God Will Use Those With Simplified Lifes

In summary of Hebrews 12:1-2, it says "Therefore, all these pioneers who blazed the way for us on this life of faith, veterans they are cheering us on.  Let us rid ourselves of everything that weighs on us or slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up.  Get with it, start running with endurance the race God has set before us, never quit.  Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in.  Study how he did it.  He never lost sight of where he was heading, it was an exhilarating finish in and with God."

Bottom Line:
There are plenty of examples of folks before us that we can learn from.  We need to rid ourselves of everything that would weighs us down / hold us back.  This goes especially for the sins that easily trip us up.  We need to get with it, start running with an endurance that will never quit, the race that God has set before us.  Keeping our eyes on Jesus, who began and finished the same race we’re in.  Study how he did it, gain hope and faith from it.  Jesus never lost sight of where he was heading, he knew very well where the finish would end up, in and with God.

What this means for me:
God has set an objective for me and my life.  He has things He wants to do through me.  However, a complicated or busy life will keep me from reaching it.  Scripture suggests that I simplify my life.  Get rid of unnecessary baggage.  I shouldn’t try to do it all.  Instead I should determine and do what matters most.  To this this I need to remove things in the way, the ones that hold me back from doing the best things.  Often the things I’m doing in life appear to be good things.  I need to realize, that the enemy will often just make me busy just to distract me, even though the things appear to be good.  I need to realize that the busy good things are likely robbing me from having time to do the best things that he wants me to do.  It will be real key for me to determine what the best things are so that I can concentrate on doing them.  This will mean that I’ll need to setup some boundaries and make some clear statements about how I will live my life.
Rick Warren in his Purpose Driven Connection from today’s date suggested that some areas to look at are:

• Trying to be like someone instead of what God created me to do
• Trying to make everybody happy
• Trying to meet expectations of others
• Too many hobbies, too much TV time
• Too much social media, entertainment
• Wrong kinds of relationships
• Getting hung up on mistakes of the past

I will spend some time on my day off tomorrow reviewing these and determining so life goal statements for myself and which to guide my actions and priorities.