The Great Irony

Not too long ago I did a blog post titled Every Day is a Good Day. In that post I talked about the benefits of getting up early or staying up late and studying God's Word every day. Or as often as you can anyway.

 Here is a little testimony of what happened when I didn't spend time in the Word, and, what happened when I came back to it.

 I am the type to get up early in the morning before my wife and kids. This is when I do my studying, plan my day and finish anything left over from the day before.

 For several days I could not seem to get up at my usual time which is 3:30-4:00 am. On those days I did not spend anytime in God's word and generally rushed through the remainder of my morning to get caught up. Business has been slow lately and I get a bit uptight when the phone doesn't ring. During this time, under the surface I felt guilty for not tending to my studies. I count this as a good thing. I was also beginning to get a bit ungrateful as well, and that was bad. In today's materialistic world it is easy to get caught up in measuring personal value by the amount of material goods we posses. How could we be more wrong!

 To keep on point, yesterday morning I rose up early and got back to my routine. After some time in prayer, I opened up to where I had left off which was 1st Timothy Chapter 6. Paul is telling Timothy how to teach about behaving in the workplace in the first few verses and then says if anyone teaches contrary to what he is saying to withdraw from them. They are teaching materialism, basically. We should always be on watch for false teachers for sure.

 When I read vv 6-8 I got a big smile. Here I have been sorrowing inside like a little baby for the last few days and as soon as I get back to the Word I get slapped in the head with perspective. You gotta love it! 

 To save you the time of looking it up I'll quote the verses here. 6. "But godliness with contentment is great gain." 7. "For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out." 8."And having food and raiment let us be therewith content." So let's see, Roof over my head? Yup. Food in my tummy? Yup. Things aren't so bad after all now are they?

 Now I'm not saying this happens every day, but it certainly is Ironic that the very thing I was whining about, is what I was only a few verses away from when I stopped my studies.

Have a teriffic week!