The Main Thing

Every once in a while when I feel like my life is going in too many directions or I feel like I am beginning to lose focus, it always helps me to think about my priorities and what is absolutely most important in my life.

When I was younger, marrying the right person was first and foremost in my mind. If was to get married, it absolutely had to be to the right person. I remember being unable to sleep the night before my wedding not because I was so excited, but because all could think about was - am I marrying the right man? Not until after we were married did I focus on the fact that it wasn't so much that I married the right person (which thankfully I did!) but that I BE the right person, especially as not so lovely aspects of my character made themselves known.

When our children started coming along, I remembering obsessing over being the perfect parent, the best mom I could be! Of course, the fact that I was not perfect made that goal impossible to achieve. Years ago I remember attending a pastor's conference with Larry Crabb and Dan Allender. I distinctly remember one of them saying this, "Your parents significantly failed you and you will significantly fail your children!" Yikes!!! Not only was I not a perfect parent, but my children would very possibly end up in counseling some day! So being the perfect parent raising perfect children wouldn't happen, but that thought made me begin to change my focus from thinking I had to be a perfect parent to being the right kind of person, which would most definitely impact the way I treated my children.

Now our children are grown and leaving the nest and living independent lives which is God's plan for our children and for us. But often I find myself asking - why am I here, what is my purpose, what is God's will for my life now? Am I fulfilling God's plan for my life, what if I never accomplish what He has placed me here to do? Am I missing something - should I be caring for the orphans and widows and if so how? Should I be working a full time job so we have something in savings when we retire, should I begin a mega ministry of hospitality not to mention prayer......and on and on. And in the middle of those thoughts I still hear this quiet voice saying, it's not what you accomplish Bonnie, but who you are in the process. It is still all about being the right person.

One of my favorite quotes is from A W Tozer and is this, "What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us." And why? Because those thoughts directly impact the way we live our lives. Hard thoughts about God keep us from trusting Him when the hard times come, which they have and will. Small thoughts about God open us up to worshiping all kinds of substitutes for Him that will not satisfy or have any lasting value or impact - entertainment, money, success, beauty, the wisdom of man. But, great thoughts about God produce in us a wisdom that the world cannot mimic or duplicate and give us the ability to stand firm in all of the circumstances of life. And, great thoughts of God change us and in the process of trusting produce a beauty and sweetness in us that is ageless and eternal.

There is no formula for being the right person - it is simply making the decision to make the Lord the number one priority in life and then determining to pursue Him with all of our hearts, like the Psalmist says in Psalm 42:1, passionately - like the deer who pants for water. In the end, there is nothing more important in this life, and there is no greater gift we can give our husband or children, or the world around us. Proverbs 4:23 says, "Guard your heart for out of it flow the issues of life." And, Matthew 6:33 says, "Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you."