Codepoke has an interesting post yesterday that runs parallel to what I intended to post on today. There's a bunch of stuff in there that I intend to chew on - later.
I haven't posted much lately. Frankly, posting here has been sporadic at best for a long time. I wish I could say that it was because I was too busy living. You know, spending time with he kids, working around the house, getting projects done and stuff like that. No, mostly I've been distracted by a lot of stuff.
I sit down at my laptop every night and most days (like now) at lunch, but mostly I browse around the web looking at stuff. Some good stuff, like Codepoke's blog or Jared's blog (two you ought to read), but sometimes it's just time killers. The online equivalent of reruns of M*A*S*H, something you do to have something to do.
It's interesting or entertaining to a point and I learn some stuff and talk to some folks, but it's immensely unsatisfying most of the time. I want to blog, but look, Bloglines says there are 18 new posts on my favorite blogs and I have 4 emails to return. Those things are easier, so I go there and the thoughts in my head that I wanted to share or the Bible study that I wanted to do don't get done.
Of course this applies to more than being online. Before we had the Internet, there was TV to watch. Even before we had a bazillion channels and DVDs and pay per view, we'd sink into the fantasy world of whatever show was on that night rather than doing something productive. before that there were books and gossip and a million other things.
I blog partly because I enjoy writing, but partly (maybe even mostly) because in putting these thoughts to the screen, I'm forced to flesh them out. I have to do the research, get the facts straight, see if there's any meat to hang on those bones. In doing so, what God has put in me becomes more real and in turn becomes useful to someone else (hopefully). But too often, I'm satisfied with the skeleton of an idea or the happy thought in my head. I'm convinced, however, that God put them there for more and through blogging that's what they become.
In order to do that, I have to decide. I have to intentionally ignore my feed list in Bloglines, my Inbox in Outlook and the call of mt Pop up camper club and Thunderbird forum and intentionally sit down to read my Bible and write out my comments or put that thought from Sundays message to the keyboard. It's intentionally pursuing what God has, in part, created me to do.
Isn't Christianity like that too? We are bombarded every day with interesting things, TV shows, newspaper and magazine articles, movies, conversations, shopping, radio shows, music and on and on. Jesus calls us to turn our eyes to Him and follow, despite all the calls of the world. Some of those things will flow through the path that we take as we follow him, but we are not to turn our eyes from Him and follow them.
We are called to live intentionally, deliberately on a course that runs counter to the culture around us. It's like trying to travel straight across a fast moving river to a point directly on the other side, The current want s to push you down stream, it takes determination to stay the course and not be pushed off track.
Too often I live accidentally, doing whatever falls in front of me instead of intentionally following a course toward Him.
