Rewiring

These last few days, I have found myself echoing the words of Paul over and over again:

"I don't really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don't do it. Instead, I do what I hate." Romans 7:15 (NLT)

Although my life is hectic, I often spend my downtime vegging out while surfing Youtube or some other mindless thing.

And time after time, I look back on the time I spent doing nothing when all the things that are piling up on me take the backburner.

So I try and change my ways, but the lure of mindlessness pulls me and I fall again.

Last night was yet another time when I had hours to do things in, and yet I spent it listening to, watching, and doing useless things.

And as I prepared to go to bed, I picked up the stack of memory verses that I have memorized so far through Bible Quizzing this year and turned to the first one.

"His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness." 2 Peter 1:3 (NIV)

It strikes me as funny that although this was one of the verses used in choir only last year, and I memorized it this year through Bible Quizzing, that it has only struck me now.

Now that I have gotten used to it, now that I know that I need that strength.

For so long I have been running on my own power, trusting myself to change my ways because that has occasionally worked in the past. Yet I continue to make the same mistakes again, continue to follow a cycle that I want to stop.

And only He has the strength that I need.

Sometimes I wonder if giving up all that I want is worth it. And even as I think it, I think back to all that He has worked through in my life and know that the question is utterly redundant.

But even then, He wasn't done showing me the things that He wanted me to see. This morning at church, the sermon was on "Transformational Discipleship" and was all about allowing others to see our weaknesses and working wholeheartedly towards change by throwing off the sin and then replacing it with a new mindset.

And it centered around Romans 12:1-2:

"And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice -- the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don't copy the behaviour and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God's will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect." (NLT)

Because, as humans, we have a sinful pattern built in. We resort to the same maneuvers again and again when places with tempting situations... we succumb.

What it is required to daily act out His commands is a rewiring. A rewiring of our brains, our habits, our systems of response, of the way that we think.

A rewiring until He is first and we are last.

And it comes with laying down of our personal plans, our personal ambitions, our hopes and dreams of self glorification.

It's all about Him.

And He is so able. So able to keep us from falling.

"Now all glory to God, who is able to keep you from falling away and will bring you with great joy into his glorious presence without a single fault." Jude 1:24 (NLT)

He's working on me.