Karaoke Tuesday: "This Is Your Life" by Switchfoot

What's on your iPod?
Mine is packed with everything from Christian contemporary to Rock... Techno to Broadway musicals... 70's to 2000's... some grunge... some heavy metal... some bubblegum pop. I know all of the words to Metalica's Nothing Else Matters, Paula Abdul's Cold-Hearted Snake AND the entire High School Musical soundtrack... And I've found in writing this blog, that you never know where you'll find Divine inspiration!

This week's song is This Is Your Life by Switchfoot. It asks a simple question:

This is your life. Are you who you want to be?

WOW... that actually makes me feel... uncomfortable...

It's not asking "Are you WHERE you want to be?" "Where" would imply some status or accomplishment that I could easily shrug off with a careless, "Yes, I want to publish a book one day, but I've got time, right?"-kind of answer. Or "Sure... I might go back to teaching.. Who knows?"

Asking me "WHO I want to be" is an entirely different matter altogether...

Who DO I want to be, anyway?
I want to be honest.
I want to be funny - I love to make people laugh.
I want to be free of worrying about what people think of me.
I want to be a good mother... no... a GREAT mother.
I want to be a loving wife and best friend to my husband.
I want to be caring. I want to think of others ahead of myself.
I want to do right by my family.
I want to be thought of as "Christian."

Am I all of those things? Wellllllll... sometimes? Some days, I'm lucky if I achieve even half that! And although each day I start fresh trying to be those things, I know that my own pride, or arrogance, or preoccupation with my own activites often gets in the way of just WHO I want to be.

And each "failed" day builds up on me... weighing me down with it's garbage. That pile of regrets, and apologies, and guilt just builds higher and higher until it knocks me off of the path I've been trying to follow.

Switchfoot reminds us that "Yesterday is dead and over" - implying an alternative: to let go of the baggage and garbage that clouds our minds and hearts. That's easier sung about than actually done, isn't it?! But it just so happens that there IS a way to dump that garbage out of our souls:

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened,
and I will give you rest. ~Matthew 11:28

God knows that often we either come running to him shrieking "HELLLLPP MEEEE!" or come crawling to him crying in our exhaustion and despair. Fortunately, He scoops us right up and offers us comfort from the terrors or troubles that have knocked us down. With his ever-renewing Band-Aids of "forgiveness," He picks us back up and walks with us through our bumpy journey of life.
But he can't do our LIVING for us.
We are free to make our own decisions and our own mistakes. And it's those mistakes that sometimes have us looking back over our life wondering "What-in-the-Hades happened to me?! This is my life?!?! Are you serious?!" It is at that point where we must grab on to that free will God has provided us, and make some choices that put us back onto the path God intended for us to follow.
This IS your life: Are you who you want to be?
And if not, what are you going to do about it?
♥Mags

The Lyrics
Song: This Is Your Life
Artist: Switchfoot
Album: The Beautiful Letdown
Hear it on Last.FM!

I Found God In The Garbage Truck...

I'm not sure we all fully appreciate our garbage collectors... 

We drag out all of our trash: our smelly food leftovers, broken down boxes discarded from fun packages, wrappings and trappings from holiday gifts, crushed soda pop cans, snotty Kleenexes... a whole assortment of stuff that we just want someone to "make go away." Our garbage collectors come (for a fee, of course, but when you really think about what they are gathering up, it's probably not near enough!) and take all of that garbage away. You don't have to think about where it's going (unless you are hyper-environmentally-conscious). You don't have to worry if it will come back and appear strewn all over your front lawn. In a few moments (they really are quick!), all of your trash has disappeared... gone... *POOF!* 

What if someone could do that for our mental garbage? Wouldn't that be amazing?! What if Someone could slip in to our minds and lift the burden of our worries, our anxieties, our pain, our past, our frustrations, our quirks, and all the little annoyances that plague us daily? What if that Someone would come to us... not just once a week like our garbage collectors... but daily... even each moment if we asked. This Someone would be at our beck-and-call to collect the trash that has built up in our heart and soul. Even better - the cost of this garbage collecting service would be my personal favorite price: FREE!!! How amazing would that be?! Like a mini-trash can waiting on our shoulder to collect all the stuff that beats us down. 

When you are Christian... you have that Someone. His name is Jesus Christ; He is Lord. He is both the Father and the Son - the creator of Heaven and Earth and has lived in human form. For Someone to accomplish that miracle... don't you think he can help you purge the garbage from your mind, heart, and soul?

Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don't get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes. ~Matthew 6:34

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. ~Matthew 11:28

If you have too much garbage in your heart... too much baggage in your mind... too much trash in your soul, consider calling the ultimate Garage Collector to come and take your burdens away. He will help lift you. He will empower you. He will save you. You will be able to feel lighter - and able to conquer the things that have driven you down. Whether it is something small and petty... or large and cumbersome... God can help you. 

Often, I try to handle everything in my life all by myself.  I like to control things - and yet, so many things that I try to control are actually OUT of my control.  I get angry, frustrated, and OH. SO. TIRED. In the times that I truly S T O P and ask for help from God, it is then that I feel less aggravated, less weary.  Sometimes, I have to remind myself to ask for help again and again - I have to ask God to just take all of these garbage worries and garbage anxieties and garbage thoughts from my brain.  I lean on Matthew 11:28 - so that I can rest in the promise that God is big enough to handle my worries and problems.  

I can rest free of the mental garbage that God takes away.

 Have a blessed day, 

:) Mags