By Karen Y. Stevens

 

I have lost my spiritual motivation somewhere along my path, these last few years.

At first, I thought maybe it was because I was just tired. But I had energy for other things, so I could not blame it on that.

I was praising God this morning in a song that goes like this; “I love you Lord, and I lift my voice to worship you oh my soul rejoice. Take joy my King in what you hear, may it be a sweet, sweet sound in your ear.”

I paused and told God that I was sorry for slacking, and I want my motivation back, to be the Christian I once was, and who He was proud of.

He whispered, “I am proud of you, just keep pushing – keep praising Me, and you will find your new-found spirit in the praise.”

King David found his motivation in praise. I think God loved King David so much, because he humbled himself all the time, and knew how to praise God.

Beth Moore did a study on King David and called it “A heart like His”.

After the study, I knew why she titled it that. King David grew to have a heart like God’s.

That’s where I made my mistake. Instead of growing in those failures of mine, like King David, I grew calloused. When a prayer went unanswered, I grew further from earnestly praying. God has been very patient with me, always coaxing me back to where I should be. It shows me how deep God’s love really is.

So, after God whispering in my ear this morning, my goal will be to praise Him more, so I can grow in motivation.

When we are spiritually motivated, the rest of our life, lines up. We are motivated for our family, work, and anything we want involved in our life.

I have also allowed myself to become calloused in a few other areas, that I need to spend time repairing. We all need to take stock of where we are at, with our finances, relationships and our spirituality.

Pema Chodron said “Nothing every goes away until it teaches us, what we need to know.”

So, if you’re not looking at your reactions to life, then you will repeat them.

I know I’m always circling around Mount Sinai, because I never seemed to learn the first time. The best thing to remember, is God does have enough love to overcome our short comings, to a point.

In Deuteronomy 4:24 it says God is a jealous God. It is talking about us bowing down to idols in this scripture, but if God can be jealous about us bowing down to idols, He can be jealous when we don’t spend time with Him.

Let’s start our new year off with a bang. Put praise at the top of your list! Take time in the morning, but also thru out your daily task, whisper under your breath, “Thank you Lord!” “Thank you!”.

These words will be on the tip of my tongue this year.

 

Karen Y. Stevens is founder of Orange County Christian Writers Guild