Up until that day, I only had to be responsible to one person: myself. However, on that day, my life included someone else's life. I was responsible to someone else: my wife.
On September 5th, 2009, I was married to my best friend, and our lives became intertwined. What affected her affected me. She became my top priority.
Now, I hope that you caught that mistake. If not, you should probably re-read the set up to this post.
When we got married, my wife became my top priority. I sought first her needs. When she was unhappy, it made me unhappy. When things weren't going right for her it made me worried.
There's nothing wrong with the idea of making my wife a top priority in my life, but the truth is that my wife should not be my #1 priority. However, if I am honest many times she can become that.
Now, I'm not saying that I don't love God or that I don't seek Him above everything else. Most of the time I do. I can honestly say that when we got married I believed that God was leading me that direction, but that is not always my focus. I am not always solely focused on where God is leading me, and what God wants me to do. Sometimes I'm more concerned with what my wife and I want to do, and where our desires are leading us.
You see, I didn't worry much before I got married. My priorities were kind of small and were limited to my own situation, yet when I got married my life's population doubled. I now had to worry about my wife and what was going on in her life: whether she was safe and happy and comfortable. I was also in my second year of college, and now that I had a wife to support making sure I kept the HOPE scholarship was a much bigger deal. So, now I'm worrying about Jenny's safety, happiness, comfort, and my grades. Add on top of that the amount of stress I had at work, Jenny's grades (she's a Psychology major, so she has tougher classes-because she's smarter than me), her job, all of our bills, getting a new car (I was in a wreck, but it wasn't my fault), and all of my positions at church, and you've got a lot of worry.
The problem here wasn't that it was too much to handle, because most of the time it was fine, but the problem was that my priorities were messed up (and can still get messed up). I was seeking first my kingdom, and my own problems. I was trying to make sure that all of my needs were met, and that included meeting my wife's needs.
This is not the life that God has called us to. God has called us to chase after the things of His kingdom before we even think about our own kingdom and our own problems. God says that if our main priority is His kingdom, then He'll take care of all of that other stuff.
When my focus is on my own kingdom, accomplishing what I want done, then it is necessary to worry. Let's face it, the world is out of my control. No matter how hard I work at my job, the economy could crash, and I could get fired. No matter how healthy I am, cancer can always strike. No matter how safe I try to make myself, accidents happen. I can't control this world, and when my main focus is my own kingdom, my own needs, then it is natural to worry.
Not that worry accomplishes anything. As Jesus says, "Who by worrying can add a single hour to his life?" We know that worrying doesn't solve anything, but when our focus is on our own kingdom, then it is comforting to worry. We are holding on to an illusion of control, and missing out on putting our lives in the hands of the One who IS in control.
I want to make it clear that I'm not saying that this is where I should be. I don't think that this is where God wants me to be, but this is where I am.
Everyday is a battle. Everyday is a struggle. Everyday is a choice whether to live my life for God or for myself. Everyday is a decision: advancing God's kingdom or advancing my kingdom?
The times that I do choose God's kingdom over my own, what I find out is that I have peace. Peace is the absence of worry and stress. When I lay my burden of worry down at Jesus' feet, I find rest. When I'm restless from sleepless nights consumed with worry, I can choose to let go of worry, seek God's kingdom first, and find rest in God.
A bonus of all this is that when I let go of worry and seek first God's kingdom and God's will, I find out that everything else gets taken care of.
When I follow God's commands for my money, I find out that I stay away from debt and I have margin in my finances. When I choose to seek first God's kingdom, I love my wife more and I meet her emotional needs more. When I choose to listen to God's will in my morality, I become more of the man that I want to be. When I make God's kingdom the #1 priority in my life, I see that all of the things I worried about all along were not as important as what God is doing in the world.
God is calling us to a better life. Not only a life free of worry, but a life that is overflowing with a joy that leaves us speechless. But we cannot gain access to that life if we're chasing after and trying to advance our own kingdoms. God demands that we lay our kingdoms down at His feet, and seek first His kingdom. He promises that He'll take care of the rest of the stuff.
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