What Do You Believe?

So it's been awhile... ok it's been a decade since I've contributed my thoughts to the web. All my thoughts have gone towards seminary, which have left me with little to share with the world. But I'm back, and this time I come to you from the ipad. (one of the most useful things I"ve ever purchased. I would put it right up there with my toothbrush)

So here's my question. What do YOU believe? You personally... your own thoughts. If you are a follower of Jesus, do you believe the words you read and stories you hear?

Because think about it, we all believe something because someone before us once believed it. Information more often that not is being passed down or around from somewhere.

Those of us who grew up in the church believe most of what we believe because we were told to, or because we knew someone smarter than us believed the same.

When we ask this question about our faith, I believe it causes us to do some inventory on where we are spiritually. I don't know about you, but when I believe in something, it's hard for me not to voice what I believe. If we truly believe, than we must live and act that way.

Last night in youth ministry, we looked at Psalm 37:4
"Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart."

If we as followers of Jesus say that we believe like we do, then why is this verse so hard to understand for many of us. I mean, we put it on coffee cups and t-shirts and those horrible Christian bumper stickers, but yet so few of us live in a way like this verse is real.

Why is that? Or better yet, what are our desires? or to make this more personal. What is your desire? Do you know? Have you grasped that? What does that look like that we are delighting ourselves in the Lord and Him giving us the desires of our hearts?
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I'll let you ponder on that while I smoothly transition my thoughts.

Here's what God has been teaching me lately.

Be patient, and quit tring to force something to happen. God operates on His time, and His plan. I feel like many of us need to be reminded of that. When it's His time, I promise you, you will be blown away when He wants to move you in another direction. God has just been blowing my head up with that lately.

When we begin to grasp an ounce of what it means to delight in Him, I truly believe He will give us the desires of our heart. I think I've spent most of my life trying to force something to happen, and each time only getting a lack luster result. It's those times when I allow Him to be in charge that I step back and say wow.