Return On Investment

A couple weeks ago, I got sucked into reading this book. The book was so crazy that everything that was happening was one bad setup after another. As I kept reading, I kept telling myself, it has to get better and continued to read it.

For 2 days, I read that book, in my room, in my bed, in my pajamas. I barely did any work. I was like, eh, I’ll get an early start tomorrow and continued to read.

The next day, same song and dance. No real work done, in my bed, reading this book. I had to see something good from it or it was going to mess with my head. Before I went to bed I was like man, why am I in such a funk.

The next morning, the first thing I heard, was THE BOOK! I was like, oooohhh 😬… I knew right away that book wasn’t going to take up any more of my time and I couldn’t finish it.

A couple days later, I was on my way to my family bible study. I was asking the Lord about helping me to control my emotions. I was telling Him how I don’t want my emotions to rule my whole day or cause me to act negatively based on how I felt.

As I was sharing this, He told me that emotions are there for a reason. They’re for us to appreciate the good when the not so good happens. They are also for you to have control over, not the other way around.

He went on to share more with me, but as I was pondering on that, He says:

I’m not looking for a return on investment. I’m looking for complete surrender.

I don’t want you to think because you’ve done a good deed, you can come to Me and say, “look what I did!”

That doesn’t matter to me

What matters to me is that you trust Me

That you allow my will for your life to be done

I also need you to let go of the hurt you think you need to hold on to

It’s not your burden to bear

I will take care of that situation, you only need to trust Me

To say that broke me down is an understatement. I was not expecting it to go that far when I was just asking Him to help me to not allow my emotions to rule my day.

Emotions, be it happiness, anger, sadness are to be brought to the Lord. I oftentimes bring something that someone has shared with me to the Lord in prayer or pray with and for them. Bringing our concerns to the Lord helps us to release the weight from ourselves and allows God to do the heavy lifting.

God is much too good to me for me to think that I was ok where I was and He allowed me to see myself and to recognize that no matter what I do, He’s not keeping score.

He knows what I’m going to do before I do it in every single situation I face. No matter how I handle it, He’s going to be with me. He’s for me, and He will never let me fall.

In any case that I do happen to fall, He will definitely be with me and be there to dust me off and help me to get back on track.

Hebrews 12:1-2 says, Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.