Stuck In A Rut

I’ve always been a firm believer that if you aren’t moving forward you’re moving backward.  Actually, I believe that if you don’t move forward for a long time you can end up going backwards at a very rapid speed. 

What do I mean?  Well, take life for instance.  You move into a new home, start a new job and make new friends.  It’s all very exciting and challenging for a while but if you do it long enough it becomes an old schedule that manages to take up all your time.  Pretty soon you find yourself thinking “I’d like to do that” or “I SHOULD being doing this” or “I should STOP doing that.”  But you can’t manage to do it.  Why??

If you’re like me you probably have a million great excuses as to why you can’t make changes.  It’s easy for me living in a 3^rd world country.  I mean I have pretty valid reasons for not doing things.  Like “I don’t want to get mugged” or “That bus stop scares me” or “My Spanish isn’t good enough” or my favorite “How can I get information if they don’t have a website?!”

All of these excuses (plus more) have kept me stuck in a rut for the past few months.  And although I love where I live and what I do, I know I should be striving for more.  I mean God didn’t create us to be stagnating, going through the same motions day in and day out.  Every day should be bringing opportunities for us to make changes big or small.

Ok, well if you’re wondering, I was inspired to write this because I got out of my rut.  Yup.  Months of frustration and I got out of my rut in one day.  ONE DAY!  How you ask?  I got to the point where I realized that if I kept listening to all of my great excuses time would fly and I would be in the same spot 1 yr, 2yrs, 3yrs from now.  The ‘world changer’ I was called to be would be nothing more than a wasted dream.  So I just did it.  I was tired and nervous and thought about backing out but I didn’t.  And now I know that God was just waiting for me to take that step.

Tonight in church I couldn’t stop reading this verse:

I’m no longer calling you servants because servants don’t understand what their master is thinking and planning.  No, I’ve named you friends because I’ve let you in on everything I’ve heard from the Father.    – John 15:15

How could we ever remain motionless when we’ve been let in on the plans of God?