F.R.O.G.

Have you ever heard of the acronyms FROG (Forever Rely on God) or DOG (Depend on God)? Perhaps if you haven’t heard of those you have hear someone utter the letters WWJD (What Would Jesus Do? or Walk With Jesus Daily).

At times I think that Christians are obsessed with such acronyms (after all, we also pray through TSP (thanks, sorry, please) and ACTS (adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication). But there is a reason for it. Quite simply, making an acronym for something does help us to remember it. But that is less than half the battle. Once we’ve successfully managed to remember an acronym and with it the message behind it, we’re then faced with the far greater challenge of actually responding to it by living it out.

Take Forever Rely on God for example. In a highly individualist and independent society, in which almost everyone has enough money to not only satisfy their needs, but to go above and beyond and live with luxuries such as ipods, laptops, nice clothes, and their favourite chocolate bars, do we really rely on God? Can we honestly say that we depend on God to feed us, clothe us, provide us with shelter and give our lives a purpose and direction? In so many cases, I don’t think we can. So often we instead take it upon ourselves to earn enough money to provide the first three, and appoint ourselves our own purpose and direction. We’re fooled into thinking that we don’t need to rely on God, because we can take care of ourselves.

But what happens when it all goes wrong? When we find ourselves in a situation that we can’t possible control? All of a sudden, we’re confused and frightened. We lose our purpose and direction.

But God can give that back to us. Our direction can be towards Him, and our purpose to love and serve Him. And whether everything is going right, or you’re lost and despairing, it’s never the wrong time to turn to God for that.

To everyone out there who have God in their hearts and strive to follow Him: please don’t give up! I know it is hard, but stick at it and He will refine you like silver.

Peace be with you.

Running Back To You

The ‘Planet Shakers’ start their All That I Want album with a song called ‘Running After You’. It’s about running after God no matter what other people think, which is great. But what happens if you do turn away? What happens if you give in to the world and start listening to it instead of God?

It’s so easy to feel ashamed, to try and hide because you know that you’ve slipped up and gone against His wishes. And if when we do return to God after that, often it’s as if we’re slinking back, waiting for the reprimand, scared that we’re not going to be accepted back again.

But even when we slip up, screw up and turn away, I believe that what God wants for us to do most is to run back to Him. If you want proof of this, take a look at the parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32). Although we do need to be sorry enough about our mistakes to change so we don’t repeat them, we don’t need to be ashamed or afraid. We can run right back to God, because His arms are open, whether we’re on our 2nd chance or our 100th.

God bless.