To Trust...To Please

Definitions:
to please- to give a person satisfaction in what you have done or accomplished
to trust- to rely upon, to put confidence in someone or something

Not your normal start to a blog post but this concept of pleasing someone and trusting someone or something came up this weekend at church. We are starting a new series at church going through our Cause and talking about what that means for our lives as Christians. I won't get into much of that in this post but will hopefully be able to distinguish between trusting and pleasing.

Of course noting the definitions above, one will know that these two words don't have the same definitions and mean completely different things depending on the situation or experience one may have. Pleasing someone isn't the same as trusting that same person. You can please someone but may not trust that person or vice versa.

Now to get a little deeper into this subject (and I do apologize to those who may not have a relationship with Jesus) about Pleasing God vs. Trusting God. Pleasing God is doing well, working towards a goal and not breaking any rules or laws that are put forth to "be a good Christian". Pleasing God is like earning favor with God; wanting to always be the best no matter what you need to get to that place.

Hmm, it seems to me that Pleasing God requires much time and energy on your part to "do good" and to "not get into trouble". That doesn't sounds like my idea of fun, it sounds boring, too hard and not allowing God to have control. Oh wait.... I can be guilty of that at times but that's not what I want my life to be about all the time. I want my life to be built around trust.

Trusting God is that simple.. Trust.......God. Sounds easy enough, where do I sign up. Oh wait. It's more than that? You mean I have to give all my life up to him? Wow, let me think about that. All through my life I thought I was in charge. I thought I was the one who needed to know what I was to do next. You mean you're telling me that's not the case? This was exactly my reaction when I first became a Christ Follower. You see, I had my life all planned out. I knew what I was going to be when I grew up, what type of car I was going to be driving and even what school I was going to be attending.

Once God took ahold of my life, things were never the same. I learned that trusting God was a lot more what I wanted to do because He along knows the best for my life.

This isn't about me but I wanted to show everyone why I chose to trust God and not merely pleasing God. You may have those moments where you fall back into Pleasing God and just barely able to stay above the water but then there are those moments of clarity where the Trusting God seems so much better and you are now floating on the water.

Trust vs. Please.. Sounds like an easy decision. what will you choose?

Unplugging

Sometimes in life you need to get away from the hustle and bustle of the "city life". I know for me, it's essential for my well being. I'm reflecting back to when I was in Elementary and Middle School (and even high school); those were the best days. I didn't have a cell phone until I got a car and even then, I didn't have a clue on what text messaging was or what a "pic message" was. Forget about the internet or smart phones; those didn't even exist.

What I'm saying is I grew up without all these electronic communication devices and I turned out normal. For me, unplugging is going back to my childhood/adolescent days. The days where playing outside was the "norm" and when video games/facebook weren't known about. I had the opportunity to be "unplugged" from technology this past weekend and I absolutely loved every moment of it. I enjoyed being able to go outside and read a book without the distraction of a cell phone or a computer giving me facebook updates every minute.

I enjoyed the simplistic view of life; where people hung outside and talked in chairs and the fun was watching people play in the pool or watch a game of frisbee golf. These are the moments when I can finally breath a sigh of relief and just enjoy "being" and not "doing".

I remember in one of my classes I took, the teacher said that we are human "beings" not human "doings". We have the tendency to do, do, do and not just "be". It's definitely hard when the world around you is going in fast forward and you are trying to keep up with it all. For me, I need to remind myself that I need to slow down and be in the place of "being". Sure things will still get done and emails will get responded to but in the "being" attitude not the "doing" attitude.

God himself wasn't one to work all the time. When He created, He didn't do it all on one day. He took his time and created over a period of days. In fact, once the work was all done, He rested. So if my thinking serves me correctly/logically, shouldn't we take time to rest just like the creator of the universe. I can guarantee that He did much more than we ever did. If He can rest, we can rest.

So what does the above have to do with unplugging? Alot. It's saying that we need to take time to just "be" take the time to enjoy life and not let it pass us by. We fill our days way too much with "things to do" and pretty soon a year has gone by and what was important has slowly been pushed to the back. Especially for families who have kids; it's when you look and find that the 5 year old with bouncing curls is now an 18 year old getting ready to graduate high school and you wonder where the time has gone.

I'm not saying unplug completely but try to just "be" more than just "do". I can guarantee that life won't pass you by as quickly and that you will remember more moments than if you did if you were just "doing".