Life Changes

For the past year I have been experiencing bad stomach pains which had recently gotten worse. Coming home from the doctor's office, I had with me a capsule of pills and a large list of lifestyle changes prescribed by the doctor. Among them included, cutting back on caffeine, carbonated drinks, high fat foods, citrus foods, excessive amounts of vitamin C, and most importantly STRESS.

Eager to reduce my stomach discomfort, I set to work making these very specific lifestyle changes. I was tired of pain being an everyday occurrence in my life. Despite my good intentions, I failed miserably. The bad habits I had learned became so much apart of my life that within hours of my new commitment, I was already wanting to cheat. Less than 24 hours later, I had withdrawal symptoms like no other: Splitting headache, fatigue, hunger, dizziness, and my stomach still hurt. The headache became so bad, I cheated on my new diet. I couldn't go on without the things I was used too.

I think coming to know Christ can be quite like this experience. We develop bad habits in our life that consume our decisions and lifestyle. Pretty soon, we are living in pain but do nothing because of our unwillingness and fear to change. We learn to ignore and block out the pain sensors that tell us that something is not right. When we finally can't handle the pain in our lives anymore, we turn to Christ.

In His word, He gives us clear guidelines and lifestyle changes. He teaches things like love our enemies, sell our stuff and give to the poor, pray for the people who hurt us, and trust Him and not ourselves. These things can cause hurt the first time around (maybe even the 10th time around). Sometimes our old life sounds easier and more convenient than these changes Jesus wants us to make. So many times we are tempted to go back to doing things our own way and "cheating".

Lifestyle changes are never fun. When we let our habits define who we are then we start to become our habits. Getting rid of our bad habits our painful but nothing compares to the end result. What if we made Jesus our habit? What would our lives look like?