A Confession… And a Resolution…

Rev. Jonathan Edwards, a leader of the Great Awakening, is still remembered for his extraordinary resolve. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I have a confession:  I am an undisciplined, arrogant hack.

And I have a resolution:  To become more disciplined (in what, specifically, is still developing).

God’s timing never ceases to terrify, amuse, and amaze me.  When you live (only because He graciously helps you to do so) a life that honors God, he seems to teach you things you never wanted to know about yourself – at the most relevant, and simultaneously inconvenient times.

September and October of this year were really busy for me – at least in terms of milestones – looking back on them I am convicted of my daily laziness.

Skylar and I were in the panicked process of finishing some home improvement projects (adding a master suite, moving into the master suite, turning our old bedroom into a nursery) and at the same time doing paperwork to refinance our house – which meant a lot of pressure on me to finish the projects.  Add to that, I started a new job in September.  I was hired to do a particular task in which I had no prior training, experience, or education – I had no idea what I was doing, and I spent a lot of time spinning my wheels.  Then in October, my role changed (thank God) to something totally different, but still something where I have no prior experience – parent mentoring.  My daughter Keaton (my first) was born on October 20th; and we closed on our refinance on the 26th.

So, a lot of “major” milestones happened or were wrapped up in the last two months, so I must have been busy, right?  Sadly, no.  I didn’t read my Bible, I didn’t invest time in my relationship with my wife, I didn’t work out, I didn’t eat well (yes, that takes more time than just stuffing my face), and I didn’t write anything worth posting (mostly just complaints and ungracious political rants).  I took every excuse that I could for a “guys night” with my brothers, I watched TV probably two to three hours a night, and I got hooked into another stupid Facebook game.  Despite all that laziness, I’ve had quite the self righteous attitude that I’ve got it together and I’m doing what needs done.

Don’t take me wrong here.  I believe that B.U.S.Y. stand for Burdened Under Satan’s Yoke.  There’s the whole rabbit trail of Good vs. Great that we could get into, also known as the tyranny of the urgent, but I’ll let this post be a discussion of examples, instead of ideas. Yes, those house projects were a good (and necessary) thing to put my time and energy into, as was figuring out my new job(s), and doing the refinance paperwork.  To some degree, “resting” is also a good thing, but I took it too far.  In a number of ways, I’ve come to think that the Great things are the often boring or difficult commitments we’ve made that require an enormous amount of our time before they produce results – but when the results come, they’re worth the wait.

Why the sudden conviction that I’ve been lazy and undisciplined?  One thing is the contrast between myself and a Great Christian of History whom I’ve been reading about: Jonathan Edwards (The Unwavering Resolve of Jonathan Edward by Steven J. Lawson).  The man’s incredible discipline continues to inspire Christians today, 254 years after his death.  Another is a Leadership Training video from Mark Driscoll (An Observation after Breakfast with Chuck Smith) which essentially says that it can take years of faithfulness (discipline) to produce fruit.  And the final straw is that even though I knew I was behind in my bible reading, that today, November 10th), I finally did the reading that was on my calendar for September 29th, and I’ve been doing two readings a day for the last week to catch up.  I don’t know why it only struck me today that I was that far behind, but it did.

So, with that conviction, I confess:  I am undisciplined and prone to laziness; and I resolve: to hone discipline.  As I mentioned above, the timing of this is amusing.  God has brought me to where I am in life, in His sovereign timing.  I’ll probably finish that Edwards book just before Christmas (I’m reading it as a part of a men’s group, not just for leisure), but of course the New Year will be right on the heels of Christmas.  With this conviction, and this timing, it seems fitting to start thinking now of of my New Year’s resolution(s), which I have never done because I thought them fruitless, apparently due to my lack of discipline.  Not only is the New Year coming quickly, but in January I go back to school, to begin working on my Master’s degree.  So this conviction of needing discipline falls uncomfortably close to adding another iron to the proverbial fire.

More to come.