Lost in a Sea of Drawers- The God-Box Complex

All right, so I genuinely should be doing so many other things rather than write this blog, but here I am writing it anyway. Who needs sleep?

I’ve been sitting in my dimly lit dining room for a while now contemplating life and avoiding my work and realized that I’ve been avoiding much more than just writing a paper on my personal growth this semester. It’s the week before finals week, and like so many college students, I am having hourly conniptions and moments where I feel as though my heart and head are going to simultaneously implode because normal human beings aren’t supposed to be able to handle this much pressure.  And to top that all off, I sound like a forty year old smoker with this beautiful cough that causes my skull to feel like tiny men with hammers are hitting me. Honestly, this is clearly the perfect time to feel like shit. But hey, sometimes life happens. And somewhere along the line of stress and pressure and school and people, I decided that it was a worthy excuse to push God aside and right onto that overused backburner and give in to worry and mistrust. I mean seriously, what the hell? It goes so much deeper than school. I am trying to fit God into my life, very feebly I might add, and I somehow believe that I’m entitled to be upset that it doesn’t seem to be working.

When I think about all the different aspects of my life, it reminds me of that episode of Spongebob where his brain is portrayed as being run by a bunch of mini Spongebobs who organize thoughts and knowledge in little file cabinets for easy access. I like to divvy up my life into different sections and compartments. My life looks like a giant dresser filled with a slue of all different sized drawers each with a pristine label. It’s kind of funny how I’m one big contradiction: I’m a disorganized perfectionist. I should be the poster girl for those Starburst commercials. But, anyways, my chaotic dresser is filled with my life. One drawer would be labeled “Friendships” another  “School” another “Anxieties”, and the list goes on and on-“Boyfriend”, “Hopes and Dreams”, “Young life”, “Quiet times”, “Verses I know”, “Verses I want to know”, “Future”, “Past”, “Sin “, “God", etc.

Each drawer is a different size containing different tidbits of what make up my life. As I mentioned, my God is one of my drawers. It’s a very big drawer. I mean, God is so big, so I wanted to give Him room. But  I could only do so much. Because my dresser, my life, has lots of different things I want. As long as God’s drawer is the biggest, everything else will be fine. You see, quite frequently, I open the God drawer. I clearly see how every other aspect of my contorted life is so incredibly messy and broken and I just want it to be perfect and nice and neat. So I open the God drawer, my God-box in an attempt to move Him into the other compartments of my life. But as I look inside it is nothing more than a dusty, old, barren drawer that, quite frankly, is a waste of space.

            Don’t misunderstand me. God has not left me. No, that’s my job. His is to be my perfect heavenly Father who continually shows me grace and love despite my disobedience and stupidity. Never once did He ask to be a part of my life. No, God is the “Go big or go home” type of guy: God did not send His Son to live and suffer and die in my place to become ‘a part’ of my life. He wants the whole damn thing. God isn’t in my drawer because He can’t fit. He wants to be the whole dresser. My God and my life should be much more synonymous than they are in the reality in which I live.

I have realized how so often, I compartmentalize my Savior and attempt to make Him much smaller and less important than He is. I find one overwhelming drawer of my life and attempt to force and push my God inside to make it all better. It’s in these times that I take my eyes off of Jesus and instead try to make Him make sense in my life, not make sense of my life. But I’m all turned around and confused. Jesus wants to be my life, not a part of it! My God is a jealous God, and He does not only want to come first- He wants to come and be everything. Instead, I try to make him my ‘god of relationships’ or ‘god of school’ or ‘god of future’. But God isn’t the idols I turn to or the drawer I gave Him. God is God of my life. He is the same God yesterday, today, and forever. He is Lord. He wants to bring all of me into all of Him. I'm so awkward. I constantly try to make God fit me like He’s a piece of the puzzle. I try to customize Him like some art project. But He’s so big. Like huge and ginormous and awesome and, holy heck SO GIANT- He doesn’t fit me. He overwhelms and envelopes me and asks to be my All in All.

It’s high time I stop trying to create a pocket-sized God to fit into my agenda, and instead live inside my living and loving God who desires to be Lord of my life.

The reason I’m writing this is because I’ve been lost in my sea of drawers recently. “Remain in me and I will remain in you; apart from Me, you can do nothing”- this is the whole point of John 15. In fact, it is one of the main points of the entire Bible. Remain means to continue to exist, to endure, to last, to live on. We are supposed to live on in Christ and He will most certainly continue to exist in us. Apart from that truth, we are nothing, we are dead. I haven’t been remaining in contentment these past few weeks. I have allowed my compartmentalizing to open my ‘Anxieties’ drawer and wreck havoc in my brain. I have shown a misplaced trust in the things and people of my life and honestly, a misplaced faith in myself. When have I ever proved to myself that I can trust me? Look, I already sound insane. I need God. I have been feeling that pressing, parched need and thirst. I’ve been forgetting my Savior. I’ve forgotten just how very big He is. I’ve forgotten that He is greater than my anxieties, more loving than this world, more important than school, more trustworthy than my friendships, more satisfying than my relationship, more together than my brokenness. He. Is. More. More than any idol I stupidly put my faith in, more than my unfaithfulness, more than this world or Me. He’s everything. Man, I wish I had a better memory and a faithful heart. #humanprobz

“Set your eyes on things above, not on earthly things!”- Colossians 3:2

In my attempt at living life with my puny god on the backburner, I have not been seeking truth in His beautiful words. But by His grace, He impressed this upon my heart tonight:

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the door-frames of your houses and on your gates.”-Deuteronomy 6:4-9

God is life. I desire to talk about Him always, to learn more about my Joy and Hope and Grace, to dance and sing His praises, to suffer and struggle and persevere in the glorious name of Jesus, to be Loved recklessly by my Creator and to Love Him with every ounce of all that I am, however great or small that may be. During these last two weeks of school, don’t forget Him as I have. Don’t push Him aside to focus on your present pressing matters. Don’t allow your hearts and souls to be ruled by the fear of anything in and of this world. Look up. Trust Him. And know Him better.

Don’t give God a drawer in your dresser. Don’t make him a file in your cabinet or a space on your shelf. You will not find life unless you live in the wardrobe. You’ll find life in the Narnia waiting inside.