What Insanity Is Teaching Me About God Pt. 2

Continuing my post from yesterday.

When Insanity really amps up and its time to go harder and faster, the camera gets right up in the face of Shaun T (the instructor) and he pushes you and encourages. He says:

Keep pushing! I’m right here with you. You gotta dig deeper and keep pushing.

Shaun is really good at firing you up and encouraging the cast working out with him on the video as well as talking to those doing the video at home. But it’s just a recording. He’s not in the same room with me. I can just turn him off at anytime.

Thankfully, God is not like that. He is with us all the time.

…for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. (Deut 31:6)

And Jesus has given us our calling and promises to be with us always.

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. (Matthew 28:19-20)

While I can’t just call up Shaun T and ask him a health or workout question, I can speak to God and have direct access to the Holy Spirit to guide me in even bigger decisions. That’s huge! Think about it: a follower of Christ has direct access to God’s wisdom through the Holy Spirit. He’s always available to give the answers we need.

And while Shaun T can’t do the workouts for us, there are times when God has to do the work for us because we physically cannot. He wants us to do that.

Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. (1 Peter 5:6-7)

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:29-30)

That’s amazing to me that God wants us to give the burden, the stress, the tough times, the demanding times to Him and let Him take care of it for us. As much as a fitness instructor wants to push us to be stronger and get better, our results depend on how much we put into it. In our Christian walk, much of what happens depends on how much we give to God and allow Him to work.

When I workout, I need to go harder for better results. All the faith in the world will not make my heart get stronger, keep me from gaining weight or make my strength increase. That won’t happen without work.

But in following Christ, I’m learning I need to do less and let God do more. Greater faith will open doors for God to do greater things.

And without faith it is impossible to please God… (Hebrews 11:6)

So maybe you’re feeling like there’s something impossible for you today. Maybe you feel like quitting. Maybe you feel all alone. God wants you to know that it’s in these times that you need to put the weight on Him and allow Him to carry it for you.

It’s through our weakness that He really works. Paul writes:

But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

 

What Insanity Is Teaching Me About God – Pt. 1

I’m in my fourth week of the Insanity workout. Man, is it a killer! Whoever named it named it correctly. I’ve never worked out like this before. It’s a killer 40 minutes of cardio and it’s still just as tough as the first week but I can feel my body is able to push a little more…just a little more.

During today’s workout, I heard Shaun T say something I haven’t caught the other times I did this particular workout.

“I’m not trying to hurt you. Just trying to make you better.”

Right there in the middle of working out, I felt like the Holy Spirit was telling me: that’s exactly God’s plan for us. When the tough times come, God’s not trying to hurt us, He just wants to make us stronger. In the book of James it says:

Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. (James 1:2-3)

James says it: testing your faith produces perseverance. Perseverance is “enduring in the face of obstacles, discouragement, or difficulties”. In these four weeks of Insanity so far, I’ve felt like quiting. Honestly, almost daily I have to make myself get out of bed at 5:30am to workout. And in the middle, when I’m tired and sweating, I ask myself: “why do I do this to myself?” But once I do workout, I feel so much better afterwards because I was pushed to my limits and stretched my physical abilities.

I feel the same way through a trial. I want to quit. I ask: “why me?”. I get discouraged. Sometimes it’s tough to face another day because you just know what’s coming. But once you get through it and see how God worked, I can see the benefits or what God taught me through it. He pushes me to my limits and stretches my faith. And while it doesn’t insulate us from the next trial, it does give us a little boost to get through it.

So today, God wants you to know, no matter your circumstances – He’s not trying to hurt you, He’s just trying to make you stronger.

Part 2 tomorrow

GPS

GPS

The DVR changed the way I watch television. I watch more TV than before thanks to DVR. I set it and forget it. In the same vein, the GPS has changed the way I travel. I’m in D.C. this week for a conference, and I no longer have to write down or print out driving directions. I can just turn on my GPS, link up to some satellites, and plug in an address and it will direct me to there. I go many more places now because I know it will always direct me right back to home. I’ve heard people refer to the God or the Bible as a roadmap or GPS for our life. There are some similarities that I can see in that metaphor: