Tag: daily needs

Day 25 of Enjoying God: Daily God

~ K ~ 1 Comment
Image from mundiwestport.fashion41.com

Today, I had to write everywhere in the apartment the following: ONE THING AT A TIME. (Yes, in all caps to get my point across to myself.)

I felt overwhelmed by the disarray of my surroundings and all the tasks before me. Visually and mentally, I saw clutter, disorganization, and messiness.

But God, who the Bible calls the Ancient of Days (Daniel 7:9, 13, 22) and is the supreme organizer and task manager, takes things one day at time. (But, if you’re of the day-age theory, 1,000 years can be as a day to the Lord. [II Peter 3:8])

It is why Jesus prays in the Lord’s Prayer (or the “Our Father”) “give us this day our daily bread” (Matt. 6:11).  It is also why Jesus admonishes us not to worry about tomorrow because today has enough trouble of its own (Matt. 6:34).

Whether a Christian subscribes to a 7-day (as humans know it) creation theory or the day-age creation theory, the general idea is that God approached one task or one project at a time:

  • Day 1 (or 1,000 years): God created morning and evening.
  • Day 2 (or 2,000 years): God separated heaven and earth (which had already been created from the beginning).
  • Day 3 (or 3,000 years): God separated land from water and created vegetation.
  • Day 4 (or 4,000 years): God created the sun to shine on the earth by day and the moon to illuminate the earth by night, further adding distinction between morning and evening.
  • Day 5 (or 5,000 years): God created creatures for air and sea.
  • Day 6 (or 6,000 years): God created land species: all animals for land and the first humans.
  • Day 7 (or 7,000 years): God rested, instituted the Sabbath to be holy, and performed no work or tasks.

As the days went on, God got more and more complex with his tasks (going from creating one general thing to two general categories with many subcategories, er, subspecies if you will). But the thing is, God took life one day at a time and to enjoy Him fully, I need to follow that example. I need to stop Americanizing my life by multitasking and overloading myself with 500 things I can’t possibly accomplish one day and approach tasks the God-centered way: one thing at a time, one day at a time.

Day 20 of Enjoying God: Provider

~ K ~ Leave a comment
Image from lanitaslegacy.blogspot.com/2010/09/jehovah-jireh.html

Jehovah-Jireh, roughly translated, means “the Lord will provide.” And boy, is He reminding me that I need Him to provide for us.

I’ve got a ’99 Toyota coupe that’s pushing 130,000 miles. In the past six months, my husband and I have probably put in $2700 of work into this thing: emissions and inspection including getting all four tires replaced in August, a catalytic converter replacement in October, and now in January, some fuel injector and spark plug stuff (among other things). (With the possibility of the other catalytic converter—probably $400—going bad eventually and having to get a $400 air fuel sensor replaced come inspection and emissions time in August.)

Sigh.

Or perhaps, Selah.

Every time we’ve been hit with one of these really expensive car bills (August really took the cake), my freelance job calls needing me to help them out. I charge them a good bit of money so it has helped to pay down these charges, which unfortunately have been going on a credit card.

After glaring at a $600+ bill today, I simply looked to the sky with resignation and said, “Well, Lord, I expect to be hearing from my freelance job next week.” (But in reality, I was looking forward to life slowing down a bit.)

I have to admit how blessed I really am when I stop and think about it. My husband and I aren’t wealthy by American standards (we’re drowning in a heap of debt), but the Lord really has been a provider for us—not when we wanted it but when we needed it. Jesus’ words 2,000 years later ring true for me:

For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they? And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life? And why are you worried about clothing? … For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. —Matthew 6:25-34

The crazy thing about worry and anxiety is that sometimes it’s based on irrationality—worst case scenarios, if you will. My experience has been that God has not let me down in the area of providing for my daily needs. (Truly the Lord gives us our daily bread as echoed in the “Our Father,” the Lord’s prayer.) I shouldn’t fret about Him letting me down now.

(Although I’m curious to see where money for a newer car might possibly come from.)