AWAKEN: DAY 7

REMEMBER, YOU ARE DUST AND TO DUST YOU WILL RETURN.












SCRIPTURE READING - DAY 7

2 Corinthians 4:18

…as we look not to the things that are
seen but to the things that are unseen.

For the things that are seen are transient,
but the things that are unseen are eternal. (ESV)

MEDITATION BY Cynthe Burbidge


Transitioning from college to the working world was unexpectedly thorny—in part due to a complete change of lifestyle. My college life was one of constant motion and fluidity, where time was a commodity, and writing a 30-page paper in one night a necessity. Between studying, a part-time job, dorm life, church life, student life, and simply being with friends, somehow there was always room for learning. My life was thus driven with an incessant desire to grow, where results didn’t matter as much as the knowledge I acquired in the process.

My first full-time job in the financial industry was the exact opposite in its eight-to-five schedule that afforded strict structure, little variety, and even less opportunity for learning. The expectation was clear: I existed to produce results. Personal growth took the backseat. During this transition, I felt a decrease in the discipline of spending time with God. In college, no matter how busy I was, no matter how late I stayed up the night before, the first hour of my day was consistently committed to God. Yet, for reasons unknown to me at the time, I found the working lifestyle hedging my spiritual devotion.

Five years later, I still struggle to maintain this discipline. It often hits me around Lenten Season, during this corporate invitation to renew our spiritual lives by fasting from various “earthly” distractions. Initially, I am drawn to participate, until I realize that I should have been maintaining my walk with God all year long. What is it that now hinders my spiritual life so consistently?

Paul pens the answer in 2 Corinthians 4:18, as he instructs us to live not according to what is seen, but by the unseen, the eternal.

During college, I was daily driven by my need for God. Post-graduation,
I find myself appealing to my own strength and abilities to perform my work responsibilities. After all, I was hired because I already had the talent for the job, right?

Yet, Paul reminds us to live according to what is not seen—regardless of our circumstances. This means we need faith—and a lot of it! Faith pushes us past what our environment suggests about how to live our lives, and instead, immerses us in God’s truth and his perspective about our world. To see the eternal is to recognize that an unseen glory, which far surpasses the world we see, is approaching—and to live our lives in light of this hope.

So what does it look like to live faithfully to God in environments that discourage daily devotion? For me, the past five years of the working life have taught me to pray—for faith, and for an increasing measure of understanding how to work as an act of worship, rather than in selfish independence. To this end, I discover that my work in the Lord is thus not in vain.

REFLECTION


What is something currently distracting your attention from things of the Lord that could instead be an opportunity to focus more on him?


Identify something eternal that you can see in the midst of your current circumstances.


What does it look like for you to be more focused on things of eternity in your everyday life?