Like me, do you find yourself inconsistent, too? Telling yourself how terrible it is to be a spendthrift, then buying the next thing which catches your fancy; teaching your younger brother how terrible it is to lie, then telling a white one yourself; nodding your head to forgiveness then finding it so very hard to let go of a past hurt.
It got me thinking.
My next triathlon is coming up. I will be trying my first sprint distance, which is half the Olympic distance. Hence, I had been keeping a lookout for an affordable tri-suit on discount. A trisuit is a kind of amphibean attire many triathletes choose to wear for their swim, bike and run. I finally found 2 I liked, of which I would buy one. Thinking about what I had read about The Power of Half, I felt justified since they were on 30% and 60% discount.
I don't know why I still couldn't buy it.
There is a concept called The Power of Half. And then, I thought, there's also God' s kind of power- the Power of All. Do I really need a trisuit. Sure, it's more comfortable, it looks better. After all, the price is slashed. But slashed or not, it still is ridiculously expensive, for a piece of apparel I will only wear a few times a year, for a less embarrassing appearance on other people's facebook pages at the end of my race. I'm only doing this for fun and to stay healthy.
I remember, it was the day before my birthday that I received the email from the beautiful stranger, who wanted to donate all his money received over the Lunar New Year to me to support whatever cause I wanted. And as I thought about it, tears welled up in my eyes.
On my birthday, the prayer devotional for the day was about being consistent. The book writes: Is your faith consistent with your way of life?
That line struck me. I understood it on 2 levels. One, are my values and my belief in God consistent with my behaviour? Two, how is my bicycle Faith reflected in my life?
I wanted a bicycle. I found a bicycle. My father gave me money for Christmas. God gave my money away to a 4-year old girl who needed to hear more than I needed to bike. I was sad. Then many little miracles happened. And Faith, the bicycle arrived on my birthday. It was perfect, far more perfect than the previous bicycle I had set my heart on. And as if God had had a hand in the whole thing, Faith was ready exactly on my birthday.
Faith, the bicycle, was only possible, is only beautiful because she reminds me of what it means to give and to obey totally, sacrificially and abandonedly. I read today, that no material possession is worth sacrificing the display of God's grace. In God's world, there is no room for a desperate attachment to things, and when given the opportunity to show what is really important to us, we must take it. Things, offer us nothing we don't already have. There comes a time where we must decide which is more important to us, a defense of our possessions on earth or a hope in our eternal treasures in heaven.
It made me think, do I value my possessions more than God's way? Do I really live and behave in a way that shows I believe God supplies more than I need?
That email brought to my mind the pain involved in having to give something I wanted up. My eyes soured at the memory of it. I thought of how God turned the whole situation around for me and blessed me with the love of friends and family and their very sweet gesture, I thought about what the stranger wrote to me about his friend being impacted by that whole ordeal and then suddenly... I just didn't want to buy anything anymore.
Days before my birthday, I found a place which straightens hair for a third of the market price. I had planned to do it, after being tired of having my hair made fun of, then after reading that article, thought to myself it was really silly and unecessary to do so. Do I really need a trisuit? Do I really need straight hair. Silly girl.
You know, if you add up all of Faith's parts, she actually is quite expensive. That sobered me, because although she is a beautiful gift, it made me think about how this would affect my choices in future. Would I want even more things, or would this blessing teach me to be even more thankful for what I have.
You won't believe this, but right about 2 paragraphs before this point while I'm blogging, my swim coach/ elder brother/friend whom I affectionately call "Huncle" (think a mishmash of Hunk and Uncle because he really is quite a hulk) calls me to tell me he wants to meet me at the train station. And just about 20 minutes ago, gave me that exact trisuit I had tried on that day. I had put it under reservation, and he'd gone to get it for me.
I feel like I'm having my birthday all week. I get the message, God. I really do.
You win, God, you win. You expect all, only because you give all. The biggest lesson I'm learning, is no matter how much we have, and how much we are blessed, in God's world, there is no room to be attached to possessions.
Faith, the bicycle, reminds me, that instead of being a symbol of extravagance, it really is a symbol of God's provision and sufficiency when we dare to give all and set our eyes heavenward. Faith is beautiful, but at the end of the day, it is still what it is- a possession, a chunk of metal, something which will fade away with the things of this world. Things may come under our stewardship, but our eyes must always have that faraway glimmer in them, always looking not at the visible, and not at our possessions, but at the invisible, the divine, and the things which truly matter in this world.
" Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity;
and quicken thou me in thy way."
-Psalm 119:37
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