. This has been a hard task for many years. The thing that most frustrated me, as her mother, was when I went in and she told me she was done.....and everything was indeed moved off of the floor, but it was all piled in other places....under the bed, on the bookshelf, in the closet etc.

The thing was, I assumed that she understood how to clean her room. I never really offered her much guidance. I simply gave her a task, but did not give her real places to put things.

A few weeks ago, I made an amazing purchase: containers that have chalkboard paint on the outside so you can label what is in each container. At $1.50 a piece, I got a heck of a deal.

I spent the afternoon while she was at school, going through her things and making a list of all the different categories for her to put her many things. Her room went from being a tremendous mess to looking like this:

The result was not simply a clean room, but a lesson in where to put things. When she got home, I went over, in detail, where to put things, how to sort, how to organize, how to make her bed, etc.

Now, when I tell her to clean her room, it is still not her favorite task, but she is no longer overwhelmed. She now picks an item up, and knows exactly where it goes.

We have a guidebook too. It is called the Bible. God did not leave us alone to figure out our lives all by ourselves. He also left the Holy Spirit who is alive and working in Believer's lives. A popular view of God is that God is a far-off observer. He sits up in heaven and just watches from afar. In this view, it is as if He simply wound us up and sat back to watch what happens to us. This is simply untrue. God IS alive and working in our lives. We are not going along the path of our Christian lives alone. His guidebook helps us to figure out what we are supposed to do so we are not overwhelmed. The Christian life is not a list of rules and regulations like many believe. We are living grace-filled lives in which we seek to glorify God and through His Word He allows us to do just that.

But, if we never pick up that guidebook, how will ever really get to know God and live the victorious Christian lives that He desires for us? It is not enough to just own the guidebook if we never read it. It is not enough for my daughter to have an organized space if she continues to live in a pig-sty. She has to put the work into it to maintain it.......but at least now she knows how!