Fight For God

                Today I found myself asking if I fought for God.  I was sitting, waiting, in a overly warm courthouse, waiting for my daughter to do what it was she needed to do today. We had gotten up early, had a quick cup of coffee, and out the door we went. Three hours later, I was still waiting. There I found myself thinking about all the wasted time that I had on my hands. The whole morning was gone. If you knew me, you would know that the morning time is sacred to me. It is my time to sit with the Lord, pray and read my Bible, talk to Him, write, do my study, and just be in His presence. But lately, this just hasn’t been the norm for me. Then it hit me, this question- Do I fight for God? What hit me even more was my answer, from the depths of my being, it came like a knife cutting to my heart. I don’t fight for God. I am not talking about going out and fighting the world to make God the only god in the universe. (Even though we know that He is). I am talking about a personal fight. I am talking about a fight to keep God the number One in my daily life.

                These past few days and weeks have been filled with just about everything you can imagine. From helping my daughter get her life back on track, to trying to build a larger customer base for our pet care company, to just trying to keep up with the daily housework, my days have been filled with anything but God. I don’t fight for God in my life.  I move His time in the morning off to go and help this person. I move my time with Him in the morning later so that I can go meet this client, work on our advertising, etc. I do other things that need to be done, and do not fight for that time with Him. I also realized that I am more and more willing to compromise this time with Him when I choose to do other things. This compromise of my time with Him leads to me making excuses for why I can’t get my study done, or why I haven’t been able to post on my blog. Over and over again I find myself making excuses for the compromises I have made to not spend time in His Word. I don’t know about you, but when I don’t spend time in His word, I am a terrible, wasted mess!

                I had to face some hard truths this morning about my time with the Lord. Because I don’t, I don’t fight to keep that daily meeting with Him and Him alone. I have found that the more I give into compromising my time with Him, the more complaining, the more frustration and the more disappointment I have in my daily life. When I choose not to fight for my time with Him, I choose to make something else or someone else number one in my life.

                So how then do I fight for this time with the Lord? I have to set those boundaries and I have to fight to keep them. The world, the temptations, the needs of everyone else around me will try and creep in- but I have to choose to fight. I have to choose to say no. I have to stop making His time the sacrifice, and start making my life the sacrifice. I have to choose to fight for the time that He has given me. I have to choose to say no. I have to know the boundaries and I need to defend them. I need to take a stand and say no- not until I have been with Jesus.

                I knew that I had to get up early this morning and leave the house, but did I make any effort to get up an hour earlier and fight for some time in prayer? No- I did not. Instead I chose to compromise again this morning, and now, after a long day of running here and there and everywhere, all I want to do is go to sleep. But, no, I need to fight. I need to fight to have some time with the One who gave it all for me. I need to fight to stay in Him. I need to set those boundaries and I need to allow Him to help me fight this battle to keep them. I must stand and I must fight.

                Today I choose to fight. I choose to fight to stop this compromising of our time together. I am the one who chooses to compromise. I am the one who chooses to let everyone and everything else come in between our daily talks. I am the one who chooses to give in when all I need to do is fight. I must set those boundaries of no, or not right now, and I must defend them with all that I have and all that I am. When I stop defending those boundaries, compromise creeps in and I am surrendering to the enemy. I must choose to fight to keep God number One in my life. If I do not, then someone or something else will become god and before I know it, I will have surrendered my life to someone other than Jesus Christ. I do not know where you are today, or what battles you are facing. But I hope that you can be encouraged as I have been encouraged to fight, fight for this love relationship that you have with your Lord. Fight and don’t give up or compromise or sacrifice your life for anyone other than the One who fought and sacrificed for you.

                Father, I cry out to you with a heavy heart. You know my needs, my thoughts, and my desires. You know the reasons, the excuses and the compromises I have allowed to come in between us and our time together. Father, I pray, I pray diligently for Your help and Your strength and Your guidance to fight for the love that we have for one another. You fought the depths of sin and death for me, I pray, oh how I pray that I would fight for You too. Father, I pray for all of those who read these words that they too would fight, that they too would fight to keep You the One and Only in our lives, until You come again. In Jesus Name, amen and amen.