Most of us think we would be happy if only we could live our lives just as we have planned.  Some people make lists:  Get up early.  Exercise.  Eat a healthy breakfast.  After perfectly executing the above items, (after all how hard is it right?),  we would then kiss our perfect spouse (who is never grumpy) goodbye and walk out the front door of our perfect house, jump into our dream car and pull out of the drive way with plenty of time to arrive to our dream job early.  Traffic and stop lights would either be non-existent or the stop lights would turn green before you began to slow down for them and the snarls of traffic would magically disappear before your eyes.

Most people think if only they could live according to their plan their lives would be perfect and they would then have peace, joy and love in abundance in their life.   But, most of us just never seem to be able to pull it off.  Even the seemingly easy stuff like getting up early and exercising seems to elude the general population.  So what is the formula for acquiring  peace, joy and love in your life?  First of all you have to get rid of disharmony, sadness, and indifference.  It seems though that while so many people want peace, joy and love they aren’t really willing to actually accept them.  Picture a grumpy husband in the morning.  What can he expect in return from his wife?  Generally more grumpiness.  For most of us it is too hard to exchange the grumpiness for cheerfulness. 

Pray for God to create you into a new person.  As he raises you up out of the mud and wipes the dust from your eyes that you may see clearly with new eye sight.  Pray for a new heart to beat with the pureness of God’s love, kindness and thoughtfulness for others.  Because without God’s love, without kindness and thoughtfulness for others, we will never be able to experience God’s peace, joy and love in our lives.  God’s peace, love and joy are only created by living the life He created for us rather than selfishly living the life we have created for ourselves.

I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.  For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.  Philippians 4:13,14

This morning I texted Colby and asked him if he had received the box I sent him last week.  He texted back an affirmative and we sent a few more texts back and forth.  All of a sudden my usually docile and co-operative phone went crazy.  It sent Colby a couple of random undecipherable texts and bounced back and forth between various things I had not clicked on.  Finally I managed to turn the phone off.  When I turned the phone back on I didn’t notice that it had turned the airplane mode on.

Brett and I had a couple of errands we wanted to run this morning so he asked me to text him when Aspen and I were ready to go.  About mid-morning I texted him not realizing he didn’t receive it because of the air plane mode.  I didn’t hear back from him, but I knew he was busy preparing for a barn party this weekend.  About an hour later he came home and asked if my phone was turned off because he had tried to call and text and I hadn’t responded.  I checked my phone, saw it was in airplane mode and turned it off.  Immediately he received my text and I received his message.

How many times do I not hear what God has to say to me because I am in my own personal airplane mode.  Unwilling and seemingly unable to receive messages from God because of my self-absorption and unwillingness to turn myself off.  If I live a self-absorbed life I don’t think about God as able to help me, willing to walk with me and talk with me.  I just think about how I am going to do everything.  I become like the phone on airplane mode, an entity unto self, unable to send or receive messages to and from God.

In Psalm 51 David prayed a prayer I should consider praying more often.  First he asks God to create in him a pure heart.  David realizes that only God can create a pure heart, he can not do it himself.  Next he asks God to renew a steadfast spirit within him.  He wants to continually live with God in his purified heart, not constantly go back and forth and up and down in his relationship with God.  Finally he asks for a willing spirit.  Willing for what?  Whatever God wants to say or do in his life.  A willing heart, the switch that brings us out of “airplane mode” and into action.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.  Psalm 51:17