Alarm Clocks....*sigh*

I don't think their exists in time a more annoying sound than that of my alarm clock. What is interesting is the sound itself could be a song, a beep, an obnoxious explosion, regardless of the noise, it woke me up and I wish the machine which made the noise would die. Serioulsy am I the only one that hates waking up in the morning? I mean, it isn't so much I hate my life (quite the opposite), as much as it is I hate waking up.

The alarm clock reminds me I can't sit in tranquil sleep all day, it reminds me I have things to tend to, it reminds me I'm not in heaven yet, needless to say, it tells me a lot of things I wish I could sleep through.

Alarm clocks aren't limited to just waking up though, sometimes it makes or breaks that meal you have slaved hours over, or it determines how punctual you want to be to an event. Though not always friendly, alarm clocks serve the purpose of reminding us we need to do something.

Job 1:20 Then Job arose, tore his robe, and shaved his head; and he fell to the ground and worshiped.

Something struck me about this verse as I read it. Job's alarm clock went off. It was time to get to work. What do I mean? Well recall that earlier in the chapter in what seemed to be seconds, Job lost everything to his name with the exception of his health (which he would lose not 5 verses later). Job's response is something I can't honestly say I would do, in fact for me, I may have a fist pumping moment at God and say "What the..?!?!" but not Job, though there was plenty of agony and confusion to be felt, that didn't in any way stop him from doing what he knew had to be done.

So what about you? What do you do when your alarm clock goes off? You know, the one that goes off when some random thought comes into your head and now you decide whether or not you want to dwell on it, or the one that goes off when you are unsure of what to do next, or how about the one that goes off when you don't hear anything from God in response? All of us have built into us alarm clocks. They remind us when it is time to seek His face. They have names like worry, fear, doubt, discouragement, anxiety, nostalgia, guilt, shame, self-condemnation, unforgiveness and so on. What some of us tend to do is exactly what we do every morning when we wake up, we hit snooze. Rather than respond to these alarms the way we are supposed to, we hit snooze and just ignore them, only to find that when it is time to act, we don't have enough time or confidence and then we end up losing or missing out on something huge.

Everyone worries, everyone fears, everyone has their doubts. It is normal, just don't sit there. Take action. If God has spoken, then your response should be to bring those things to light and claim those promises. Claim grace, claim peace, claim redemption. Don't let these things just remain as concepts in your mind, concepts are easily manipulated, make them realities. Live based on them, don't just think about them. Grace is a beautiful thing, however, if I leave that sitting in my head, I can easily excuse or explain away certain things and end up missing out due to what I call "analysis paralysis".

Understand something, God is constant, and His love abounds more than you and I can think or imagine. In those moments where you feel dry, or you feel as though your losing it, remember this: He will never leave you nor forsake you.
"Oh ye of little faith, why did you doubt?" Mark 4:40. How many times does He have to ask us that before we start getting it? When are we going to begin living by faith and not sight? (2 Cor 5:7).

God's command to us when we get these ways is this: Take every though captive (2 Cor 10:5). In Psalm 34, we get a beautiful picture of what happens when we continue seeking Him despite all of the above mentioned feelings,

Psalm 34:4 I sought the LORD, and He heard me, And delivered me from all my fears.

I like that it almost personifies fears. It is almost as if fears is a person from whom we can be delivered so long as we allow there to be only one type of fear in our lives, the fear of the Lord (Prov 1:7).

So the next time your alarm goes off, stop what your doing and respond to it, "Arise you who are asleep..." and pray.