Relationship and Religion

June 5, 2011

Today was my first official day of summer. I decided last minute that I wasn’t going to take my June term after all, it was going to be too difficult with going to Seattle and leaving for camp shortly afterwards. I had once again overbooked myself, so it’s nice to know that I now have a break. To celebrate I went to the beach down the road and finally started Peace Child which I borrowed from Blake a few months ago. I also took the dogs for a walk and started listening to the 4th Harry Potter book. I was smiling more than I have in a while too. I think I finally realized that it’s okay to have a break, especially since my business isn’t getting me any closer to You. 

I can't even believe the things that I let rule my life. It’s kind of ridiculous really. I’ve been out of school (the normal semester) for about a month now, but this is only my second time writing. I should have had a few hours daily to journal and read Your word, but I procrastinated and did other less important things that robbed my time. I moved back home for June though, so hopefully this is a start to better habits. My mom reminded me today that the reason (one of the main reasons anyway) I’m here now instead of Africa is to use this whole year as preparation for next, which means daily seeking You, something I obviously haven’t been doing. 

People pray to be hungry for You and even sing songs about it, then they are frustrated when that hunger never comes. But as Sarah Boogerd pointed out, like everything else in the Bible, spiritual hunger also works opposite of what one would expect. When Jesus was teaching the people he said, “You heard it said ______ but surely I say to You ____.” One of the most famous times was when Jesus was talking about enemies; he said, “You have heard it said, love your neighbor, and hate your enemy, but I say to you love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you.” Things in the Biblical world, work counter to the norms.

This same idea goes for spiritual hunger: “you have heard it said, eat when you’re hungry and you will be satisfied, but surely I say to you, if you seek me, You will become hungry and will never be satisfied. You will always be wanting more and more of me, and I will always give you more of myself as you seek me.” This was Sarah’s point. She said that for so long in her life, she kept praying that You would give her a hunger, and your quiet response was, “Quit praying for hunger and just seek me.” 

There’s plenty of time if that is what I chose to spend my time doing, but I don’t often make relationship with You a priority. One of the coolest things that Blake has liked about Uganda has been his lack of distractions. There’s no TV or video games to occupy his time, so instead he reads his Bible in his spare time. Also every morning when he gets up at 6:30 he does devotional as a requirement. My boyfriend is going to come back a different person who has really learned how to put You at the center and unless something changes in me all I’ll have to show for myself is perhaps a tan. 

I’ve heard it said so often “Christianity is not a religion but a relationship.” And though I believe that to be true to an extent, for probably about 75% of Christians, that is complete bull. Relationship has been replaced by religion because religion is easier to identify and easier (especially for people like me) to preform. If people can reduce a relationship with You to a mere checklist, then they can be “good Christians” without ever really investing anything. 

Not going to lie, I kinda like religion; it’s easy. I can look like I’m doing all the right things without effort. But what is the point of being a “good Christian” and doing all the right things if I don’t have the heart behind it? I need to ask myself if I’m really seeking relationship with You or if I’m just putting on a deceiving act.

So God, I pray for relationship. I pray not for hunger but for discipline. Discipline that will bring about the hunger and that drives away religiosity leaving me longing for more of you. Bring me to a point that values You above all else, even the things that are considered good. I pray that the things that truly matter will surface and all that of less importance will diminish. Help me to finally follow through with my commitment to you, and in doing so really get to know You.

John 3:17-21

For God did not send His son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in his is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believe in the name of God’s one and only son. This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of the light because there sins were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.