July 2019

Wow! The year is half over. Can you believe it. It seems like, at least to me, that the year has flown by quicker than normal. I say this because things that I felt we had lots of time to prepare for are suddenly upon us. I reluctantly recognize that there are those who are good at managing their time and things don’t seem to come at them faster than expected. However, I am somewhat, in a dysfunctional way, comforted by the fact that I have heard others make a similar complaint, as I, about how time goes by faster than expected.

     Because I have been blessed to have training made available to me about time management as well as other organizational skills, I can present a somewhat educated view as to why this happens to me. It doesn’t change things coming up on me much, but I can explain why it happens. The answer is simpler than I would like to admit. I get so busy that I sometimes lose sight of what the original plan was. As someone once said “when you find yourself waist deep in alligators, it is easy to forget that your original plan was to drain the swamp.” We make a plan, we have every intention of implementing that plan in an orderly fashion and suddenly, life gets in the way. Something similar can happen in our church life and our life as individual sons and daughters of the Lord. We make a plan for our spiritual walk; we perhaps commit to ourselves to read certain books or to get plugged into certain ministries and before we know it, we find ourselves saying things like “that was this weekend? I forgot!”

     The other scenario that can occur is that we make every deadline, fulfill every commitment, reach every goal we set; and yet we lost sight of basic Christian priorities. Many years ago, I read somewhere (after a while, books we have read start to blend), “Satan loves a busy Christian.” We get neck deep in ministry and “doing” that we sometimes lose sight of some basics that were part of our original plan. To help us remember the original plan, I thought we could muse over two texts during July. Both are from Paul written to two different churches. The first is the church at Ephesus and is found in Ephesians 4:1 [I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.] (ESV) The second is to the church at Philippi, found in Philippians 1:27 [Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you, that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel.] (ESV) The basics are rather simple. One is to walk or live in a manner that is worthy of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The word translated as worthy can be understood in this context as “constant” or “consistent” with the gospel. In other words, the lesson found in the Gospel of Jesus Christ establishes the path for us to walk. The other basic is that we do this together. We are to strive side by side for the faith. In one Spirit and with one mind does not mean we all think exactly the same but it does convey that we all have the same goals and objectives which is living in a manner that is consistent with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Sharing the same objective helps us help each other stay on the path that His gospel laid out. In those moments when I have allowed life to get in the way and have forgotten what my original objective was, I have been helped to get back on track by a loving brother and sister in Christ.
     As we plunge ahead for the second half of the year; let us not lose focus of our original intent, to live for the gospel of Jesus Christ; and let us help each other stay on that path.
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Have a blessed July,
Vic