How Can I Be Always Vibrant and Inspired?

Sometimes the effort of living feels too hard. We try and  we  feel like we fail. We start our day with a vision for how life should look and it still turns out all wrong. We work our hearts out doing nice things for others but they forget to notice, now we feel used. I’ve had enough of this so what’s the key to getting it right?

A tree without leaves (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Brother Lawrence was a monk who is known to us today because of his unusual life quest. It shouldn’t be such a novel idea to us but the realities of life today and our habit of going for the easy way make his quest stand out to us. He attempted to live his life in continual awareness of the presence of God. At the ripe old age of eighteen he was standing looking at a tree. We have no idea why he did that but as he stared he got a sudden insight. The tree had lost its leaves and looked like it was dead and lifeless, but he realized that he knew something important: the tree would stay that way for a while then grow new leaves and produce fruit. Maybe the present day version of that would be he was standing outside a closed supermarket and realized it would not stay closed forever: next day it will re-open and its shelves will be re-stocked. It’s a miracle! Now before you get under-awed by this insight, we have to take it a step further. Seeing the tree and knowing that its life would return in the spring reminded him that seen or unseen, the life continued. In the same way, God’s power and providence will never leave him. Next step: he could be conscious of God’s presence and talk with him throughout each day through all that each day brought to him. Conclusion: we must give ourselves totally to God in all of life, placing our focus on doing his will, choosing to never “leave him” even as he never leaves us.

Flowers, leaves and trunk of a Pyrus communes tree spring to life again (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

As long as the earth endures,

seed-time and harvest,

cold and heat,

summer and winter,

day and night,

will never cease.

– Genesis 8

For by him (Christ) all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers of authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things and in him all things hold together.

– Colossians 1

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble, or hardship or . . . (drop in here whatever thing you would consider to be “most personally shattering”) . . No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all of creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

– Romans 8

It’s not the crises of life which separate us from God, it’s the mundane routine of every day that distracts us from seeing him and from being aware of what he is doing. Our tendency is to forget about the God who never forgets about us. Our consciousness of God’s presence with us is a transforming power in our lives.

The Brother Lawrence challenge: could I go through an entire day without forgetting God is with me?

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