Luke 12:15 --- And He said to them, “Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses.”
Just yesterday I was led to discuss prayer and how it looked in my life. Well today I struggled mightily to get into prayer. Why? Well, I'm embarrassed to say, but the Lord has directed me to be transparent each day so here's the story…
I work from home, and I've wanted a bigger monitor for a while. We had some extra money a month ago and I got one. A fancy 34-inch widescreen even (good sale on Amazon). It died… Back it goes, which was a blessing as the money ended up being needed for more important things…
Fast forward to this week. We got a little extra money from my check. I started drooling over a new monitor, but I didn't feel like I was supposed to buy one. So, I prayed and got nothing. Then I started dropping hints to Amanda. Oh, it sure would be nice to get a monitor since the last one broke. I got acknowledgment but no, greenlight. My fishing trip for justification was not getting me anywhere… So, I did what any good Christian man would do… that's right I stayed up until midnight drooling over reviews and thinking of ways to get a yes out of Amanda. I'd abandoned praying about it... I had to crack the wife on this one… I finally go as far as to tell my sweet wife, if I got a monitor then the next time we have extra money she could use it towards whatever she wanted. This is horrible for me to type out, but here, big mighty Christian man is trying to manipulate his wife at midnight. Thankfully, God allowed my raging desire filled brain to finally run out of gas. My quest for the "My Precious" or some call it a monitor ended...
Then the alarm goes off at 4:00 AM and guess who is waiting for me… God. He was awaiting my arrival at our meeting place, so guess what I did for a full hour? I avoided Him. I drank lots of coffee standing in the kitchen, until my toe started hurting (weird right?), which drove me to finally come sit down... Face to face... with Him.
I cracked instantly. I confessed, repented, apologized, and just poured out my heart to Him. Incoming Lord of the Rings reference (y'all know it's my favorite books & movies). I had gotten this Gollum like greed that bent my entire world around "My Precious" also known as Monitor. To the point it not only drove me physically (staying up 2 hours past my sleepy time), but mentally (I schemed and plotted) into not good places. Which then led to affect my spiritual side by avoiding prayer today. Maybe it's a little silly, but little things can cause ripples into much bigger things.
Well, this is not a social media post I thought I'd ever type up. From father of the year taking my boys to individual dinners and giving them personal one on one time all the way down to attempting to manipulate my wife at midnight so I could buy a monitor we really can't afford. Only by God's love, grace and mercy am I able to type all this. I am just glad He loves me enough to not leave me how I am in my own ways, because my old flesh can be ugly, scheming, and wicked when it so desires. Thank you, Jesus, for your sacrifice for me and for all who will accept You. I'm forgiven and I am not condemned because of Him!
Well, I spent an hour studying 1 John 2:12-14, then another hour drawing art with the Lord to go with it. Then when I came here to recap this encouraging stuff, the Lord pointed me to sharing the above. He also took me back into doing some more art with Him as well. Which you see with this post. God is good, always. I love Him more and more every day. Never in a billion years would I have shared a single drop of this story before, yet here I am, not because of me, but because of Him. He's got something in it, somewhere, for someone.
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