Humbled again

I have learned over the years of my music playing that my willingness to worship on my own is a good indication of how close I am with God. If I have have an urge to just play some music, secular music usually does the job. In order for me to pick up my guitar and go into worship mode automatically, there are a few possibilities: 1. I feel the need to worship God to thank him for everything that is going on in my life, 2. I feel good with where I am with God and feel compelled to worship or 3. I am completely broken before God and need his forgiveness and help.

The third scenario happened tonight. I was sitting there at my desk bored out of my mind and was overthinking everything that had been happening (like I always do), and I picked up my guitar randomly. I tuned it, and the lyrics to few worship songs just came to me and I played and sang and prayed until my fingers hurt and it was time for bed. It was refreshing and it reminded me a lot of things, and it made me sad.

I was sad because I realized I only came to him and asked for help when I was in a dark place. I was sad also because I realized I have been pretending to be close to him, but I really wasn't.

Ever since I left the Navy in late July, I've had a lot of free time. I would wake up early in the morning to have my devotion time and pray with my mom twice a day. I never missed church and I went to Bible study every Wednesday. All of these things would have been good if I had been doing it with my heart eager for God, but I hadn't. I went through the motion and did all the right things, but I was impatient, and I only did it because it was the right thing to do (spend more time with God brings you closer to him blah blah blah). Of course I didn't know that at the time otherwise I wouldn't be writing this blog to share with you my experience haha.

But then an opportunity presented itself to me, something I've wanted for a long time and man did I want it. I thought it was so perfect that I prayed to God "I'm getting way too excited over this and God if this is not what you have prepared for me, please just take it away so that I don't have to waste time on it and think about it all the time." I honestly can't tell you if I'm glad or mad that I said that prayer to God because He did take it away from me forcibly in the end, and it really hurt. Maybe if I had actually been close to God I wouldn't even need him to take it away from me to know that it was a temptation in disguise. It took me several days to come to the conclusion that while I did make the mistake of falling into the temptation and treated the situation with terrible handling, God pulled me out of it and snatched it right out of my hands because he knew I would hold onto it with all my might and never admit I was wrong.

As I was thinking about all this again tonight, the first song that came to me when I picked up my guitar:

Your love never fails -Jesus Culture

You stay the same through the ages

your love never changes

there may be pain in the night

but joy comes in the morning 

(which comes from Psalm 30:4-5)

and then the bridge that repeats:

You make, all things work together for my good 

(Romans 8:28)

as I was singing another song came to me, and funny thing is, it's one of the songs I sing that most when I worship, but never did it have the effect it had on me tonight.

Blessed be your name-Matt Redman

You give and take away

You give and take away

My heart will choose to say

Lord, blessed be your name 

(Job 1:21)

Anyone who knows me enough knows that I am TERRIBLE at remembering scriptures and where they are from. But when it comes to worship song lyrics, I somehow remember it haha (given that it is from the Bible in some way of course). After those songs, many others came to mind but I feel like this is a good representation of what I was really communicating with God about. Through this, I
was able to calm down and stopped thinking; Instead I began to thank Jesus for the experience.

I would be lying if I told you tomorrow I'm just gonna wake up and I'm gonna be 100% okay and I'm gonna find meaning in all the things I do to get closer to God, but I'm going to try. I'm not going to do things just because I'm Christian and it's right for me to do it, I'm gonna do it because I love God and he knows what's best for me. I also would appreciate it if y'all give me any feedback on this and support me through prayers as I walk on through this journey. And most importantly thanks for reading till the end haha I did not know I was gonna write this much. Welp it's definitely time for bed since I still have to wake up early tomorrow. Thanks again and God bless!