![]() ![]() Yet we often can treat faith as an item on our to-do list instead of a relationship. Although reading our bibles is pivotal, our relationship with God is not confined to the 30 minutes we spend reading our bible in the morning. However, that should not be the only time we spend with God in our day. Setting aside time to spend with God is needed. We do because we ‘have to’ not because we ‘want to.’ĭon’t confuse this with me saying routine is bad. This is where we set a routine so stringent to spend time with God that we can almost completely miss the point of it. We then for a short period of time are proactive about our faith life, winding the box waiting for God to show up in our worlds. The first is the ‘jack-in-the-box’ and the second is the ‘ticking the box.’ The jack-in-the-box is where in the busyness of life we fall into the trap of only intentionally seeking God when we need something, when bad times hit, or when we feel like God is not near. There are two distinct ways I’ve seen this happen in my own life. Our faith and relationship with God is not designed to be in a box, yet so often we put it in one. However, something that I have found is that although some things in life have their own time, place and box. It has benefited my environment, working away from my room has meant that I don't feel stressed at night when I try to go to sleep. This has been hugely beneficial in keeping me ticking along and enjoying both working during and relaxing after work. Working and living from home this year has meant that I have needed to form some sort of routine in order to keep myself sane and keep work and home life in their own separate boxes. I often wonder if the distinction of these boxes means that we feel we need to act or be different when we open one of these boxes.ĭon’t get me wrong, I think that sometimes we need these boxes. Everyone and everything seems to have a box of its own that it fits into. We have our family, our school friends, our church friends, or work friends etc. Sometimes we go even a step further and compartmentalise people in our life. Even the most disorganised of people can fall into the trap of neatly organising their life into labelled and filed away boxes. Everything we have has been put in a box of its own. We have our home life, our work life, our social life, our church life etc. We wind it when we need it and wait for it to pop and then we put it back until the next time we require it again.Ĭompartmentalising our lives is something that is rooted in the very basis of our society. ![]() What I find even more terrifying, is that sometimes we treat our faith a little like a jack-in-the-box. If you haven't seen one, let me describe it to you, it's a box that you wind and then all of a sudden a clown pops out of it. Even make a sign of the cross on your desk or steering wheel and in so doing proclaim His Holy Presence there.Do you ever look at some toys and wonder how on earth it doesn't terrify a child? For me every time I have come across a jack-in-the-box, I wonder that exact question. ![]() Furthermore, declare His presence wherever you go. Today, know that God is with you, really with you, wherever you go. He is the invisible God who inhabits the physical world He created, even becoming incarnate in Jesus. The Lord does not call us to be spiritual people who transcend and vacate the world but rather God calls us to engage the world around us. That language is similar to how we describe the Sacraments and the Church building itself. Rather, His presence was actually and physically communicated in and around that box. The Ark was more than a reminder of God’s promises and presence. Yet, in God’s grandeur, He makes Himself known in specific places and times. We do not want to forget His great actions on behalf of His people, often in the face of great resistance (Psalm 106:13, 21). Jesus walking on the water and feeding the crowds are good reminders that He can do far more than we can ask or imagine (Ephesians 3:20). God does not fit in a box He is bigger and bolder than our plans for Him. The box was the throne of God such that where it went so did the force of God’s presence. The Ark of the Covenant was a box in which were kept the tablets of the Ten Commandments. ![]()
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