Praying in true repentance

Lately I've noticed that I rarely recognise and truly repent of my sins. If I am to be truly honest, I have a pretty poor perception of how sinful I really am. Often my sins are not overtly noticeable to others - I sneakily make sure that my actions seem pure on the outside - so it's easier to get away with it. Often I can't even see them in myself! But at the heart level, my motives can be so repulsive to God. And to be honest, I rarely acknowledge this.

We are so frequently told that Jesus died once for all of our sins - which is true - but I think this allows me to settle into a level of complacency that is unhelpful, if not destructive. When was the last time you actively sat down and listed your sins to God? Sins of omission, or commission, of actions, of thoughts, and of motives? While Jesus has died and risen in our place, paying the penalty we should have paid for our sinfulness, we still need to be repenting daily in order to grow in righteousness and to develop a deeper and richer relationship with the Lord.

So even though it's not as attractive as praying in thanks, praise, and petition, we should not neglect the important step of confession as we fall at our Heavenly Father's feet. Perhaps the best place to start is by asking the Spirit to reveal the repulsive things in us that we can't necessarily see.

Healthy desire vs. pure idolatry

Something that my husband is well aware of is that I have a particularly strong (and growing) desire to have children. I have always loved kids – their curiosity, their joy, their unconditional love, and just how darn cute they  are! I’ve babysat a lot of kids over the years, and it would be so special one day to be able to raise our kids the way Marty and I want to, instilling our own Christian values in them (something I can’t do with other peoples’ kids). And with several of my close friends starting to have babies, the ‘cluckiness’ just keeps intensifying! (Mum and Dad, don’t get excited, I’m not pregnant. Just wanted to clear that up!)

But this has caused me to question lately, at what point does a desire become idolatry? Modern idols are not carved out of wood or stone – they can be anything… food, sport, success, career, social acceptance, a spouse, a house… They can be something inherently good, but if we choose to put them in the place of God in our hearts, that’s when they are transformed from a desire to a coveted object/idea. (That’s the conclusion I’ve come to anyway). But it can be so difficult to read your own heart sometimes and distinguish where your heart is on that spectrum. Perhaps a good way of gauging it is by asking “what do I spend most of my daydreaming thinking about?”. If it’s the thing you desire, then it’s probably time to re-prioritise and to start praying for God to give you a renewed hunger for Him and for His Word.

I’m still considering whether or not children are an idol for me, but I know that either way I need to be on guard, because Satan is prowling around like a roaring lion, and will try to use anything he can to twist my heart and my priorities away from God. Even if it isn’t, he will try to tempt me with something else in the future and I need to be ready, clothed with the armour of God