Bringing the dead to life again

So I recently was diagnosed with major blockages in my coronary arteries.  I was essentially a dead man walking.  I had a condition that was going to kill me....and I was clueless.  I happily (well sometimes) went thru life blissfully unaware.

But slowly the condition came to limit what I could do.  So I just did less.  I accepted that.  I "intended" to do better, to get in shape, and believed I had time to do so before anything serious happened.

Thankfully I was made aware of my condition before it ended my life.  I went in last Thursday for a cardiac stent procedure to relieve the blockages in my heart.  I no longer have a bad heart, it has been fixed.

Much like Salvation.  As a sinner I went thru life thinking I was fine, blissfully unaware that I had a condition that would inevitably kill me.  But Jesus came and offered to fix my heart.  That should be it, I am fixed, healed, alive, life is easy now.

Hold the phone.

Life for me today (less than a week after the procedure) feels harder.  I struggle with intense anxiety, phantom pains, and a compendium of associated symptoms.  But see thats the rub, it "feels" harder.  In reality, my heart is fixed, it has more flow, it is not trying to kill me...but my mind has yet to grasp the amazingness of my rescue!

I fear, I worry.  I cling to things that will not preserve my life.  How much of a mirror to my spiritual walk!  My heart has been fixed, my life has been saved, I am a child of God...yet I live, oftentimes, as one who is still dying.

So my prayer today is to live in the reality of my salvation, not in the shadow of my old condition!

Shameover

shame·o·ver

/SHāmˌōvər/

shame = 
a painful feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behavior.

hangover = 
1.the disagreeable physical aftereffects of drunkenness, such as aheadache or stomach disorder, usually felt several hours aftercessation of drinking.
2.something remaining behind from a former period or state of affairs.
3.any aftermath of or lingering effect from a distressing experience:


My neighbor coined a phrase (or he heard somewhere else).  Shameover.  It was the awful feeling he had when he woke up in the morning and realized how much money he had spent at the strip club.  But it can apply to any of the things we do/pursue in life that we know aren't good for us, are not in line with the who we think/know we should be.

I am still working thru the shame of realizing the ways in which i have not only allowed lust and sin into my life but entertained it.  I enjoyed its presence.  I kept telling myself things wouldn't go further....but they always do.  And each new line that is crossed (or re-crossed) is adding to the shameover.

It's really only when I am willing to admit what I have done (sharing with another) that I can begin to 'cure' the shameover.  The real 'cure' is in Christ, admitting my guilt to Him and asking for forgiveness but, for me, if that is all the farther it goes the shameover hangs on.

The first step is recognizing you have a shameover...admit to yourself what is the cause of it.

Then we can begin the process of curing our shameover by admitting the source of our shame to Christ and trusted others...and work towards not getting drunk on our pet sin again.

There's no quick cure for a shameover!

Limited Resources

It's hard to admit that you are overextended physically, financially, and emotionally.

We only have so much time, money and emotional energy to commit to life and all it entails.  But I have been spending mine like drunken Navy man on shore leave!

Money is somewhat easier to track and see where it's gone....but time?  emotion?  How does one measure that...how do you determine where you should be spending it?

I am not sure I know the answer to that question.

The well is running dry.  Something has to give.

Disintegration

Really hit a rough patch this week. So my struggle isn't my only issue and I have found that when I am having a rough time in other areas of life the pornography and acting out is worse. So looking at my life honestly I have to admit that I am a wreck. Personally, spiritually, and financially. My lack of discipline in all of these areas is the chaos that feeds/justifies my addiction and contributes to the feelings of hopelessness. But I am not hopeless, nor am I helpless, I am also not alone. My choices are what got me here. Every dirty dish, I own. I made that...and when I decided it was easier to toss it in the sink instead of deal with it...that small mess grows.I have a good job, I just spend more than I make...apparently. I am always tired when i get home because I dont' exercise enough. But finding the energy to exercise when you come home to the same chaos everyday....it's not easy. All of us here face similar struggles I am sure. Mine are not the worst. I just have to work on it. one dish, one bill, one load of laundry at a time. I can't recover in only one area of my life....I have to recover my life in whole. God came to make us whole, to integrate what was dis-integrated.

Reboot

I work in IT.

When your computer bogs down, starts throwing errors, or gets all mucked up from too much porn.

Reboot.

Rebooting resets the computer to it's normal state, clears out the current memory, and can give you a chance to fix whatever the initial issue was.

What it won't do is fix hardware problems, or bad programming.  That takes skilled help, it takes effort, it means that you have to go in a clean out whats causing the problem.

Sometimes your computer has to crash before you admit you need to reboot.

I crashed.  And am in desperate need of a reboot.

Hope for the journey

I think we mistakenly assume that Christ in us means we will feel these wonderful urges to only do good and bad things will suddenly be unappealing. Or that somehow our actions have bearing on our eternal position in Christ. We either have asked Jesus to be our Savior or we havent. If so, the rest of life is "working out our salvation with fear and trembling" which, to me, means...trying to figure out the ramifications of being saved while still living in my sinful body here on earth. Our eternal destination is set with God in Heaven, but we have a few miles to walk here before we get Home. We are imperfect creatures, saved, and destined for future perfection in Christ. 

12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13 Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:12

 
Be encouraged, God has not abandoned us.

Unregenerate Bastard?

There's been some discussion of late about 'unregenerate christians'

those with no fruit, or those living in habitual sin.

 

So even tho I am in Christ and saved by Grace, there's an expectation of growth, or some development, maturity. Trying to wrap my head around the idea of grace without using it as a license to keep sinning and simply claim that I just "unable" to get victory in this area

 

....maybe its just that I am 'unwilling' to submit to the amount of pain necesary to see that battle won.

 

There is still the reality that I am living in a sinful body, I am not yet perfected, I will always have a sin nature.  But will i always give in to it so easily?

 

Porn has been my struggle since college, lust was even years before that.

More than half of my life i have been hamstrung in one way or another with this...even if only for its power to contribute to my insecurity in my relationship with my Heavenly Father.

 

I am grateful for Gods faithfullness in the midst of my faithlessness :)

All is not lost, and God is not finished with me yet...but yikes its hard not to get a lil' down about it once in a while!