regeneration

Destiny is very important to me. Knowing that I am in God’s will for my life is something that I would not trade anything for–it’s vital to me. No matter what value people assign to me or my actions, knowing that I have the backing of Heaven–knowing God’s Spirit is at work within and around me, knowing that I am following His will for my life-that’s what’s important to me, and anything that distracts me from His will or His purpose has to go by the wayside. I’m a Christian, a husband, a father, and I have a calling on my life.

I find myself continually checking my motives any time I pursue something new. I am a ‘pursuer’. I have to be going after something. God said in the Bible, ‘without vision My people perish’. My interpretation of that: ‘without some place to go, without something to do that’s within God’s will, you’re never going to be fulfilled, you’re never going to be happy, and you’re always going to be spinning your wheels with a dead, empty feeling inside. But once you hook up with God’s purpose for your life, once He directs you to the right path, once you know that you know that you know that you are in the center of God’s will, then you are truly alive.’ That’s a wordy explanation, but that’s what I see in the verse.

I am not learning Japanese so I can impress everyone with my ‘l33t nihongo skillz’. I am not learning it because this is the next obsession in my life–though I do continually check my motives in prayer every day to make sure! I continue because I sense destiny here. I sense a purpose far beyond myself. I do not know all the details. It doesn’t always make sense–we have no concrete plans to visit or move to Japan, for example. Yet deep within me, I know that this is God’s will for my life. I know that God is involved here. So I continue, and I know that I do so with God’s strength and anointing on it.

Distractions fade away when you lock on to your purpose. I’m more focused. When I’m home, I’m home–I play with the girls and try to focus on them and talk with my wife. When I make time to study Japanese, I study kanji, hiragana, or what have you–and nothing else. When I’m at work, I devote that time to work that my employer demands, and any time that’s left over goes to my studies. Life is becoming clearer and more focused. Stresses and worries fade away–the nagging dilemmas of financial struggle that I can’t do anything about, I can just shrug off, because I know that we have done all we can do. I’m going to focus on what I know God wants me to do, and let Him handle the rest.

The time is short. We only have so many hours, days, weeks, months, and years to spend here before passing on. If we don’t hook up with God’s purpose for our lives, we walk around as the living dead–our hearts are beating, but our souls are dead within. I don’t know exactly why I’m learning Japanese, other than I know that besides the fact that I’ve always wanted to learn the language and I’m fascinated with the people and culture, other than that interest, I sense destiny on it, and I’m going to ‘follow the cloud’ and listen to God.

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