Less and More

He must increase, I must decrease. John 3:30

How’s that for a piece of Scripture that stands in complete opposition of today’s culture!  Everywhere we turn someone is trying to market something to give us more.  More money, more beauty, more power…you name it and somebody’s sellin it and many Americans are lining up to buy it.  All the while, the Father that loves us is gently saying, less of that and more of me…I promise you will be blessed beyond measure.  This is a passage that has come to me again and again and again the last 5 weeks and I’ve done a beautiful job of ignoring it until this week!  Poor God, sometimes He has to work SOOOO much harder to get my attention than He should have to!   
 
Every summer begins the same; a long list of chores that need to
be done because I didn’t get to them during the school year.  These tasks are real gems; things like cleaning closets and extracting the crumbs from the silverware drawer or washing windows and blinds! This summer I had lots of other things on my list too; great books to read and letters to write and sitting on the porch. I told myself none of the fun stuff until the yucky stuff was done.  I started with the easy tasks and procrastinated on some of the really awful ones.  It got to the point that I dug in my heels and practically threw a temper fit about the last few jobs on my list.  It was making me crabby and I was ashamed of my procrastination.  As I was doing morning prayers one morning, the devotional was about offering our most “undesirable tasks” as a loving gift to the Lord making the tasks more about Him and less about self.  Humm...that was aimed right at me and it was a great idea…but I decided to fold a load of laundry before I tackled those awful jobs.  As I was folding, I reached into the basket and pulled out Shannon’s red t-shirt from Bible Study and the back of the shirt said, “He must increase, I must decrease. John 3:30.”  As if that wasn’t strange enough, I don’t remember Shannon even wearing that shirt in the past month but there it was in the laundry…that day! I was beginning to soften a bit so I dropped to my knees and said, “Ok God, I’ll do these awful, gross, not-fun-at-all chores out of love for you and in thanksgiving for all you’ve blessed me with, more of YOU less of me.” One second after I said amen and pulled myself off the floor, Jason walked in and said, “Mom, do you need anything?”  He helped me with three of the worst jobs on the list and we were finished much faster than I had planned.

 It was unbelievable! I was so caught up in how awful this was for me, I didn’t give a thought to Him and how He might use simple tasks to draw me tighter to His love.  I even got help washing windows that day!  It was like Jesus was sitting at the island in my kitchen saying…quit thinking about yourself and let me show you how amazing I am.  He’s calling us to fix our gaze on Him and not on our personal comfort, bank accounts, and our reflection in the mirror or our position in life. The only position He wants us to secure is the position right there with Him. I realized He has all those things in complete and perfect order…I just need to think of me less and Him more.  I’m glad He loves me enough to speak to me even through the laundry!  God is good….all the time!

A Seed To Plant: Take three opportunities this week to deliberately put
this verse into action. I’d love to know what happens!

Blessings on your day!