When your faith is boring...

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"Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers." Galatians 6:9-10

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I get in a rut. Life is going good and bad at the same time and I can’t seem to pick an emotion. And sometimes this monotone feeling spills into my faith life. My time with Jesus can sometimes be on autopilot and my prayers become almost as bad as the cop-out prayers you do when you’re 10 years old and someone asks you to pray:

“Dear Lord, thank you for this day, please help the soldiers in Iraq. Amen.”

For the graduating seniors out there, maybe you are stoked to graduate, but also petrified to graduate.

For the parents of those seniors, maybe you’re stoked for your kid to graduate, but petrified for your kid to come back home.

For those who work, maybe your job is going great, and because of that, your faith has been put on the back burner.

For those in high school, maybe you have the dream boyfriend or girlfriend, and that’s all that matters right now because you’re convinced they’re “the one”, and you’ll be moving to Tuscany together soon where you won’t need faith, only each others love…

Or maybe you’re none of these, and you’re just unsure where you stand in your faith. But you know that in order for your faith to develop, you have to let go of some of your own beliefs and ways of life, therefore you’re trying to hold onto both your beliefs and a belief in God, leaving you in a bit of limbo with a false representation of God.

There are a million ways we can let our faith grow stale, boring even. But God did not intend for our faith to be boring. He intended our faith to be a relationship based on the most intense and passionate love ever to exist.

So when our faith seems boring, what do we do?

Here are 3 ways we can rejuvenate our faith in order to live our lives in the passionate loving arms of Jesus:

1. Serve someone else:

“Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms.”

1 Peter 4:10

Whether it’s praying for someone, serving at your local soup kitchen, or helping a family member move, drive your passion for Jesus into the life of someone who needs it. Your feeling of monotony may be Jesus telling you your faith is strong and therefore ready to impact the lives of others. Our purpose in Jesus is to serve the children and the widowed. Let’s do it!

2. Raise your sword:

“Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”

Ephesians 6:17

Get passionate about something! Our faith is a weapon, let us use it to fight evil. Find an organization or issue in the world that you want to make a difference in. God may call you to do something or go somewhere you never even dreamed of! Expand your faith and go to battle.

3. Write it down:

Jesus spoke to God multiple times. His conversations with God were crucial in order for him to be able to follow his God's will.

“After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone.”

Mathew 14:23

“One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God.”

Luke 6:12

Begin writing down your conversations with God. Your prayers, a list of things your thankful for, even your plan for the day, can all me surrendered to God. And when you write it down, it becomes a tangible conversation, like a text message. And when God speaks to you, write it down. Writing our prayers down can sometimes help us focus on talking to God rather than letting our minds wonder during our conversations with Him. Writing down prayers also allows us to see when he answers them! After a while you may have quite a journal full of prayers and answers to look back on. This can be a reassuring tool when your faith is shaken.

I pray you encounter Jesus today in a new way. Whether your faith seems stale or strong, Jesus is here.

The state of our faith is not an indication of Jesus' presence; it is an indication of our devotion.

Let’s devote ourselves to Jesus today, and express our love for him in new ways!