For awhile now, I have been thinking about this - how do we respond to God. You see, our baptism is just a sprinkling of H2O and a nice presentation if we don't ACT on the Spirit that moves within us. Our life as a Christian - going to church and serving on committees - is just a facade if we don't ACT on the commandments that God speaks to us. You see, our faith is only a RELIGION - a SET of disciplinary rituals or a set of customs UNLESS we ACT.
In The Lorax we find a stone with the word "Unless" and at the end we find out it means that unless someone cares or more precisely, acts on those cares. And that is true about our faith...for it doesn't become faith unless we actually act on God's call...unless we respond to God.
We can go to church on Sunday morning and still not be following God; but the same is true that we may think we are following God and find ourselves no where on Sunday mornings. We need to respond to the Spirit that is flowing within us and the God who is calling us by name to follow - to understand - to believe and more importantly to ACT.
Action however, is not self-righteous or stem from our own motives. Action does not mean that we follow our wills but that we listen for Gods. Acting and responding to God's call is about trust! Trusting in something bigger then ourselves, grandeur then our imagination and more knowing then our own eyes.
And that is where it becomes difficult to respond to God - for you see it is difficult to trust God. Let us face it, we as people (as humans) don't trust ourselves much let alone other people. We are always second guessing others and being suspicious of their own behavior - why? Because we know what we, ourselves, are capable of and we don't expect better from anyone else. But God calls us to live better, to be better and more importantly God expects better from us.
So, let us respond to God in our daily lives - knowing that God is our cheerleader, God is on our side and that God is waiting for us to in our faith respond.
