Day 9: The Power of Jesus' Command

I spent the day with the Uppercue's and I am spent, so no entry tonight. I'll catch it up tomorrow morning.

LATER: Or tomorrow afternoon. Whatever works.

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"You cannot command an emotion, but you can command an action."

Great, great opening statement. I try to explain this to my students (in the sense that just because you don't feel like doing something doesn't mean that you are entitled to not doing it), but it usually doesn't work, mostly because a)our culture tells us that whatever we "feel" is right is what we should do and b)people are selfish. I have problems with both of those things, and I think most people do. It's WAY easier to start doing something we want to do than it is to do something we don't really want to do. It's also real easy to keep looking out for ourselves and what we can get out of life instead of looking to see what we can contribute to the lives of others. That's just part of human nature.

There's an interesting concept to help us counteract those things, at least when it comes to relationships. The idea of "nevertheless love" is an interesting one. The idea that, "I don't feel like doing this, but nevertheless, God wants me to, so I will do it," has the power to completely turn around some relationship issues. Again, the way the action/feeling formula works is that we act first and feel later. It might take some time before the feelings get to the place where we want them, but regardless of the struggle, we are called to ACTION, not to emotion. It's really easy to get discouraged and give up: easy to feel that God has left us. But it is in those moments where God is taking us through the process of strengthening our faith. Too often we run into a wall as we pursue our goal and think, "Well, clearly I was headed in the wrong direction," and drop whatever we were pursuing! God's goal for us is total dependence, and we can't get that until we hit those walls and realize how impossible it is to live in our own strength. And we don't get to those places until we start to say, "nevertheless, Lord, I will do it."

Point to Ponder: If you've stopped feeling love, the first step is to begin to act with love again.
Another challenging concept- no one wants to act on a feeling they don't have! This is mostly because we get caught up in thinking that emotions should control our actions, instead of realizing that it should be the other way around.

Verse to Remember: Galatians 6:9- "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up."
I love Galatians. The next verse in this chapter tells us to do good to all people, and especially to our brothers and sisters in Christ. This is a very encouraging statement, especially when we are starting to feel burnt out and wonder why we are doing what we are doing. It's easy to get tired of doing good things, especially when you end up in a situation where people are not necessarily expressing appreciation, or (even worse) are downright ungrateful. On the flip side, it's really easy to continue to help out people whom you like and enjoy spending the time with, regardless of the situation. In both circumstances, though, we are called not to get tired of doing good nor to give up.

Question to Consider: Is there someone I don't feel like loving whom I need to love?
Isn't there always? OK, I shouldn't say that so glibly. Although I'm generally a nice person, I can also fall into being a "nice" person, which is not a very loving way to treat someone else. There are some people that I'm "nice" to that I need to get rid of the falseness and just be nice to.