As I lay in bed last night, I could not get this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpMcM1JJR1M) by Mike Huckabee off my mind (please take the 3 minutes to watch before reading on). I lay there asking myself questions like: How did this happen? Why did we let people ask God to leave the building? Who did this? Why do people allow this? I like to think of myself as not just a complainer of problems, but as a person who wants to recognize problems and be a part of the solution. I don't ever want to be a person who jumps on the bandwagon of complaining about issues but never wanting to help fix them. Now I ask myself: What can I do to change this? How did I let this happen? Am I going to let people take away my right to communicate with God any time I want to? How can I bring God into every aspect of life?
If I am a Christian and I think about why I was created, it is to powerfully glorify God's name in all that I do. I honestly couldn't go to bed last night because I was so bothered by myself and the way I go on about my daily routines in my own "little" world and am not intentional about putting God in every area of my life. I stayed awake thinking of new ways that I could devote my life here on earth to do God's will as it is in heaven. We have simply removed God from our schools, our businesses, our organizations, and our government. I have not done well in the past and probably will not do it perfectly in the future, but instead of making New Year's resolutions to lose weight or achieve more "earthly" success, I am going to put my focus next year on being intentional to bring God into every aspect of my life even if it makes people a little uncomfortable. If we, as Christians, got intentional about bringing God into our businesses on a daily basis, initiated prayer before our staff/board meetings, encouraged our children to pray before lunch in the cafeteria and any other time they feel the need throughout the day, and encouraged each other to get in agreement and prayer about the direction of our nation, I think we can put our country back on track to what our heritage was founded on.
In the past, I have struggled with ideas on how a "financial advisor" can glorify God in their business. After all, I am not working at a church and people do not see me in this "light". It hit me last night that I can use my talents as a "financial advisor" to serve the Christian community by promising to pray over their finances, asking God to bless my decisions regarding investments, bless their money, and asking God to give me wisdom on their financial plan. I now realize that you do not have to work at a church to actively "be" the church. In the organizations I am involved in I can ask to bring God into the meetings by praying over the organization before each Board meeting and if that is not "allowed" to do as a group, I can go to the meeting early and "unofficially" pray before each meeting. In my child's life, I can talk with him about different ways to communicate with God during his day at school and re-assure him that he can pray anytime he would like and anywhere he would like. I do not think it takes the government to make any "official" rulings to bring God back into the nation, I think it takes Christians rising up together to be intentional about bringing God into every aspect of their life and His light will shine.
A poem I found to be right on target with what we need was written by Darrel Scott (his daughter was killed in Columbine) and was presented by him to the House Judicial Committee:
Your laws ignore our deepest needs, your words are empty air.
You've stripped away our heritage, you've outlawed simple prayer.
Now gunshots fill our classrooms, and precious children die.
You seek for answers everywhere, and aks the question "Why?"
You regulate restrictive laws, through legislative creed.
And yet you fail to understand, that GOD is what we need!
I am passionate about God and trying to do things better in my life, but I also struggle with posting this because I know criticism comes with being a Christian. I cannot make a promise that I will be a "perfect" Christian next year nor that I will not "mess" up, but I can promise that I am going to put my focus on doing things that matter in 2013 and I hope you will join me!
