How Connected Are You?

In this day and age, we all want to be connected.  Information can travel around the world in just a matter of milliseconds. However, this brings about a BIG question.  How connected are we with our Father God, and our Savior Jesus?  In today's computer world, we have all kinds of information that we can find out in the speed of light.  We can look up tickets for a movie, watch a movie, find a recipe, find out how to fix our car, where to get products and services for the area that we live, keep up with friends and family through social networks like Facebook, Linked In, My Space, Twitter, and more.  We can even look up the information on any subject that we want to, without even going to the library!  However, all of this connectivity can consume us if we let it.  I am sure that none of us prays to God as often as we need to.  If we prayed to God as much as we spent on the World Wide Web, it would be a much better world.

It is so easy to put God on the back-burner in the good times, and only contact Him in the bad times.  However, just like a good friend or family member, our relationship with God needs proper attention; not only in the bad times, but also in the good ones.  God wants a RELATIONSHIP with us; not just a RELIGION.  There are people who think that religion and relationship with God are the same thing.  However, they are not.  We can be religious about anything.  We can be RELIGIOUS about filling the gas tank at the same time each week, and at the same gas station.  However, we don't have a relationship with the gas pump.  If we do, then there is a definite problem.  What does God want?  He wants total reliance on Him and His Son for one.  The only way to have a relationship with God is through His Son.  John 3: 16 says:" For God So Loved The World, That He Gave His Only Son, So He That Believes In Him Might Be Saved."  There are some people that believe that just going to church makes you a Christian.  That is not true at all.  There are some people who think that praying makes you a Christian.  People in every religion pray.  Even demons pray.  Some people think that doing a lot of good deeds makes you a Christian.  Not even good deeds will save you.  As it says in the Bible," For by grace are you saved through Faith, it is not of your own doing, lest any man should boast."  Do you want to know what defines a Christian?  As the late Christian singer, Keith Green said, "Someone who is BANANAS FOR JESUS!"  Someone who loves the Lord God with their whole heart and their whole strength.  The most important part in addition to loving God, is to love everybody else, as much as you love yourself.  That doesn't mean to put yourself first, but to love yourself, then others.  It is important to have a healthy self love, or it is impossible to love anyone else, including God.  God enables us to love ourselves, through His precious Word.

On the topic of loving others, when we show love to others, we must do it without expecting anything in return.  There shouldn't be any conditions on our love either.  No two people think alike or do things alike, because we are all "wired" differently, if you'll excuse the expression of speech.  Each and every person that God made has something to contribute to the world.  No one is above another, and no one is below another.  Everyone is unique and special.  For it states in The Word that, "He knew me while I was still in the womb".  God always has, and always will, have a plan for each and every person that He created.  However, we must get our foolish pride out of the way.  God can't use us if we're proud.  He wants us to be humble and meek.  Meek isn't weak, it just means humble enough for God to speak to us.  If we are too set in our ways and full of pride, it blocks God's communication with us, because instead of hearing His voice, we only hear our own.