Our God is an awesome God!!

"I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate to do I do."                                                                                                                                                               -Romans  7:15

Have you ever had a goal that seems to end unsuccessful, or a desire to better yourself, only to find that you willingly commit acts that result in your own failure? There are definitely a few things on my agenda that keep getting moved forward thanks to my "never give up" attitude. One goal of mine in particular is my deep desire to read the word of God. Not only read it but to apply it and share it with my children and all those that I love. Why wouldn't I not want to share something so wonderful with the people I love. 

We can also relate to this aspect in terms of New Years resolutions and some examples might include a decision to start going to church, spending more time with our children, losing weight, eating healthy, drinking more water, quitting a bad habit, etc. According to Wiki, "A New Year's resolution is a secular tradition, most common in the Western Hemisphere but also found in the Eastern Hemisphere, in which a person makes a promise to do an act of self-improvement or something slightly nice, such as opening doors for people beginning fromNew Years Day," and New Years resolutions are dated way back in history to the babylonians and the medieval era.

Goals, resolutions, dreams, desires, hopes and self improvements are things that we all, hopefully, want to accomplish successfully. Not attaining our wants is becoming highly accepted more and more. Our society is becoming desensitized to humanity because of media and worldly influences. I fear I am witnessing our upcoming generations losing sight of our wonderful God. Parents are no longer sharing the word of God with their children and they grow up not knowing the greatness that awaits them. I myself am guilty of not being as diligent as I would love to be, but the point of these thoughts is not to condemn you, judge you or make you feel like an inadequate person. The point is to inspire you to do it anyway, even if you fail because failing at something you love is way more easier to swallow than never trying at all. The truth is that it is in human nature to sin, and we all need to continue to place hope in ourselves.

To hope is to patiently await for that which one does not have,...

"I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate to do I do." (Romans 7:15) As I was reading the book of Romans with my two children the other day we happened to stop on this verse and talk about what it means to us. My 11 year old looked completely confused as we read the contents of our love letter (bible) from God.  So my daughter,15, explained in terms of candy, "so say you are wanting to be healthy and you know candy is bad for you and unhealthy. You love candy though and you choose to eat the candy, even though you know it is bad for you. You do not understand why you do this and that is the sinful nature of man." I was happy to hear her input, and more happy to see that her brother understood as well.

I also added another example of a real life scenario that I personally do not understand, that I hate to do but I still do and that is mommy yelling. Even though she hates to yell at you kids, mommy sometimes does it anyway and this makes mommy sad. It makes you kids sad too! But mommy loves you and God loves you too! Mommy is not perfect because it is written also that not one man is perfect except Jesus Christ. I think that helped him see that this verse can relate to many situations in your life. God's word is our manual for life and the only way to truly benefit from reading is also applying it.
My children and I are also reading at least 2-3 Chapters a day, but some days we don't make the time. I was sitting here thinking how I have it written in my agenda to read with them and I decide to read the chapters anyway, even if it is by myself. As I rush through the word, thinking how I am going to  reread this tomorrow with the kids anyway I apologize to God afterward and I sit and recall Romans 7:15. My reading the bible is truly something I want to do, yet countless times I neglect to follow through with this desire.
It was as if a light switched on and I felt compelled to write this in blog. so hopefully if you are having a struggle to open your bibles, you can see that it's a special time to spend with our father. What a blessing we have at the tip of our fingertips. I don't know about you, but I see loads of people searching for blessings out in the world. Yet our truest blessing is not to be found because it is right there, offered as a gift. In a world full of sin, with times ever changing, the only thing in life that doesn't change is God. Even if we don't deserve such a blessing, our God is gracious and His love is never-ending and unchanging. 

Prayer is the key to communication, like a personal email to God. He knows even before we ask and he is eager and willing to give us anything we ask. What a wonderful God!