Regression

Have you ever suffered from regression?  Regression…  a relapse to a less perfect state.  You could be exactly where you want to be.  On top of the world, doing something awesomely and then something happens.  You go on vacation, or get sick, and you stop exercising that skill you have just mastered. That skill then becomes smaller and smaller. 

Think about it.  If we don’t practice what we learned in school, it leaves us.  Even if we were so good at that skill, the skills can really leave us without practice.  My 2-year-old daughter was given a break with potty training this past week and has really regressed.  I didn’t do my physical therapy exercises and my strength has weakened.  I haven’t done my devotions in a long time, and it is easier to just say, I am going to skip this morning than hold myself accountable. 

Even when the skill that we have learned and mastered really benefits us, we feel better because of that skill, we take a break and loose the momentum.  We loose the power surge that was behind us learning or doing and miss out on benefits to our mind, body and soul. 

As you may have been able to tell, I have been suffering regression with my devotionals lately.  It isn’t that I haven’t wanted to do them at first, it was that I could not physically sit long enough to do them.  But when that happened, I didn’t sit down with my Bible and try to do them not in front of the computer, not writing my thoughts down in this way.  I just gave in to my first instinct and didn’t do them that morning.  And life was fine.  But I am noticing now that life is no longer just fine.  I want more, I want that relationship.  I miss the relationship that I had with God and with my Bible.  Just like I would love to be 20 lbs lighter, I want to be so much smarter when it comes to the Bible. 

Unfortunately, the 20 lbs doesn’t come off without hard work and a diet change.  Therefore, I am getting back into the Bible, and ensuring that what I do and say is glorifying to God.  Although the 20 lbs would be great to loose, I would be better off gaining a better knowledge of the Bible.

1 Timothy 4:8 “For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.”

I can’t take my body with me when I go to heaven (thankfully), but I am going to be taking my soul and the knowledge that I have gained on earth with me.  I am going to be taking how I worshiped and glorified the Lord.  Physical exercise is important, but Biblical exercise is so much more.  I don’t want to let myself regress in anything, but the Bible especially.