Doing Him Good All The Days Of My Life...

I have been thinking about the verse in Proverbs 31:12 “She does him good, not harm, all the days of her life.” It’s true that this verse is speaking about the Proverbs 31 woman’s husband, but I think it can apply to our relationship with God as well. It says she does him good “all” the days of her life, not just the days after she got married. This includes past, present and future days. So, that of course led me to question if I am doing God good with the way I am living my life? Am I redeeming the time He has given me and living purposefully? Am I preparing myself for what the Lord may have for me in the future or am I selfishly just floating along waiting for what I think will be the next best thing? Ten years from now would I be able to stand before the Lord or a husband the God may have for me and say that I have lived faithfully and have done them good and not harm? These questions have sobered me and I realize that I often fail to “live”. To really “live” in the good of where God has me. I can sometimes categorize my life into sections or what I call “seasons”, but God has called me to be concerned about today and not tomorrow. Just because things may not be going the way we think they should, doesn’t mean we are to stop living our life to wait for something better. God has given us our lives to live for His glory…when will I rise to the occasion? C.S. Lewis says it this way about the interruptions of life,

“The great thing, if one can, is to stop regarding all the unpleasant things as interruptions of one’s ‘own,’ or ‘real’ life. The truth is of course that what one calls the interruptions are precisely one’s real life—the life God is sending one day by day; what one calls one’s ‘real life’ is a phantom of one’s own imagination. This at least is what I see at moments of insight: but it’s hard to remember it all the time.”

God is calling me to do the next thing. Why put off until tomorrow what I can do today? And why put off becoming and doing the best? I want to do good and not harm for the Lord and all those He has placed and will place in my life. I want walk out my days carefully, making the best use of my time. Doing this will mean saying no to a lot of things, but when we say no to one thing, we can say yes to something else and that may be God’s best for us.

“Many a questioning, many a fear,

Many a doubt, hath its quieting here.

Moment my moment, let down from Heaven,

Time, opportunity, guidance, are given.

Fear not tomorrows, Child of the King,

Trust them with Jesus, ‘DO THE NEXT THING.’

Do it immediately; do it with prayer;

Do it reliantly, casting all care;

Do it with reverence, tracing His Hand

Who placed it before thee with earnest command.

Stayed on Omnipotence, safe ’neath His wing,

Leave all resultings, ‘DO THE NEXT THING.’”

--author unknown

To do this means getting practical. Carolyn Mahaney suggests setting aside a time to pray about and plan a list of priorities that you believe the Lord would have you work on. Here is a sample list that she created for herself.

“List of Priorities:
• Grow in godliness.

• Love my family.

• Serve in the church.

• Fellowship with Christians.

• Evangelize non-Christians.

• Attend to my work.

• Care for my physical health.
Once you’ve listed your priorities…evaluate yourself, prayerfully going through the priorities one at a time. Under each category, assess how you are doing—what is going well and what needs to change. Then consider how you can grow in that key area in your life.” – Carolyn Mahaney

So, all of this is the latest thing the Lord has brought to my attention. I know for myself I will most likely need help in creating my list of priorities from my parent’s. They have an outside perspective that I don’t have on my life. I know I will fail in doing good many, many times from this day on, but I know the Lord is faithful to help and sustain and my prayer is to be able to say I have done the “next thing” and done it for God’s glory. I want to prepare myself for the present and the future.

“Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.” Ephesians 5:15-16