Oh, the disease, you ask?<\/p>\n
Well, it\u2019s one that I have sung about in an old hymn on many occasions. You’re probably familiar with its words,<\/p>\n
Turn your eyes upon Jesus\u2026and the things of earth will grow strangely dim,<\/em><\/p>\n As I sung this in the past, I knew the concept told in the song should be true, theoretically Jesus outshines this world, but tonight I have recognized that to some degree the things of earth had grown strangely dim to me. I haven\u2019t intentionally sought this, just somewhere along the way, things I once prized have grown dim, and it has me up late tonight.<\/p>\n Now I should be cheering for these symptoms point to what should be a spiritual accomplishment, but seems more like a debilitating sickness. You may look at the symptoms in your heart the same way.<\/p>\n It\u2019s troubling, for due to a life change, my family doesn\u2019t have our own home (we\u2019re living with family while I launch a new ministry and write a book), we do not have guaranteed income, my wife who once was able to stay home with our children is no longer able to do so, and the road to some level of stability seems insurmountable; and, what’s weird is that I\u2019m totally fine with it.<\/p>\n We do need our own place, I need to provide security for my wife, but honestly, I could care less about looking at homes. This is crazy because usually my list of wants is a mile high. I actually just got sickened watching a couple hours of HGTV (and i usually like it). Hundreds of thousands of dollars were spent on one house for a family of four and multiple millions was spent on a home for a family of two, while in Somali 110 people died from starvation in the last 48 hours. And we see kids regularly in our school district who have only a couple pair of clothes, and their school lunch is their only meal that day.<\/p>\n I need to be interested though \u2014 we need a family home. I need to be scrambling to make money, but I\u2019m frozen \u2013 consumed by the hope that others would see the greatness of God and a life with Him through my less than lucrative ministry.<\/p>\n There have been symptoms of this dim world thing, but I hadn\u2019t put it all together. Symptoms like that I how that love to hunt and fish, and always have felt I needed the best equipment. Yet, now I don\u2019t even want to flip through a Cabelas catalog or walk through Bass Pro Shops. I had this long bucket list of things I wanted to accomplish in life, but they have begun to feel irrelevant.<\/p>\n Again, this should be a spiritual victory \u2014 I\u2019m sure I\u2019ve preached that we all need to view life like this. But here I am up late upset that I\u2019m not upset about not having certain things. I\u2019m worried because I am not going to be able to survive in America with this \u201cdisease\u201d. My wife isn\u2019t gonna have the things I feel she deserves and I want to provide. I\u2019m gonna turn my kids into weridos. I\u2019m gonna screw them up. I must find a way to get my head out of the Jesus clouds and face reality, but when I think of the vastness of the eternity ahead it seems so foolish to store up things here (not to mention biblical).<\/p>\n I have been very reluctant to post this because I know it sounds like I\u2019m tooting my own horn, but listen \u2014 I\u2019m crap. I sin. I fail. I disobey God. I might wake up in the morning and start back coveting that cool black jeep for sale down the road or develop a major desire for a bass boat. But the reality behind that old hymn has happened to some degree in my life and it really it should in every Christian, but when it does America becomes a tough place to live. Our dim world mindset fits more with third world countries. This tension has pushed me to not embrace this “dim things of the world” outlook on life, and that may be the same for you.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/Frustrated_man_at_a_desk_cropped-300x253.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/flashlight-629668_960_720-300x225.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/51DBhk03hIL-200x300.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n