| May 22,
2006
Newbie Frustration
1 Peter 2:2; like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual
milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation,
-NIV
Yesterday the site was down for maintenance (I hope
you enjoy the new look and feel). I spent a lot of
time trying to figure out various aspects of site
design and many things didn’t go right at first.
As a matter of fact it was quite frustrating. Designing
a site and writing are two totally different skills
and frankly the site building is something I am very
new at.
When we try to master a new skill and it doesn’t
go right we can in a lot of different directions.
Some give up (around one a.m. I was tempted to do
that). Others get frustrated and finish things carelessly
just to get done. Sometimes you can become satisfied
at a level below our best. We do this a lot with Church
too. Many of us come to church all fired up and ready
to work hard in our lives. We come at being a Christian
with the same attitude we take on any new project.
However just like any new thing in our lives we rarely
realize that we are missing a lot of skills necessary
to live a healthy Christian life. These basic skills
include reading the Bible, prayer, meeting with others
to learn and also worship. Most of us are at best,
rusty in these skills, at worst we have never attempted
them before. Just like yesterday when I started getting
frustrated due to my lack of knowledge on HTML coding,
we routinely get frustrated as our walk with Christ
seems not to have any real effect on our lives. However
as long as we keep working at it and do not give up
we will eventually see a change. Slowly at first our
efforts start to get results and over time we become
champions at it. Paul often writes about training
in Christianity like an athlete, we need to keep training
and we need to not give up.
A friend of mine once said “When you are going
through hell, don’t stop!” As long as
you do not stop you will continue to grow. Let God
work his way in you to get through the frustration
and life will become easier in him. Peter was writing
to all "newbies" and he said that eventually
they grow up through "pure spiritual milk",
we will get that way; however, until that point it
is okay to be a "newbie" just do not let
the frustration take over. |
