Anything but God

Today I just want to share a piece of my heart with you. I’ll try to make it short, but stick with me. In the past few days I’ve been talking with a couple friends about music. I’ve talked to many and I had the idea when I was in middle and high school that what I listened to didn’t really affect me. And I wasn’t talking about the difference between secular and Christian music, but I was talking about the difference between a song that leaves you feeling depressed and a song that makes you excited about life and following after God. I used to listen to music when I was angry that allowed me to stay angry instead of dealing with my problems. But I’ve realized that putting on some worship music or turning to the Lord helps things so much more than ignoring them.

I realized something in talking with one of my friends though. While I don’t want to listen to music that’s going to leave me feeling down, it’s far more than that. Everyone has their thing. There is almost the idea of, “I’ll run to anything and anyone but God first, and then I’ll go to Him if nothing else works.” When we get stressed out or upset, we all have our thing that we want to turn to. For some it’s food, for some it’s music, for some it’s a smoke here and there, for some it’s drinking, for some it’s coffee. Some people run to a friend, boyfriend, girlfriend, pastor, or parent (which aren’t necessarily bad). But when these things become our release of pain and stress before God, it’s not a good place to be. Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for having good relationships withe friends and family. But people can fail you in one way or another. The only thing that remains constant is the Lord. So my challenge is that we take a look at our lives and ask what we’re putting before the Lord and what we’re using to release our stress instead of running to Him. Be open to anything He might be showing you and see what happens when you put Him first.