My Turn

My Turn

My Turn

There is an old family video with my daughters, Jessica and Megan, dancing for the camera. They are probably ages 2 and 4. Jessica dances while little Megan waits patiently. Then finally it is Meg's turn. She begins to dance - but Jessica decides to join the fun. Meg says, "My tun! My tun!". Jessica continues to dance. Megan yells, "MY TUN!" Jessica continues. After several minutes of this Megan has had enough - she goes in for the attack - mouth open - ready to draw blood. Yikes! Time to shut the camera off and parent!

Think about how Megan must have felt. She was patient. She sat on the couch waiting her turn. She followed the rule and did what was expected in the beginning. She was ready for her turn. But...she didn't get it. Her turn didn't happen. Wow! Do YOU ever feel that way? Do you ever feel like jumping up and down and screaming, "My turn! My turn!." Do you feel like you are following the rules? You are patiently waiting. You are ready! But hey - when will it actually be My Turn? It is MY turn to get ahead financially! It's MY turn to catch a break! It's MY turn to be happy, to be a stay at home mom, to retire, to have a happy marriage, to lose 20 pounds, to move into my dream home, to be appreciated, to be noticed, and on and on and on. It is MY TURN!!!!

I can relate! I bet you can too! Let's think about these feelings for a minute. Should we feel this way? We can probably do a great job of justifying these feelings - I mean life is NOT fair - to us anyway. But if we feel this way - then aren't we dwelling on what we don't have and what we feel is wrong? Is that even emotionally healthy? My guess is no. Okay...so what should we do? Anybody remember that old hymn "Count your blessings, name them one by one. Count your blessings, see what God has done." (Stop rolling your eyes. This is still a good idea. Try it.) The best thing to do - the healthiest thing to do - the right thing to do is to focus on what is right in our lives - what we do have - how blessed we truly are. Author, Jon Gordon suggests taking a walk of gratitude each morning - starting our day being thankful for all that we have.

Psalm 16:11 says, "You will show me the path of life, in your presence is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore."

Wow! So if we trust in the Lord - if we seek His presence - He promises fullness of joy! Fullness of joy! If we are screaming “My turn” then we obviously aren’t full of joy. We aren’t even content. But what did that verse say . . . in God’s presence . . . so, to be in His presence we must be seeking after Him - right? So, maybe today it is God who is saying, "My Turn! My Turn!", to us. He has been patiently waiting. He is ready for His turn to receive our attention. Instead of us focusing on so many other things – maybe we should shift our focus to Him!

The words above was one of my very first Blog Post.  Today as I sit and read it, I wonder why I stopped where I did.   The last few sentences just touch on the fact that we do not give God His turn for our attention – for our complete and total focus.  But…oh…it is so important that we learn to change that.  There are so many things that grab our attention and take our focus off of God and His will for our life.  And the sad part is – that is all Satan has to do to win.  There is no need for him to try to tempt us or make us do something terrible.  He only needs to distract us.  Ever feel distracted from focusing on God, spending time with Him, studying His word, spending time in prayer, seeking Him and His guidance first?  Well…guess who gets the credit for that?

In Matthew, Jesus tells us that we do not have to worry about anything because God loves us and knows what we need.  Then in Matthew 6:35 He offers us this instruction…

“But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. “

In my Bible study group we talked about what it means to “seek Him first”.  One of the ladies shared what I thought was very relevant to how we live our life.  She said that when a problem arises before we call a friend, call our mom, Google it or turn to social media – we should first…First…FIRST…stop and pray and ask God to intervene and walk with us through the situation.  What do you do?  Do you seek counsel elsewhere or do you turn to the One who created you and loves you like no other – the One who controls the Universe – the One who bore your sin and died an excruciating death so you could be free – the One who dwells within you and has promised to never leave you nor forsake you?  When we stop and think about it - it seems ridiculous that we would do anything other than run to Him.

So…today as we live our crazy lives, how can we allow God to have His turn?  Well…we can put Him first in our life…give Him top billing…exalt Him to His proper place.  We can learn to put Him before our family and before our work.  We can add spending time with Him to the top of our “To Do” list.  We can dwell on Him instead of our problems and our work.  We can seek Him and when we do we will find Him patiently waiting for us.

Remember that A.W. Tozer quote I have shared before? “As God is exalted to the right place in our lives, a thousand problems are solved all at once.”

Today… it is time to give God His turn!  The really cool part is that when we do - we feel complete, full of joy and all our needs, wants, desires are met in Him.  Yep - it's His turn!