Jar of Clay

Despite Love Himself being infinite, He didn't create our hearts with an infinite capacity. I am learning that there are only so many things we can spend our time and energy loving and caring about. I'd like it if every single friend was my best friend. I'd like to be able to call or email everyone on my facebook friends list. I'd like to obsess about every single one of my clients until I solve every single one of their problems. But I can't, no matter how much I want to. I'm a big fan of choice, and I believe that within the limits of your circumstances (where you live or were raised, your family atmosphere, et cetera, all of which in part determine what you place importance on) you can chose what to fill your heart with. What matters to you? What has a proper place in your heart?

I was reading a fantastic article on young men in the church and the poverty of male leadership. The author was in part blaming pornography, and here was their reasoning: porn takes a guy (or girl's) focus away from God dirties the person's heart. Not only that, but then the person who looks at porn often uses precious time and energy hiding this addiction, in the process lying and distancing himself from others (like mentors, etc). Their time and energy can easily be eaten up by this disease of pornography. And don't worry, whoever you are reading this, the "secret" will eventually come out. Now, that's a pretty harsh example, but aren't we doing this every day? Filling our time with endless episodes of TV shows, scrolling for hours through Facebook (guilty), reading novels constantly, worrying about the latest fashion trends or gossip or politics or (insert trivial thing here). 

Here's a little experiment. What do you spend the most time talking about? Do you know someone who talks on and on about their favorite TV show as if it were something happening in real life? The Bible says something about this. "The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks." (Luke 6:45) 

What are you guarding in your heart? What do you treasure and spend your time and energy on? I know for me, for the first three weeks of my new job I was obsessing over my clients' situations, trying to figure out every possible way to help and fix and do for them what they hadn't been able to do for themselves. When I called my parents, that's all I'd talk about (within the bounds of confidentiality, of course). And when I wasn't at work or thinking about work, I'd be sitting watching a TV episode on my computer, or reading a novel to "unwind", because I knew I needed to take care of myself. None of these are bad things, of course. Not in moderation. But I wasn't doing ANYTHING else with my life. And since when is my life about me anyway? One day someone finally called me out. You see, since I'd returned from Brasil, of my dearest Brasilian friends and I talked almost every day using a texting application called Viber. We'd promised to Skype each other often and keep in touch. I have other Brasilian friends I've made, too, people who aren't Christians who God blessed me to be able to share His gospel with over the summer. Well, my friend just up and asks me "Mindi, how long has it been since you've talked to Rosa?" See, I'd usually discuss with this friend of mine how my conversations about God were going with my other friend, Rosa. Boom. Just like that. I answered that it'd been weeks. Weeks. She had expressed that she already felt like she was bothering me by emailing back and forth. I'd assured her she wasn't, that we were friends, and I loved to keep in touch with her and talk with her. I do. I love her very much. But I'd let something else consume me to the point of ignoring a precious soul who is reaching out for the love of God. More than that, my friend's example was glaring at me. I hadn't called him in a week, we barely texted, and we hadn't Skyped since I moved down to OKC. But he wasn't concerned about how I was hurting him: he cared about Rosa, who was teetering on the edge of faith in God. I couldn't even tell you the last time I had opened my Bible for myself at that point, let alone in conversation with another. And Rosa and my other Brasilian friend aren't the only two I've been neglecting. I don't even know any details of my best friend's wedding, which is in December, because I haven't taken the time to call her. 

I've been failing, my friends, and I'm ashamed. Help me. Tell me if I've not been talking with you like you'd like. YOU, as my friends and family, come first in my life. I know I haven't proven it but trust me when I tell you I love you more than anything and I want to keep in touch with you. I don't want to be consumed by the things that don't matter. I want to squeeze every moment out of every day, living each to its fullest. I want to pour out the love in my heart, my time, and my energy on those who deserve it. Not some stupid TV show so I can "veg out" after a hard day at work. Not hopelessly thinking about all the things I should have done during the day at work (since I can't change these things after the client walks out of the room, anyway). But thinking about, praying for or with, and loving YOU, those are what I choose as my priorities.