The Old Elbow Grease Method

Things come pretty easy these days; you don't really have to work hard to get them.



I want the new album by so and so....so I just download it from Amazon. I don't have to wait for it to be in physical form. I don't need to hunt it down at the music store. I don't need to wait for it at all. I can get it now.

There are so many more examples, but what got me today was a devotional I had done earlier this year. It's not anything spectacular and I feel like some of the days so far haven't really meant anything to me...until today.

It was "Assess the Goods: Becoming New". It talked about how God is in the business of taking broken things and turning them into glorious displays of His love.

Say what?

Didn't I just blog earlier this year about how I'm trying out this new me, trying to let go of the old? #oldme, #newme? He is going to take me as I am and work on me with good, old-fashioned elbow grease. He's fixing my gears. He's polishing me. He's taking time to make a better version of who I am. Not who I was. Who I AM. He is making me new, not me.

2 Corinthians 5:17 "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come; the old has gone, the new is here!"

This is groundbreaking, even though I've heard it a gazillion times.

So, on the days when I'm missing music, missing my job, missing the comfortable, I need to remember that God is just polishing me. He's not taking the music out of me. He's not making me go through the trials I do just for fun. He is polishing me to be used in even better ways. It's going to be uncomfortable in a comfortable way.

I need to take God's elbow grease and apply it as well. Kick the little devil off my shoulder who whispers in my ear. Keep pressing on and pressing forward. Onward and upward! Onward and upward. Onward. Upward.

I choose joy.
I choose Bryce.
I choose not to lie.
I choose to not be wicked.
I choose to not seek out music today....
I choose to trump worry with worship.
I choose to not be bitter.
I choose to surrender my timeline.

I choose to believe that God will use me again. I believe it. I know it. I claim it. He has promised me that this is His plan.

Now....I need to get to work and keep working on the little things, one day at a time. It's going to be hard work, painful maybe, I am brave, I am bruised and I am who I'm meant to be...but the end result....it's going to be awesome.