There are many aspects to writing books. One of the final stages—besides publishing and marketing—is formatting the book. This can be one of the most tedious, laborious, frustrating and time-consuming aspects of writing. Trying to transfer a huge word document into publishing software creates havoc on almost every page of the book.
Also, books in our current generation can’t just be words on a page. There needs to be pretty, little details at the start of the book and the beginning of every chapter. Some books even add details to every page! Having to add these details is also very tedious work. You have to really know your word processor in order to fully use the tools available to you. And once you figure out the best way to format your book, you have to go through each page many times over until everything is perfect.
On one particular day, I was formatting a collection of faith essays. I was adding details to the beginning of each chapter, and the process seemed slow and boring. However, after a few clicks, I felt like I was getting into a groove. It was almost like the word processor was reading my thoughts and was anticipating what I needed. But I knew that wasn’t the case. The word processor is unchanging. It was I who had finally adapted myself to the word processor, which created a beautiful, consistent flow to the formatting process.
The same goes with our lives of faith. God is perfect and unchanging. Though His movements morph to each generation, person and situation, He Himself is always perfect and holy. The struggle we face begins when we try to adjust our lives to Him. Our imperfection collides with His perfection, and we go through growing pains—a shaping of our character into the image of Jesus.
We finally feel a smooth flow in our lives, not when He has changed, but, rather, when we ourselves have changed, submitting to His will and standard. The struggle is real and difficult, and we may want to give up; but if we keep working at it, we will find a flow in our unity with God. When this happens, God is able to do so much more in our lives than we ever thought possible. We just need to get into His groove and hang on for the wild ride!
Memory Verse:
“For I the Lord do not change…”
– Malachi 3:6 (ESV)
Prayer Prompt:
“Father, help me to get in sync with You and Your will for my life. I’m tired of being frustrated, and I want to know You more so I can do more for Your Kingdom. I know the struggle is part of the process, so I pray that the Holy Spirit gives me divine understanding today…”
Contributing Writer:
Alisa Wagner
Faith Imagined.com
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