I started to post something here yesterday. I sat staring at the empty box where my profound, witty, insightful, intellectual post was supposed to be rapidly filling up the blank space. All I saw was white, no words, not wit, no insight. I closed the blog and went to bed. I was disappointed at first, then I realized, perhaps, I am not supposed to be witty, insightful, intellectual all the time. Ok, I am not witty, insightful, or intellectual all the time, but I wanted to give that impression. I did not want, actually still do not want a blog crammed with nonsense about the trivial aspects of my life. What I wanted was to be great, to appear great, to be recognized as some really awesome person. Now talk about pride AND self-delusion...lol. Last night gave me a harsh look at a side of me that I don't often see, a side I believe that is not reflective of my true and total personality, but it is a part none the less. I am glad I saw that and now I am glad that I am working on another of the flaws in my person. My daughter makes lists, lots of lists; lists of book she wants to read over vacation, lists of homework assignments and her plan for getting them all done, lists of chores and fun she plans to do on Saturday. I sometimes think she has too many lists, but I think I need to take a cue from her and draw up a few lists myself, ones that deal with areas in my life where I need to be better, areas in my life where God is not glorified.

Ok, I am now taking a rabbit trail, straying slightly from my main point, but this is a good rabbit trail...glorifying God. I always think about glorifying God in connection to either doing things overtly spiritual, like worshiping Him, praying, reading my Bible, witnessing, or to not sinning, not giving in to besetting sins, not being an example of how not to keep the Ten Commandments. Now, before I go on, I am aware that anytime we fall short of the glory of God, we are sinning, but I want to talk about things I do, or we do that do not bring glory to God, and in fact often detract from His glory, but that we don't zoom in on as SIN.
1). I am fat, not slightly overweight, not pleasing plump, not big boned, just plain, nasty fat. Ok, I wear it well, or so I have been told, but the fact remains, I AM FAT. I have thought that I need to lose weight, it would be good for my health, I would have more energy, I could wear cooler clothes, I would be able to do more activities, that I would make my daughters proud of me. The one thing I have never thought about, never considered until just the other day, is that I am not bringing glory to God because I am fat. Now, hear me out. Being skinny, or pretty, or handsome is not what a person needs to be to bring glory to God. God made us all different and His idea of beauty is far from ours. I believe even "ugly" people are beautiful to God. What I am taking about is that I made myself FAT, I am causing harm to His creation. I am saying to those around me that not only do I not care about the wonderful creation that God made, but that God can not do anything to help me bring His temple back to its healthy form. By remaining fat, I am not bringing glory to God.
2). I am in debt, not enough to cause a country to go bankrupt, but in debt. What that means is that I owe people(businesses) money. People either loaned me money, credit cards, items purchased on credit, etc. with the idea that would honor that debt and pay them back or they provided services that I agreed to pay for. I have not, or have not completely. Now, yes, there have been difficulties in my life that caused me financial setbacks, and there have been attempts or are on-going attempts to pay folks back, but I am still in debt. Now, some would say that owing a business money is not a big thing, that businesses expect losses, that they right it off, don't worry about it. I have been off and on working toward reducing my debt, but the reasons again were not right. I want to be able to buy things when I need them, I don't want to keep getting calls from bill collectors, I want to silence my critics who make negative statements about my money skills. These may all be good motivations, but I am a child of God. It is my duty to bring glory to Him and my financial situation is not doing that, in fact, it is really detracting from that. I am basically saying that either God does not care if I honor my obligations, or that He is unable to help me clear up these debts. By staying in debt, I am not bringing glory to God
I could go on and list a few more, but I think you get my point. I and by extension, we need to remember that everything we do is connected to bringing glory to God or not. I often lose sight of that fact which is why I do some of the really dumb things I do. I can't fix this, God can, and so I have started to ask Him to show me all the areas where I am falling short and asking Him to help me change them.
Want to join me? Just ask Him to show you Him and to show you you. You won't like what you see, but if you truly are one of His children and you truly want to bring glory to Him, you will do this. Let's help each other in this. Comment on this post with your struggles, your questions and join together in a choir that fills the heavens with glory to our awesome God.